 question mainly to proponents of quote posts, but anyone can respond: what would you say is the semantic relationship between a “quote post” and “the post being quoted”? Are there any semantics at all, or is it a generic link/reference? What’s the difference between a “quote” and a “link preview”? By semantic, I mean “meaning”. What does it mean to “quote” something? If “quote posts” never existed, how would you design an equivalent? EDIT: got plenty responses! see downthread for conclusion 26 comments
This is less a question of behavior or functionality (“here’s how i use quote posts”) and entirely about semantics (“the nature of the relationship between my post and the quoted post is…”) To use replies as an example: the functionality of replies is that you want to link your post to on or more posts in a series. But the semantics of replies is that you are specifically responding to the thing you are linking; the “link relationship” between “your post” and “their post” is “reply/response to”  @trwnh I would say the "the post being quoted" is embedded content within the "quote post", exactly like media or a link preview. In all of those examples, the post is usually presumed to be "about" the content it's referencing. "Check this image/link/post out. here's what I've got to say about it." Which makes it odd (to me) that the content being commented on is usually displayed below the text of the post. If I were designing from scratch I'd do the opposite. @tom this is something mastodon wants to do (quote above/first, content below/second) and i agree it’s ergonomically better semantically it sounds like you’re saying there’s not much to it, it is primarily just a generic link that happens to come with an embedded preview. but there is also the “about” thing. how would you refine this statement? is it sometimes/generally/always commentary? citation? something else? @trwnh I don't think there's any one answer to this One of the most common use cases is commentary or response, a "loud reply" as @erincandescent put it. I think most of the hostile uses of quote posting fall into this category (which is not to say it's always or even usually hostile) But also sometimes it's just to add emphasis, explanation, or even just personalization to a "boost." i.e., to share something with an explanation of why you're sharing @tom @erincandescent so is it always a response, or only sometimes? is emphasis/explanation a type of response?  @trwnh been pondering this. I think the cleanest relationship I've been able to come up with is that a quote post recontextualizes the original post. it removes it from its original context and places it in a new context.  @trwnh a quote post, to me, means you can talk *about* something while still making the person being quoted and the wider network part of the conversation. they get notified, other users can see quote posts of a specific post (through ui elements). fundamentally it enables a different kind of conversation compared to just talking *to* someone. @dxciBel this is a functional argument not a semantic one i’m pretty aware of what people intend to *do* when they quote post, but i’m struggling to extract any inherent link relationship from that. so when you say talking “about” something, the quoted post is… “being talked about”? i’m wondering is there a way to refine this statement and is it always true or just sometimes/generally true. @trwnh yeah i noticed on your reply to your own post that i wasn't really answering your question. having a hard time wrapping my head around what would be a suitable answer tho. i'd say it can also be a way of being talked to, not just about. just, the intended audience is a different one. similar to replying and then boosting your own reply, it talks to your own audience as well and not just the author of the op.  @trwnh tbh I don't think there is a big difference between "quote" and "link preview" once it is posted. @ConnyDuck so it’s primarily or entirely functional, with no semantic considerations? i’m generally of the opinion that a “quote post” is just a button for inserting a link preview (could be opengraph!) that changes the thread (like setting a different context) and maybe sends a notification (like sending a Webmention) so there might not be a reason to define rel=quote or similar property. but i am looking for contrary views.  @ConnyDuck @trwnh  @trwnh for me, a reply is intended mainly for the person whose post i’m replying to (e.g. this reply is me answering your question for your benefit), whereas a quote is intended mainly for my followers (e.g. quoting a good point and elaborating on it, so that i can spread that point to people who follow me but not OP) @tech_himbo this seems to still be about functionality not semantics, although it does get at the intended purpose. but semantically you are talking about audience and context, and the same functionality could be modeled by setting a flag to show reply context, or by changing a context, or even being particular about who you include in `to` vs who you include in `cc`. the question is, is this enough? or does the act also involve a component of “special relationship” between quote and quoted? @trwnh maybe we have different ideas of semantics. for me, specifying an addressee 100% changes the meaning of an utterance. if i yell “fire” at a rifleman, it means something different than yelling “fire” in a crowded theater. the meaning isn’t just the replied/quoted post plus my post; it also includes the relation my audience has to my post. more broadly: meaning is a function of how an audience relates to an utterance, so signaling the audience and intended relationship changes the meaning  @trwnh I think that's really hard to give a complete answer to. To me, the question is similar to "for what reasons might you reference something else as part of a conversation or post" @joelving sure, but everything is a reference. replies are just a special reference that indicate you are responding to something. the attribution is just a special reference indicating authorship. the thing i’m interested in finding is: how can we describe the “quote” relationship, if such a thing even really exists? @trwnh Maybe I'm not getting what you're trying to achieve. My point was that it will probably be impossible to enumerate every kind of relationship between two posts. We have "replies", "for example", "see also", "source", "rebuttal", "review", and the list goes on.  @trwnh A reviewer does not necessarily expect or want a direct interaction with the author of what is being reviewed. The deliberate change of context is a weak partitioning of discourse. Particularly in a microblogging context, discussions can branch quickly and become very confusing, so partitioning discourses helps maintain coherence. That's likely to be even more important in a decentralized and federated model. @foolishowl interesting. for > like a review of another microblog post or thread is there any meaning attached to the relationship, or is the meaning in the act? > a deliberate change of context, making it a special case of a reply these are semantically `context` and `inReplyTo`. how does a quote differ from replying to something but changing the context?  To me, in Smithereen, it's a link preview that's getting some special treatment and that you create with a dedicated UI. The difference between quotes and link previews is that I don't do link previews yet. The semantic relationship is the same as when I link something in my own post. To quote something means to include it as part of your own post, possibly adding your own comment, to have a conversation about it with your followers.  >What’s the difference between a “quote” and a “link preview”? I think there is no difference. Quote is simply an enhanced preview. |
Gregory's Server
@trwnh I think I’ve said it before but: a quote is just a louder reply