Let the Free Republic site create the Title, Author, Date, and Source, given the Source URL

vanity | January 9, 2022 | me

[karpov]

I'd like the ability to post by entering only the Source URL, clicking a button and having software populate the entries of Title, Author, Date Published, and Source. The user would still supply Topics and Keywords (if any). This would be optional -- the user could still fill out the fields as is done now.

It's good to have diversity of sites. Free Republic is text-heavy, which makes it easy and fast to scan many posts. But I do think the suggested feature would make it easier to use, like Reddit, where if you enter a URL, it generates a title.

[metmom]

All we need is just one forum for all topics. We do not need a general chat or a blogger or a breaking news or any of the others. And what the heck is a vets COR anyway?

Good question, but I personally do not mind the general categories overall. Some I just ignore if I don’t want to read anything on them.

[metmom]

Because computer chips fail so regularly and are so ridiculously expensive to replace, mr. mm and I prefer to find stuff that is manual and not digital.

[WhoisAlanGreenspan?]

Yep I was just wondering yesterday where I first heard about FreeRepublic.com from. Could of been the Drudge Report?

I know I spent a fair number of months before I signed up in 1998.

Simple keeps FR blazing fast. There's countless examples of websites who don't understand that. And with automatic monthly's of $1 per day it's the best bargain around.

[metmom]

Preach it!

[metmom]

The only change that has been done that I really like is that in the ping list, MY posts show up in green and the ones to me are in what looks like purple. Regardless, they are not the same color and that makes it so much easier to find something.

That was an AWESOME change.

[Karoo]

I have no complaints. Just very thankful that I have a place to go to learn, vent and be with friends.

[daniel1212]

" This site is running the same software it did 20 years ago. You might as well be wishing for parking assist on a K car. "

A fitting reply. Bu the OP is only a 2 year-old poster here, a relative newbie. I think changing the software would result in more complaints due to other changes.

[daniel1212]

It is not really software that needs much of any improving, but us posters. See An exhortation to those who post thread (normally post as much of the meat of the article as allowed, describe videos, etc.) As I have exhorted on another thread, if we want to help make FR even better as the premier conservative new aggregator then it is not by uncritically posting a few sentences from clickbait articles from such sites as bigleaguepolitics.com, which means actually going to the article and navigating btwn ads in order to see more, and finding the source article (if there is one) to get the complete story. Nor carelessly posting the first few sentences of stories including ad lines as some even do. But by providing the most pertinent excerpts in the first 100 words from the source (that number is what will show up under FR Articles (if you choose Text), and up to 300 word excerpts where allowed for copyrighted articles.

This helps if we seek to help people who want to be better informed about issues pertinent to Christian and conservative issues, of which FR is the best (and best moderated) among the rest. On FR you can select (under Settings) up to 250 articles being shown in Latest articles, with as said, up to 100 words being shown, with no ads (except the raiser). Thus a scanning of FR twice a day one can keep up with such events and input without taking much time.

In contrast, having to go to other sites since the post lacks important basic info usually means facing all sorts of ads, while in the background network requests can be slowing down your system (Gateway Pundit means loading up to 500 network requests in the background for its homepage, versus 3 for FR articles page). In addition, trying to post comments on such means having another account with such liberal services as Disqus, and risking "awaiting moderation" and often deletion of your work (esp. if linking to FR) due to a bot and biased mods.

Plus very readable rendering on articles as well as posts, and which enables all sorts of html formatting (even if lacking an "edit" feature), and no unreasonable limits on how many words your post can contain, or the page limit of articles (some over 10,000 posts). Plus we have our own FRemail,

Thus even though articles are to be linked to their immediate source, with so many articles available to be scanned and the superiority of FR, as much pertinent info fit to conservative print as allowed should be provided on the articles page, by the grace of God. Not that I am - and my posting - is not in need of improvement!

[daniel1212]

You mean you do not miss up to 500 network requests:

FR latest articles (see @ requests on top right: click on image to enlarge) :

Versus

[Presbyterian Reporter]

You have aptly summarized the issue. Thanks for the reminder to all FReepers who need to take the time to clearly post a news article.

[Hebrews 11:6]

You want the Robinsons to make it easier to post articles. Did you ever consider that, in their wisdom, they have deliberately erected hurdles to slow down posters?

[sauropod]

+1

[daniel1212]

"Yep! I’m a wildlife photographer and would like to share some of my work but with third party hosting required I gave up years ago. I’m a member of 14 forums and this is the only one that still has to use third party hosting. After what Photobucket did to it’s users (holding photo’s hostage) I never again allowed that to happen"

After you post an image here, as this from Flickr,

then later delete it, it seems to remain on FR servers as this (which I just deleted after doing a preview here)

[daniel1212]

" You want the Robinsons to make it easier to post articles. Did you ever consider that, in their wisdom, they have deliberately erected hurdles to slow down posters? "

Some posters of articles seem to have it down to a science. However, posting comments is easier here than on site that require a separate account (such as with wordpress). There is software that disallows posting comments in quick succession, which I do not like, since on some threads I may prepare posts (which take a long time - about 20 words a minute) due to my stiff arthritic fingers and thus correcting all the typos) and then post them together. Organization.

[daniel1212]

"Yup.. but, I DO remember something we used to have that is no longer here.. How many times a thread has been read..."

The FR Articles page does tell us how many replies a thread has.

[PeterPrinciple]

I’d like a post edit/delete button pretty please?

---

We have a better tool. Think before posting. Much better.

[aquila48]

“The amount of time it may save me is not worth messing up a user friendly site like FR over.”

Why does it have to be either/or. Can’t it be both? Just getting the title, the author, the source and the date from the url (which is very doable) would make it significantly easier.

[daniel1212]

"That would be done with Open Graph META Data; https://ahrefs.com/blog/open-graph-meta-tags/ — https://ogp.me/ FR software would have to sniff the html document at the url for OG tags and pull them in to the posting form fields."

Yet no matter how many gimmicks were used in FR, I do not think Google et al would allow it to come up in top search results, which it often used to at least as regards some Christian issues. Instead, it seems to marginalize conservative and substantive pages in catering to mobile devices and WOKE algorithms. And Al Gore Rhythms

[Bayard]

1996 was about 25 years ago, my math is not perfect but 1996 is over 20 years. Btw that’s a milestone there, is FR going to do something for a 25th anniversary???

[daniel1212]

"One great option that would increase readability and make free republic a more enjoyable place would be to eliminate the forums. All we need is just one forum for all topics. We do not need a general chat or a blogger or a breaking news or any of the others. And what the heck is a vets COR anyway? Maybe 20 years ago the different forums were viable, but who needs them anymore?"

That is frankly unwarranted and deleterious. While there are some Topics that seem marginal (Anthrax Scare; Freeoples; Dimensional Doorway;The Guild;The Hobbit ;cheese), lumping all forums together is simply untenable.

3 threads of nw_arizona_granny's Prepper Threads

• Thread #1
• Thread #2
• Thread #3 had over 10,000 posts each in 2018. Though such went to under 1,700 in 2018 to less than 300 in 2020-21. Where did they all go. Purged, died or left?