massive post = image error

[mb26]

ok well i just tried to preview a massive post (not spam)... it is like 12kb in a .txt file.. and it gave me

'You have included too many images in your signature or in your previous post. Please go back and correct the problem and then continue again.

Images include use of smilies, the vB code [img] tag and HTML tags. The use of these is all subject to them being enabled by the administrator.'

well i had no IMG tags so i'm guessing i had too many smileys, but there wasn't a high denisty of smileys.
whilst i support a limit of smileys, over use can get annoying, it should be linked to the words posted somehow so if u have a large post u can use them occasionally without having to go and edit!

[glc]

There is no reason to make a post that large - images or no images. If you want to post something that big, please do it as an attachment.

[mb26]

i'm not sure if ur on the right lines, cuz ur not making much sense to me
yes there is a reason to make a post that large. there were no images, only a couple of smileys (<10) and text. go read it and see if u can summarise it better for me if u want.

to post it as an attachment is rediculous no one would read it any besdies smileys wouldn't work anyway.

[glc]

Let me rephrase if I may. We try to keep this place friendly to those on dialup and low screen resolutions. Images add to the file size, and long posts make people have to scroll excessively through a thread. This is the reason we are hammering on people for large signatures, by the way. It's a thread loading time and a screen real estate issue. When you described a 12kb text file, that's a LOT of text and I expected to see a much longer post than what it came out to be.

If you don't mind, do this sometime - log onto a dialup account somewhere, on a computer with a tiny monitor set to 640x480 or 800x600 - and start loading threads. I think your outlook on this issue may change.

I can only assume that the limit you ran into is part of the vBulletin settings, to prevent people from making huge image-laden posts - and each smiley probably qualifies as an image. Yes, I know a single smiley is trivial, but they do add up. Remember that it's the content that really matters here, not the eye candy.

Please accept this as the way it is here, I'm not trying to give you a hard time.

[mb26]

i wont change my mind as i already agree about keeping the site low-res and dial-up friendly already.. also i no longer have a dial up account and i dont plan on signing up just for that -- i remember it far too well as it is! however, i feel smileys can offer an impression sometimes which cannot be portrayed with just plain text, and stop people getting the wrong idea or w/e, not just 'eye candy'. i dont over-use them anyway. i also have no sig or av, and whilst i do post in-depth sometimes, only when the situation grants it. i rarely post images and when doing so i do it as an attachment.. i'm hope if u read all the post u dont think any of it is useless or spam, and there are very few smileys for the size.

each smiley comes to around 1kb, and AFAIK if one is loaded on the page it doesn't have to be re-downloaded. so my total post would have been <~20kb... the (left half of) the PCmech logo on the other hand for example is 43kb. so i dont think 20kb is too much for a dial up connection.

anyway, if u can't do anything about it, in a dynamic kind of a way (i'm not for allowing >10 smileys on a post of 2 lines, or >10 images of any size) then its no big deal i suppose, its not exactly a common occurance