Flame Threads

[gunner154]

What is a Flame Thread?

[Lord J]

Something like a fuse, movie producers lay it down on walkways for scenes in action movies with lines of fire for martial artists and superheroes on motorcycles to leap over.

No, seriously though, this would probably be better answered by a moderator, but a flame thread is the situation when someone gets onto a message board and starts putting someone, or something else down because they may have wronged them in some way, or may be of a different belief/race/gender etc., or just for the fun of it.  These posts, especially on active boards like these, sometimes become known as Flame Wars.  An all-out, no-holds-barred, free-for-all for anyone with the guts to step in and start, well, flaming.  The reason why most flame threads are avoided is because they have a tendancy to become very personal and offensive, to the recipient of the flame, or just the poor soul who's just happening to read through it.

Note, never mistake a "Discussion" thread for a "Flame" thread.  Threads like "Religion", "Nuclear War", etc, usually become pretty heated, but very rarely come to actual flaming, and when they do, moderators are usually quick to stomp it out.

[Gunseng_Harkonnen]

For example. we have now a lot of flame thread in Emperor: Battle For Dune forum, where people complaining about cheating and "flame" each other. Mostly it consist a lot of crap like "you are a newbie", "your strat suck" or "you are stupid" or even worse.

[nemafakei]

Simply, a flame thread is one in which the sole purpose of posting has become insulting each other.

(NB 'become' - while the initial purpose of the thread may have been honest, later posts may still be flames.)

However, there are also threads in which people post rubbish; these are also sent to Gob's dungeon...