What is the purpose of "comment compression" (don't know what else to call it) on threads? Let's say you post on Shave of the Day. Your post pops up, and the few posted just before yours are there too. But then there's a gray bar (on my theme) which says there's are more posts, click here to see them. When you click on it, you're warped back in time a full day or two -- perhaps several dozen posts -- when all you wanted to see was the posts before yours and to proceed backwards at your own pace. Maybe it's just me but I'm baffled by the point of this feature. On a 1-10 annoyance scale it's a 1, but it's bugged me for years and I just don't get it. Can someone explain? Thank you.
I spend a good part of my time on TSD in The 30 Day Rule / Focus Group. It's fast paced with 100 or more posts every day. If I write a new post and send, that gray bar gives me the option to go back to any new post that happened while I was composing my latest post. If I'm caught up reading it's only those that happened while I was composing. If I'm quoting someone from days or hours ago, I'm thinking it won't drop me back pages. Just to current new posts. TLDR; Feel free to ignore the gray bar as you please.
