Two posts. Posted at the same time, by same poster (to control for ignores lists, liking or disliking a poster, etc.) Neither headline is inflammatory, overstated or sensational.
Today's Obama Iraq and Foreign Policy Speech : Full Text & Video http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=132x6506106Views: 81
Email addresses for Jon Stewart, Comedy Central and Viacom http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=132&topic_id=6506089&mesg_id=6506089Views: 1063
The headline that suggests the hope of moronic content (please,please,please), like a boycott of the Daily Show, is candy. The headline that promises nothing but the text and video of Obama's most important foreign policy address to date is broccoli.
This experiment merely supports what is already obvious: People come here for controversy, fighting and marveling at the stupidity of their fellow beings. So calls to run off apostates and generally turn GDP into sunshine and lollipops would most likely result in an all but empty forum, or the expansion of heretic-hunting to include increasingly mainline content.
(It is possible that more people clicked on the second post simply because they didn't already know what was in it... it's mysterious. "Wonder what this is about?" But again, if everyone hewed to orthodoxy there would be no mysteries. Everyone would already pretty much know what was in every post before even reading it.)
Since disagreement is the life-blood of discussion forums there is no such thing as a popular AND harmonious forum.