Dave, I am aware of the of the preferences menu and I have set my view to flat mode as you evidently done. For unregistered viewers there is no option for changing the view, they must view the page by the default of threaded mode, which can be completely cumbersome and unreadable. Try logging out and call up Northern Hewers Historic Hewing Questionaire thread. I think you would find the threaded mode the most frustrating reading experience you've had in a very long time.

So in the interest of forum improvement, flat mode should be the default mode. Let's hope small improvements can make the forum grow a little.