Topicals get plenty respect, the fact of the matter is that they're too lengthy for most's attention span. Hence why OM's recieve lots of responces, but topical battles (basically two OM's) get next to nothing unless the writers are extremely well known. As for writing "cheesy poetry" on a "RAP BOARD," well, most like to concider these boards as "Hip-Hop" boards rather than strickly rap. Hip-Hop being a culture including graffitti/art, poetry/spoken word, among many other various cultural activities and expressions rather than mearly the specific field of "Rap Battling."