A plea to my fellow Dopers.

In My Humble Opinion
1

First off;
This ain’t a huge deal, so it’s probably not pit-worthy although we’ll see where it goes from here.
It’s just something that personally bothers me when it happens.

Someone starts a thread asking for help, opinions, instructions, criticism, etc.
Several posters offer their help, expertise, a link, thoughts, etc on the matter.
The OP never comes back.
Bothers the heck out of me especially when the matter seems urgent to the OP and they never follow through once they hit “Submit New Thread”.

Sarcasm may follow;

OP (not anyone/thing specific, pulled out of ass);

"Help, Help, my computer keeps starting on fire what should I do!!"

Several posters give thoughtful answers ranging from, “Mine does that too but I found a work-around, what kind do you have?.” to, “Get a Mac, they hardly ever start on fire. Try unplugging it, does that help??”, to “Do you have the ‘Bonfire’ screensaver activated?”
This is even more frustrating when the OP doesn’t give any information in the initial post and everyone in the thread is trying to help but we don’t have enough information to go on. Op may never return, or if they’ve fixed the problem they don’t come back to say which of the posts was helpful to them or what the fix was.
Did I mention that this drives me crazy?
Now, I understand that everyone has a busy life, but if you’re going to be asking others to help you out at least stay focused on the thread long enough to reciprocate, 'kay?
This happens in auto problem threads, computer threads, general fix-it stuff around the house threads, and occasionally life matter threads where it seems like there is a genuine concern and urgency on behalf of the OP but they don’t seem concerned enough to follow up with a response or two once they start the thing.

This get to anyone else?
Can we please try to be better at following up on OP’s that we start?

Thankyou and have a great day,
Uncommon Sense

2

I don’t want to break this to you but OP’s with problems like that usually don’t return because they died from the problem. Computer fires are a common cause but it could anything like calming a raging bull or posting from a laptop asking the best way to get out of a sinking car. A lot of times our quick and witty responses save live but you can’t win them all.

3

It’s been nineteen minutes since he posted, and Uncommon Sense has consistently refused to return to the thread, despite the replies it has garnered.

4

I know, but then their next of kin should report the outcome. Don’t you think?

This is especially a concern of mine with posters who have stuttering issues.

5

:smiley: :smiley: I just got my $15 worth. Thanks.

6

{glub, glub}

7

Throws out a life buoy.

Darn, I forgot to tie the rope to something… oh well, there it goes.

8

I’m with the OP. I hate it when that happens. I suspect some OPs, beset by early senility or distracted by other things going on in their lives, forget having made their posts in the first place.

9

Maybe they forgot to bookmark the thread and when it fell off the first page, thought it had disappeared into the space marked, “Here there be Draggyns.” :smiley:

Yeah, orphaned threads bug me, too. I understand that you might be reading every answer and taking copious notes, but would a little feedback kill you? We’re making…some effort to help you here.

10

In the case of computer trouble threads, it might just mean that the advice was too little too late. Unless you spot them on another thread, later on.

And when the OP is “Help me remember take my memory pills”, well…

11

I find this is a problem most often with our guests.

12

Who ARE all of you people, anyway? And what am I doing here?

::is led gently away by the attendant::

13

<snerk> Ok, that was funny.

14

Mine don’t know my password or that I even lurk, er, access this fine broad.

15

We can post here now? Hot diggity!

16

dupe

17

Wait, you need a password to access broads now? Or just the fine ones?

18

Hey, I resemble that. :dubious: