A poster's join date doesn't invalidate/validate their position

No I’ve been here less than a week and someone already used the argument with me. I would say it is a form of the general fallacy of criticizing who said something rather than what was said.

It’s not fallacious if the point I am trying to make is that the person in question is very likely a troll, spammer, or bot. Then the join date and post count are absolutely relevant. Such accounts typically do not last very long so what you’ll notice is obviously irrelevant, nonsensical, spammy, or trolly posts often come from accounts with no history on the board, a single post, or a bunch of ads and trolling in a single day, soon to disappear forever from the board either voluntarily or by ban.

It’s a way of pointing out that it is potentially a gigantic waste of time to engage with that account.

You can always wait and see if the account shows signs of intelligence later on, but in general, such poor opening posts lend themselves to being declared spammers or trolls in short order, with a fairly high success rate predicting them as such.

If you’ve been here a week and have been posting in an on-topic way in threads which are actually current, then you’re not likely to be one of those.

First impressions do matter. If your initial posts are off-topic, zombie thread resurrecting, or full of links, I generally deposit your account in my mental recycling bin until proven otherwise. I also don’t note anyone’s join date in any other circumstance.

That’s me though. Maybe you came across someone who is firing off that particular gun without aiming first.

Yeah, we already noticed you, Frank. Now learn some fucking manners, you abrasive git.

Well, that’s not fair. They could be loonies drive-by posting in dead earnest, too.

Oh woah now! We got a badass here :rolleyes:

In that first week you managed to break one of the basic, most fundamental rules of this MB in GD, so there’s that. Plus all that nonsense about the US army being “a joke” accompanied by gratuitous Obama bashing. My troll radar certainly pinged pretty loudly after those posts from you, which are still just left hanging in that thread without further explanation. It’s these sort of outrageous, nonsensical statement that we’re talking about (emphasis added):

Now, you might be a perfectly normal human being with one crazy quirk, but that’s all I’ve seen of you, and it doesn’t look good.

I will personally attest to Ranger Jeff being an active and valuable participant on the AOL Boards. That and a small monetary consideration should help bump him up in the consideration of the commitee. Maybe to early October, 2021.

Link, please. I’d like to see if there was any justification for the argument.

Sheesh.

And thank you for proving their point for them.

If I come across it I will post it, but I have better things to do. The term used if you can figure out this board’s search was “newbie.”

It seems to me though pretty obvious that I was not spamming or something of that sort, so the evidence speaks for itself.

Meh, we celebrate Spanish culture on Cinco de Mayo too. Every day can’t be America Day, we gotta change it up sometime.

Unpresented evidence never speaks for itself. Something you might want to remember the next time you “have better things to do”.

I assume he is referring to this

My objection to having a post minimum before someone can start a thread is that it would negatively impact the weird and wonderful variety of GQ questions. Some single-post drive-by questions lead to good discussions, even if they’re kind of off-the-wall. Or especially if they’re kind of off-the-wall.

The ones that annoy me are those who post long complicated OPs asking for personal advice and then never return, even when board members have posted many thoughtful replies. It makes me reluctant to respond to noobs asking for advice, which is too bad because there are many who are sincere.

Good noob! :: pat pat :: And welcome to the boards.

Put a sock in it, grandpaw.

I think the easiest solution is to offer a nugget of advice, and wait to see if they take it. It’s kind of like catching a squirrel.

Nope.

Ah, very well then. I apologize unreservedly.

Typical Join Date 2008 mistake!

Another nugget of wisdom from a newbie. No, a new join date doesn’t automatically invalidate a poster’s position, but a lot of drive-by dumb comments come from first-time posters.