I get you, but I don’t. Lemme 'splain it like this:
In this thread, I have three replies as of this post. That tells you the following:
I’ve posted three times and not gotten banned yet.
Really interesting information, huh?
Back in the day, I had over 15K posts (when that was a lot). For a time, the 10K post club was rather exclusive, by which I mean most people didn’t have the time or logorrhea to bother posting that much.
I’d trade 99 percent of my pre-P2P posts for a nice long thread discussion among a healthy Libertarian, Polycarp and David Simmons. Oh, and Persephone, too. Poohpah chalupah would be nice to see as well.
(The last three people are dead, and Polycarp abandoned his account something like the day before things went back to free posting.)
It’s wonderful getting all these old posters back! They bring “new blood,” but new blood that’s already been well-trained in the ways of the Dope.
Plus it’s just nice to see 'em.
I agree that the board had gotten somewhat stagnant. New-new posters bring a lot to the boards. Plus, some entertaining wackos need more than 30 days to get warmed up…
Not that I saw, at least. The post was linked in the SDMB livejournal community, else I’d still be looking for Polycarp (man, these square brackets are cramping my style). It came in a Sampiro Pit thread. I’d detail it more but the thread really speaks for itself to the extent that there’s any clear reason for Poly’s quick exit.
In the post, he asked that the remaining portion of his subscription be given to Sampiro and that he (Sampiro) knew why.
I know of no subsequent Polycarp post or other revelatory information.
Things do change:) Glad to know the kid is still sprouting around. Remember that photo of you with “Beansprout” on your tummy? (I’m positive I’m not conflating anything there. You had two nametags. It might have been for NYCFest 2000.)
Stuff with me: married, graduated from college, moved to Texas. Not nearly as exciting as people make it out to be. I didn’t even attend the graduation. The wedding was more a legal formality (on my end) than anything big and special. Texas move was for work (from which I am typing ATM, as there’s a lull in activity).
We’re attempting a punkin, and if/when that happens, I’ll be bribing Ed for admin status so’s I can go back and delete the posts in which I ran nekkid. Can’t let the kids know, natch;) (With my common sense, they’d actually have trouble understanding why it wasn’t OK to do in person.)
The last day or so has been interesting, what with remembering people I’d forgotten and having them remember me. Sorta like a reunion.
I don’t care either way. It’s not going to turn into Yahoo Answers 2.0 or anything, the community won’t allow it. In some respects we (or at least certain users) treat new users with unpopular opinions (especially conspiracy theories) and bad grammar worse than 4chan treats “newfags” that don’t fit in. The “worst” that will happen is the influx of new users that aren’t 1337 h4x0rz lol but still used to other boards may get us avatars or images in sigs or somesuch that has been opposed due to the [del]elitism[/del] “exclusivity” of the board in the past, but it’s hardly a major issue and I doubt it will happen given the outspokenness of the admins and several users on the issue.
IMO it may even be a net good, certain viewpoints have been marginalized under the guise of “this is a board where we FIGHT ignorance” (regardless of whether I agree with the viewpoint expressed or not I have a personal issue with people who use the motto to attack other poster’s ideas) and it turns into a somewhat boring 1 vs 1000 match in a lot of controversial threads. And people just seemed to leave because they didn’t want to pay to be shouted down, maybe this way people will stick around and post more because there’s no financial investment (however little) required to argue your viewpoint.
No sorta about it. While I’ve enjoyed seeing and PMing some familiar [del]faces[/del]usernames back, I’m dreading the number of teens and not-missed former members and posters from other boards who have no idea what “Cite?” means because they’re used to shooting their mouth off without getting a tab who’ll be coming in. Plus the disabling of search is driving me nuts (here’s you a security token right here…)- when are they going to fix that?
See, that right there … my wife is never posting here. For one, I’d have to get her into it. For another, she really doesn’t need more drama.
For a third, it’s exceptionally difficult to make me look normal. My father says that if he is not the strangest person in a room, he high-tails it out of there. (And considering his health, that’s a nontrivial feat sometimes.)
I’m not quite there, but living with someone who made me look normal would be a challenge for all concerned. (Not both: ALL. That’s what it’d take.)
In other news, my ex posted in a different thread here. (I didn’t have to get her into this place. I met her here.)
I’m with you on this… it’s like a breath of fresh air.
One thing I find slightly disconcerting is the number of people who showed up immediately Tuesday morning saying “Hey, I’ve been away but now I’m back”. Were they really just sitting here for 3 years silently lurking, waiting for pay-to-post to end? Were they playing sock games that whole time, or are they new socks of existing paying members? Or did they just get a nicely worded “welcome back” message from the management? It just concerns me a bit that there were so many so quickly, makes me wonder what’s going on.
Polycarp has continued to post. He’s posted four times since the lost weekend, and was on last night. It’s possible that, given that his exit post was posted in the Pit on a weekend when people were posting all sorts of crap that they didn’t actually mean, he was less than serious.
Toss me in as another ‘the more the merrier’ guy. It’ll be fun to have a steady flux of new talent coming through the door.
The thing about P2P was that it made us comfortable. There were a limited number of posters and you generally knew what each would say/do/feel about any particular topic or issue. That’s the very definition of stagnant, in my book.
New posters, and old ones returning, are the very lifeblood of an interesting and changing diversity of opinion. Given the mission statement here that should be our priority.
