How did you discover the Dope? No not the dope you hide in your baby’s diaper when the police burst in.
For me I used to frequent everyone’s favorite website Rotten.com (they never update anymore, except the news) and I would always check what happened “today in rotten history” which usually had interesting historical factoids. Well one day it mentioned the Black Hole of Calcutta and I wondered whether it was accurate information. I hit up Google and found this article. After reading a few more topics of debate I noticed the link to the message board, and the rest as they say is history.
When I was a lot younger (I’d say back in late elementary or junior high) I was looking at bored.com and there was a link to the Dope website. I read the articles and discovered the message board. I finally signed up once I got to college.
Thanks, now I feel old and pathetic. To see “when I was in junior high” and “… .com” in the same sentence – for me, it’s just jarring!
I first came across Cecil Adams’ first book when a friend brought it in to class (high school). Read the newspaper column sometimes when I lived in Chicago (for college). Not long after getting “online” myself (around 1999), used the website to find answers to a few questions – at first, just in Cecil’s columns, then in the message boards. Finally joined up myself two years ago. It’s the only interactive web anything I subscribe to.
I was familiar with the books, but knew nothing of this forum. I know a member of this board from Fark who recommended I search the archives here one day when we were chatting on-line about old-school TV remote controls and slinkies.
Pull up a chair little ones and let me reminesce about the good old days: About 20 years ago, I became acquainted with a wonderful book called “The Straight Dope” by a friend of mine who worked in a bookstore. Liked it so much that I gave it as gifts to a few people.
Fast forward a decade. Mr. Pundit and I bit the bullet and forked out abut 4 grand for our very own personal computer. We also joined a web community called America OnLine because it came downloaded onto our computer and discovered it was a wonderful online community for novices. For those who weren’t around at the advent of the internet explosion, you have no idea how great, and awful, AOL was. It was a wonderful online community. The site was colorful and user friendly, which was a complete change from previous web experiences, which were text based and boring. With just a click of a button you could talk live with another member, find book clubs and support groups, research travel ideas, you name it. Remember, this was brand new for most of us, and stand alone sites were few and far between. AOL was the springboard for the internet world.
Anywho, one day when I was actually able to get through to AOL (busy signals and sluggish speed were every day occurrences), I happened upon a new AOL site called “The Straight Dope.” I checked it out and discovered that Uncle Cece was online! The Straight Dope quickly became one of my AOL favorite places. But the good times were short lived. Shortly thereafter, AOL made the (really bad) decision to start charging vendors for being there, and the AOL/Straight Dope site was shut down. However, before signing off, one of the moderators (Lynn?) announced that the Straight Dope would soon have its own dedicated website. I checked every now and then and one day discovered that it was up and running.
It was very soon thereafter that I abandoned AOL altogether. With a lot of its vendors deciding that it would be cheaper and less restrictive to form their own internet site, AOL became obsolete. Unca Cece killed Steve Case.
So while I’ve been here since '99, I’ve actually been with the Straight Dope since '98, possibly '97. And that, my little friends, is how I happened up the Straight Dope.
I Googled something and the first result was one of Unca Cece’s columns. I read the lot of them and saw the oddly colored “Message Boards” link. Every once in a while, on the Dope’s homepage, I’d see Threadspotting and poke through a thread. Sometimes it was good, sometimes it was bad.
I finally put two and two together and realized that these Threadspotting thingies were coming from the Message Boards. So I took a deep breath and gave a little clickeroo. One of the first threads I remember reading was the saga of Hal.
And that’s the beginning of my downward spiral. We haven’t hit bottom.
Yet.
bored.com freshman year of college. Enjoyed reading the columns then stumbled upon the boards because of threadspotting. Read them for a few months then signed up. I was in need of a good message board.
It’s a winding road. A couple of people in the SF field moved into town, and there was an interview in the local paper, where it was mentioned she knew the lyrics to “Louis Louis.”
We met up with them a few weeks later and I complemented her on her knowledge. She told me about this book The Straight Dope
Several years later, in my web browsing, I stumbled upon the Staight Dope web page (I may even have searched for it). I joined the discussion immediately and never looked back.
My local (alternative tabloid) paper stopped carrying it for some reason, so I did a
Google search to get my weekly fix, and discovered the forum in addition to Cecil’s
columns.
There is a Discover magazine from April 1995 sitting on my bedtable. I’ve never thrown it away because I kept getting caught up in the article about Gloria Ramirez. Hoping to find out what happened (so I could toss the magazine) I did a little googling and found What’s the story on the “toxic lady”? and wound up not seeing my boyfriend that weekend because I was busy reading SD archives.
Even though I checked straightdope.com fairly regularly after that, it simply didn’t occur to me to check the message boards - thinking it would be like every other board I’ve ever seen, full of “OMG i wuz LMAO” and “Why is the sky blue?” type people. So I don’t know if I clicked the message board link by mistake, or what, but the first thread I saw was What if I ate this toy? and an addiction was born.
About 18 years ago a friend of mine lent me a copy of the first Straight Dope compendium book, and I couldn’t put it down. Something about the combination of a flip, sneering know-it-all-ism with an actual respect for facts and experimental science resonated with me. A free local paper used to carry the column as well (The New York Press) and eventually I discovered the web site by chance.
I actually had a few posts under a different ID back in 1999 or 2000 (and thus coulda/woulda been a “Charter Member” of some kind) but when it went premium, dismissed it with the sentiment, “Why would I pay for what USENET newsgroups give me for free?”
Then I concluded that USENET was taken over by spam-bots, trollers and porn pushers, and came back here for the occasional intelligent or entertaining discussion. I couldn’t remember my password so I created a new username – ta da!
Long, long ago, right here in this galaxy, I was a naive guy on AOL. One day, the Welcome Page had a link to The Straight Dope Message Board, which was then on AOL. I signed on, and I have followed it through its several incarnations since then. This version began in early 1999, and my member number is 45, or thereabouts.
A philosopher said that wisdom is learning how ignorant you are. That makes me a wise man, indeed. :rolleyes:
I was looking for Dave Barry columns online using Yahoo back in late 2000, and came upon The Straight Dope homepage. Seeing as I’ve been a fan of Uncle Cecil’s work for a hang of a long time before that, I clicked.
And found the first ever messageboard I’ve belonged to.
In college, I saw a poster on campus about urban legends which showed that all the horrible murders that occurred on our campus coincidentally happened on all campuses everywhere. So I began searching the internet for more “common knowledge,” that was incorrect. The factoid that led me here was balancing an egg on the equinox.
I was irate at my fifth grade teacher. He even demonstrated the egg-balance for us in class one day, to “prove” that you could only balance an egg on that day. Once I learned the truth, I felt a need to fight the deception.
I always suspected that my fifth grade teacher was also wrong about brain transplants being possible. He even cited a case where a husband and wife had the procedure. To this day, I hold him responsible for my fear of mad scientists.
I really don’t remember what first brought me here. I was looking for the answer to something or other and clicked a link to one of the Straight Dope columns, which answered my question and inspired me to amble through the archive. Eventually I had a question and joined up on the boards so that I could ask it, and then I got to liking the discussions here. Enough to stick around when they told me it was time to start paying for the fun.
This board was mentioned on the Chronicle of Higher Ed message board, so I came over to see what was up.
The first thread I read was about someone going on a mystery trip at work and was getting clues everyday. She was posting the clues and everyone was guessing. Seemed like a fun place to hang out. (She went on a whale watch, btw).
I then found a 'best of" thread complilation or another and almost killed myself laughing so hard. I couldn’t breathe, could barely see after reading some of the oldies (like the floating blimp story).
I read a lot, post a little and enjoy it immensly!
