I think I’m not relieved to find I’m not the only one who does that!
The dumb thing is, I’ve been known to spend 15 or 20 minutes writing a reply, then think better of it and ditch it. I didn’t when I first joined up, but maybe I’m more careful now. Right now, I probably ditch as many replies as I make, and I nearly ditched this one.
I used to do it a lot, but now not so much. This isn’t because I’m more confident in what I post, it’s more because I simply do a better job of the mental go/no-go edit before I even click the Reply button.
I usually talk myself out of posting before I hit Reply, mostly because I don’t have the time it takes to participate in a thread and I don’t want to seem as if I’m abandoning my posts. But then every once in while I find myself thinking that message boards require active or at least some participation from the members, and then I’ll post several replies to various threads within the next few days. Yes, this thread hit during my posting spree for this quarter.
I ditch about half of my posts for two reasons:
1.) I read it over and chalk it up as redundant to the discussion.
2.) The post makes claims that I can’t be bothered to bust out Googlefu to research, but know I’ll get called on.