My SDMB posts that never see the light of day.

[Cat_Whisperer]

@Wendell_Wagner

One of the reasons that I don’t post everything I think of is that I realize that many of my posts would just be snide jokes. A lot of offhand comments that I make in person are snide jokes. People I know in person understand that. They sometimes laugh at them. Sometimes they just sigh and roll their eyes. I realized long ago, indeed well before I started posting to the SDMB, that you can’t treat a message board like it’s the office water cooler. Not everybody is going to understand your clever references. People can’t see your facial expressions and body language, so they won’t know whether you’re serious or not. You have to be more careful online than in person that other people will understand your intent in what you say.

That’s why I use lots of smiley-faces.

[Onomatopoeia]

@The_wind_of_my_soul

The ones I delete tend to be the ones where I realize that my main reason for posting was just to talk about myself, and not actually contribute to the discussion.

I have a difficult time heeding this myself.
…crap

[nivlac]

I’d estimate that half my written posts just get deleted instead of submitted. Main reason is because I’d determine that my post would have added nothing new to the discussion. I hate redundancy.

[JohnT]

When I delete a post, it’s most likely because I don’t want to get into a pissing match. There are a fair # of threads that I read which piss me off for one reason or another, but don’t reply because I don’t want to keep replying to people more argumentative than me. Essentially I ask myself “Do you want to argue this for the next 3 days?” and more often than not, the answer is “Hell to the no!”

[overlyverbose]

When I delete a post, it’s usually for one of a few reasons:

1. I already know the answer to my question and am asking only to justify not taking the right action or not feeling bad about having done something stupid. Luckily this doesn’t happen terribly often, but I often find myself thinking, “Well, if I’m asking, I obviously could’ve handled that bettter.”

2. It’s too personal.

3. I don’t feel like dealing with the occasional poster who will throw out some ridiculous counter-argument that would probably never apply. For example, I once posted about waiting for a plumber all day and how much that irritated me. I hadn’t been impolite to said plumber at all - just was venting on a message board. Several posters came back with things along the lines of, “Well, yeah, but maybe the plumber’s wife was pregnant and had an emergency. Did you think about that? Well, did you? You’re such a selfish bitch - my husband, who’s a plumber, hates people like you.” Sometimes I just don’t feel like having to present a 100% airtight rant if I’m just looking for somewhere anonymous to complain.

[Cerowyn]

Good reasons posted here! I only post about 1 in 20 posts that I start (and at least half of those shouldn’t be posted, anyway).

What we need is an “almost posted” counter. We could have a “trash post” button that counts all of the posts you start but don’t submit.

[Cat_Whisperer]

@nivlac

I’d estimate that half my written posts just get deleted instead of submitted. Main reason is because I’d determine that my post would have added nothing new to the discussion. I hate redundancy.

I hate redundancy, too.

[Rachellelogram]

@Cat_Whisperer

I hate redundancy, too.

I, too, hate redundancy too.

I have no problem posting the private innards of my personal life online. I don’t really care what internet strangers know about me. And if it’s relevant to an interesting topic, or if I can help somebody, I’ll say pretty much anything about myself.

However, I will often delete a nascent post that I can’t phrase concisely enough to get the point across without boring my audience. I think I have a preposition addiction, and I need to make my sentences smaller.

[Finagle]

One in ten is a good estimate of the responses that back-buttoned before I hit submit. Maybe 1 in 5.

Too much personal info is probably the second most common reason.

 The most common, though, is that the response just isn't as amusing or trenchant as I had pictured it in my mind.   My Muse is already a C student, but sometimes she plays hooky entirely.

[Cat_Whisperer]

@rachelellogram

<snip>

However, I will often delete a nascent post that I can’t phrase concisely enough to get the point across without boring my audience. I think I have a preposition addiction, and I need to make my sentences smaller.

I often picture my first year English prof. writing on my essays, “Wordy!”