Peek at this:
http://members.bellatlantic.net/~adhdah/Guestbook/readbook.html
Note the somewhat long thread “Escaping Mental Institutions”. Note the string of replies to a guestbook-poster named “Ian <Igrad2>”. I just got another one this morning, which doesn’t appear on the list.
I don’t get a lot of action on this site, and the “Escaping Mental Institutions” thread, in particular replies to this Ian fellow’s post during the last 8-12 months, is starting to stand out and make me wonder.
The replies are mostly to the 2001-vintage post of this Ian fellow. If he were the OP on the thread, that would be one thing, but he’s not.
A lot of these replies seem to come from young folks at odds with their families who’ve run afoul of psych institutions. In its own way not surprising since the poster Ian was in that situation himself, but on a guestbook where replies to existing threads is relatively rare and ongoing threads just don’t happen, I’ve got this one situation where eight people have responded to this one post. And none of them respond to each other.
I’d like some fresh evals from people (especially people who manage at least a guestbook if not a full-fledged forum): should I doubt that these are all unconnected people who have found their way to my site, read the guestbook, and then found themselves inspired to reply to this one relatively old post on a relatively old thread?
Do you think the convention I use – bringing entire old threads to the top when a new reply comes in – is a major factor? (But then why don’t other posts or threads that rise to the top attract similar attention?)
Is it likely that a youth org of psych ex-inmates has linked to my site, my guestbook or even to the post of this Ian fellow?
Does anyone think I’ve got (silly as it sounds on such a low-volume environment) sock puppets?