What originally brought you to the SDMB?

A friend introduced me to the books; I searched for Straight Dope on Alta Vista and found the board.

My uncle was a charter member. He recommended several good discussions.

Ha! I joined after learning of that thread when it was Slashdotted.

On shore duty in Pearl Harbor in the late 80s, I would occasionally go to the Walden books at Pearlridge Center and look for something meaty in the “Humor” section. That’s how I found my first two books.

In the mid 90s, now a civilian in California, I was listening to evening talk radio on my way home from work, and the guest on Mr. KABC (he coulda been Mr. KFI at the time though; I misremember) mentioned Cecil Adams and the Straight Dope and conversations. So I got on the phone as soon as I got home and asked what that was all about. The host told me that The Straight Dope had a website.

In 1999, I got internet, and went looking for it. That’s what led me to the SDMB.

BTW, when I first joined, I was aware that the column was carried in the type of publications that often get called “the local commie rag” (or something). Finding as many conservatives as I did was a bit of a surprise, under the circumstances.

I used to read the columns online when I had free time. I was bored one day and started clicking on threadspotting links. After a few days of that, I decided to check out the rest of the threads.

One of these days, I’ll finish those, and go back to the columns. :slight_smile:

I remember when we grossed you out, as a moderator, with that “possibly TMI” zit thread!:smiley:

Garsh I can’t hardly remember but pretty sure I followed a link from another site. Quite possibly BORED.

I ended up here by following some references/links on the snopes forum.

I remember when he used to go by Clogboy!

I’ve never read a print column or book, and after I found the forums in 2000, I don’t think I’ve touched the frontpage or read a column since!

I had a terribly boring job that I hated, and my longtime internet friend turned real life friend zyzzyva sent me a link to straightdope.com. I read through the archives and came across the Forums link, and there I stayed till the Winter of Our Lost Content, when I drifted away and a ton of us moved to Livejournal. I still peek in from time to time, and keep in touch with a lot of the old #straightdope crew on FB, etc.

Thirst for knowledge

ETA: Quando Omni Flunkus Moritati

Bought a couple of the books back in '92. Ten or twelve years later I happened to think of them and Googled…

never read the column in a paper (getting back to the OP, based on the responses so far, I doubt that the alternative newspaper origins of the column have much impact on how most of us ended up here.)

when we got the internet at work in the mid-90s, one of my colleagues told me to check out the Straight Dope columns. I started reading them regularly on-line, as well as watching the Straight Dope show on A&E. there was some talk about something on AOL, but I didn’t have an AOL account, so it was meaningless.

then in 1998, apple came out with the iMac and we bought one for home use. i was noodling around one night in the spring of 1999, reading the columns, and it said that the AOL boards had migrated to the internet; no AOL account needed. so I gave it a try, because frankly, the internet had been pretty boring and I’d been thinking, “What’s the big deal?”

Lurked for a while, then joined so I could post to a thread about the “Kyrie eleison”. Been here ever since.

And after a while, I realised that my former co-worker, the one who had pointed me to the columns, was posting, as Rube E. Tewsday. (He’d moved away by that time.) Unfortunately, he stopped posting around the time of the 2009 “c-word/Pit politeness” brouhaha.

Late night drinking/surfing. I was looking something or other up and after link after link I fell into this rabbit hole. Making my usual graceful entrance I landed with elbows flailing and mouth running. It never occured to me to just read and not post.

A friend gave me one of the books in '99. He also told me about straightdope.com, and I lurked for a short time then joined the SDMB in '00.

I started reading the Dope the same year I came to Chicago for college purposes, early 1980’s. When I got on the internet I discovered that the Dope was also a message board, and here I still am.

ETA: It just hit me that I’ve been a Doper for thirty years. Wow, I feel old now.

Somewhere in my travels through the Internet I came across a link to this thread:

If LotR Had Been Written By Someone Else!?

N00b!

:smiley:

Jayzuss, I hadn’t thought of it that way. Not counting whenever I read the books, I’ve been hanging with Dopers for about 25 years. [goes upstairs to check print date on his first SD book] Humph, 1988 printing. That has to be a second copy, as my 2nd SD book is a 1989 first edition and I know I bought it years after the first and had the first for a while before I found AFCA in 1987. But I’m happy[ish] to call it 25 years.

ETA: I was never in a town that published the columns and don’t think I’ve ever seen one in the wild. So those folks have a permanent leg up on those of us who found Cece from the books.

The books lead me to the AOL message board.

That lead to the internet once the AOL thing went away.

Found a book among a small selection of English language books in a second hand bookstore in Thailand. I’d never heard of Cecil or the Chicago Reader, but loved the book. Swapped it for another book the next day. Wherein I promptly forgot all about it.

Couple years later found another book in a second hand bookstore in Kathmandu! Snapped it right up, but still swapped it for another book, next day. But this time I remembered to write down Cecil’s name!

Months later when I returned home and got on line, I found this place!

I believe my first question was why Bolivia had a navy ?