Personally, I’m here to visit friends, learn new things, unlearn things that are wrong, and learn how to fight bullshit effectively.
You?
Just generally shouting existential despair into a great void of indifference to remind myself I exist. And make people laugh. Feels purposeful, yenno ?
Oh, and correcting people who are Wrong. On the Internet. Because deep down, it’s me. I am Sisyphus. Hear me painstakingly nitpick.
Reddit it to much of a PITA to read regularly.
Also, inertia, I’ve been here since AOL.
Out of all the internet venues where I could post my thoughts, the Dope was, and still is, the one where people are most likely to actually engage with another person’s thoughts and not just nod in agreement with whatever they already think or dismiss whatever they don’t.
And it’s home. It’s where the library of previous posts (mine and other folks’ that I’ve read over the years) exists.
The Dope has some of the best debating, question-answering, discussion culture of any message board I’ve seen. Many other discussion groups/boards I’d been on were just drowned out by nonsense conspiracy theories, immature memes, a culture of “our way or the highway” or just absolute low-quality posting.
I’ve been active on message boards since the 1990s. This board, while not perfect, does a really good job of moderation. At least spam is quickly removed and hijacks usually shut down. If you post in GQ about how an engine works, responses advising you to get saved by Jesus will be shutdown.
Reddit is a mess most of the time. And, far too many message boards are either inactive or overrun with spam and obvious trolls.
I enjoy reading the topics and expressing my opinions.
People here need to know what I think. Duh!
Kill time. Ward off ennui. It works, sometimes.
People. It’s the people here.
And, I post alot because I’ve a bunch to say. I’m not always accurate (I’m open to being proved wrong)
I’ve been here since the AOL days. I like reading opinions and reviews. Sometimes if I have a burning question that I would like answered quickly, why, I come here! ‘Who is That Guy in that commercial who looks so familiar?’ The Straight Dope knows. ‘What to do in Bugtussle on a weekend?’ The Straight Dope knows. ‘What’s the song in that commercial?’ I have been bitch slapped and had my head handed to me over the years, but I often get thoughtful and useful replies to oddball questions.
I like reading things I wouldn’t have thought of myself. I like reading stuff I disagree with, and these boards manage to provide a fair bit of that. I like reading stuff by smart people, checked by other smart people. And I like that it is not an echo chamber. I do wish there were more nutjobs. I really enjoy those when they come along - the creatively bizarre ones, anyway. I guess none of that answers why I post: I post because boards are participatory. If I don’t post, and others don’t: no more boards.
I enjoy doing it, the thread games are fun, I learn new things, it kills time, I have to go to the library to do it so it get me out of the house, the typing helps my bad hand,
I’m embarrassed to admit it, but I need the money. I’m one of a handful of posters who are paid to post.
Twenty years of inertia.
I’ve been making occasional innocuous posts over the last 18 years as a means of keeping this profile active while maintaining a low profile. My ultimate plan was to spread misinformation on the Internet ahead of the 2020 election as part of a coordinated effort to get a corrupt game show host in the White House. I hate it when I have a great idea but others beat me to the punch. Nowadays I’m mostly here for the Mariana Trench jokes.
Interesting - how does that work?
I post, rather than just reading and lurking, because there are people here worth talking to. I don’t know so many of those in the real world. It keeps me from being mentally isolated and gets me out of my head.
There is a special interest board that I participate in, but since I am new at that interest I always seem to be asking for help. Here I feel like I can occasionally make a useful contribution.
They keep telling me the check will clear soon though. I mean, I trust Them implicitly, but it’s been 10 years now. This isn’t how I’d run a New World Order, y’know ?
It’s a good place to hang out and socialize. I know people here and am known. And this is a general interest board so I don’t feel I need to restrict myself to narrow topics.