Understanding that the mudane, everyday, somewhat insigificant, average, and oft repeated topics are a part of the lifeblood of a forum like this.

55/Rad

One place this shows up far too often is in the Mechanics area. NOthing is worse than repeatedly watching people arrogantly give replies to mechanincal questions. It appears that it is often painful for some of the more experienced to give answers to the noobs. If it is so painful, why freakin bother?

The sad part is that questions often don't get asked because people are afraid to be belittled. Personally i welcome it. I am on here to learn about cycling and personally don't give a crap if someone is rude or arrogant as long as i get what i came here looking for. I don't personally know one sole on this board so it makes it a little hard to really give a crap what somebody says.

I think a lot of the people enjoy being jerks anonymously of forums like this because they are not allowed to get away with it in real life. I can understand that. So maybe i have to agree that people should just be a little less sensitive. If an individual that you have never met in your entire life can type some words on a computer that hurts your feelings, than there are probably larger problems.

The thing that really mystifies me is people that get irritated with repeat questions. That does torque me off. People that get irritated with that and create things like the sticky $500 Mountain Bike thread, must think the forums are just designed for their happiness. I don't care if i read 1000 questions of people wanting to know what $500 mountain bike to buy. I don't have to read the post. I think having a sticky is a fine idea except it doesn't actually work.

That $500 MTB sticky has just about every topic in the world discussed and certainly isn't a very good tool for a noob looking for buying advice. There is much, much, gleening to be done to pull anything useful out of that thread.

Thank you 55 Rad. Ice day today!

I disagree completely. since that particular sticky we have had a LOT of reduced repeat questions on the subject of 500$ bikes. We have also had newbs come in and thank us for having that sticky in place as it helped htem get 3 or 4 bikes to choose from which they then asked questions about. That sticky has been a time saver for them and us in that forum. Before that thread was made it was a daily occurance to have 2 and 3 questions about the same 3 bikes in the 500$ range. Thats has almost completely stopped. It did its job imo. Even though, you are correct, it is a pain to work through.

And downloading all those "huge" 140KB DOS programs at 300 or later 1200 bauds. Actually some of those free or shareware programs were pretty neat. I remember one that converted your document to and from all different sorts of formats.

Them were the days!

I remember when graphics first hit online. Dling huge BMPS and then the most compressed gifs. Was hillarious how much time we would spend dling absoutely nothing worth having

There are those individuals who are secure in the superiority of their intellects, and are perhaps puzzled as to why they haven't been able to gain or maintain friendships. I no longer respond to these sorts in kind; I assume their punishments are built in.

The Golden Rule pretty much applies everywhere.

"Do unto others before they do unto you." ~ Igor

Thanks for the tip regarding the IGNORE option; I did not know that was possible. I just wasted five minutes reading some unduly obnoxious posts regarding steel alloys. Unfortunately, those five minutes are gone for good, but my account is now set to ignore the poster BTW, I did enjoy your graphic.

Very well said. Couldn't agree more. Bravo!

You guys may find this hard to believe, but I find this board to be rather friendly by comparison.

I belong to a forum made up of radio and TV broadcasters from across my region.
They are the most insecure, pathetic, angry, bitter, back-biting, belittling, immature, you-name-it . . .

Every other thread breaks down into a pissing match between three of four regulars. It's hideous.

On this board, there are only a few bad eggs, and they're not nearly as bad as the broadcasters.
Still, there's always room for improvement. Unfortunately, those who are jackasses both on the board and in real life aren't going to snap out of it.

You mean this one?

I still think this video should be mandatory viewing for all newbies.

Hehe, yea. Anything endorsed by Hasselhoff is okay in my book.

I've seen that flash video on almost every board I've frequented. Some people just don't get it. There are a lot of 'Billy' impersonators out there.

It's true. That's why most mechanical questions start out with such mawkish apologies! "Please,Oh Mighty Ones, tell me if my chain is compatible..."
Although the "How do I clean my chain" threads are a bit annoying, I seem to remember a time, at the dawning of the ages, when I thought a pocketknife would make a good tire lever, so I don't go wild flaming the guy. Some bicycle lore is hard to find on the internet by virtue of how specific it is, though, and I see a lot of snotty replies to these posts, too. Nothing wrong with trying to find out about something.
As far as "netiquette" goes, I generally only flame flamers, unless the original poster is just overtly whack/evil. If people can't handle it, go watch TeeVee.

Sorry to nitpick, old man, but the term is gelatinous.

No bother.

Stuart Black
Polite and pratically perfect in every way.

Sorry to nit pick, but the word is practically.

Sorry to nitpick, but the word is "nitpick"

We could go back and forth all day! Besides, I'm not perfect, just practically

Stuart Black

and my dictionary reads:

nit-pick (Merriam Webster 1994)

The whole point being that it is a waste of time to nit-pick!

How long you two been married?

To me the forums are like a local pub. Everyone comes in and shoots the bull. It's a very relaxed atmoshpere, so if course snide remarks and sarcasm can be found. You can always blow that off and talk to the people you like.

What, you need the IGNORE function? Just freakin' ignore a bad post on your own! For example, I happen to think the entire Mountain Biking forum is puerile, so I never go there.

I kind of think familiarity more than anonymity breeds the "bad" posts. Many regulars just get used to each other and comfortable here, so they use the language they would between close asociates, and not the words you would use when talking to a complete stranger.

Unless, of course, you have lice. Then it's just hours of entertainment Plus it's a gift that just keeps giving. My daughter had head lice about 12 years ago and all I have to do is look at her hair to make her skin crawl. Great fun!

Oh! I think the train is off the tracks and in the next county!

Stuart Black

Gotta look that one up.

55/Rad

The opposite of senile. From the Latin words, and later psychoanalytical concepts of "senex and puer". If you were going to look it up, you wouldn't be here!

I agree. I found this forum to be pretty entertaining(compare to some other forums out there).