On Jun 27, 2009, at 10:39 PM, Horace Heffner wrote:
Intentionally or not, the combined effect of posting irrelevant
material on a thread and then calling out an individual to comment
on it is less like that of a compliment than it is like a troll.
On Jun 28, 2009, at 12:35 AM, John Berry wrote:
Not the intention.
Also trolling for what, an intelligent conversation on topic for
the list and related at least somewhat to the thread.
Yes, I was hopping not to be totally ignored so I pushed a little.
So it *was* intentional.
I had previously given up on this list and posting in general but
have decided that maybe rather than not posting I should push to
get a conversation started, there is a wealth of off topic
conversations.
You intentionally interrupted an on topic thread. There *was* a
conversation started. The above excuse is no justification for a
hijacking then.
Just takes more work to get people to reply to potentially useful
conversation as I think you said in another thread.
Useful to whom? If you post and no one replies then that's a pretty
good indicator that no one at that moment in time is interested in
contributing or has time to contribute to discussion on that
particular subject or post. However, you can still take away the
satisfaction of your having contributed information or ideas you
think are useful.
It is one thing to contribute and another to make demands. Demanding
time from others, especially specifically identified others who are
not interested, to discuss subjects in which you have an interest, is
not too far removed from demanding experimental time. Bill Beaty
addressed that subject pretty well:
On Jun 24, 2009, at 6:40 PM, William Beaty wrote:
Honestly seeking help is not the "FREENRG-L NEWBIE" problem.
Imagining
that others might be interested in your work, that's not the problem.
When looking for help, do you believe you're *entitled* to others'
time
and energy; and everyone should drop their own unimportant useless
little
projects and instead work on yours? Do you see your own projects as
staggaringly important, so important that all other projects are
worthless
in comparison? If someone refuses to let you usurp their time, do you
respond with personal attacks?
This seemed to be attitude of many who joined freenrg-L and
immediately
started trolling for people to do their experiments for them. It
was some
kind of weird narcissim disease. It seems to be common in our
community.
The fact people will ignore difficult subjects, like electromagnetic
theory, to discuss easy to post on subjects that are mostly a matter
of opinion or simple facts (like politics as related to energy) that
might be borderline off topic should not be taken personally. It's
just human nature to post on what's easy.
Before posting in a manner designed to push people on the list it may
be worthwhile to consider this definition of "troll":
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Internet_troll
"In Internet slang, a troll is someone who posts controversial,
inflammatory, irrelevant, or off-topic messages in an online
community, such as an online discussion forum or chat room, with the
primary intent of provoking other users into an emotional response or
to generally disrupt normal on-topic discussion."
Pushing can have the opposite of the intended effect. It can give
people the feeling they are being trolled, and that invokes the
response DNFTT, "Do not feed the trolls".
I think it is best to just enjoy the privilege to post on subjects of
interest to you and hope you are making a contribution of some kind.
I expect posting ideas is always taking a long shot at making a
meaningful contribution to humanity, but if you keep at it, the 100th
or 200th, or 1000th idea might just be of great use, or later
stimulate some ideas of great use from others, and justify all the
prior effort. You will probably never get appropriate credit or
recognition, but you can, if you choose, derive some personal
satisfaction from initiating memes, and contributing to the gestalt.
Best regards,
Horace Heffner
http://www.mtaonline.net/~hheffner/
