Genius lost to the ether

[Langrenus]

My perennial confusion about where to put posts manifests itself once again, but anyway...

Poll - what proportion of responses to threads (or, indeed, new threads you've typed out) do you back out of submitting? I'm interested about how much creative thought (and general flaming/random stuff) is lost because people ponder and refuse at the last minute...

Reasons and/or commentary would, as ever, be greatly appreciated.

*takes a breath and clicks 'Submit New Thread'*

[Jennifer]

I usually do not ditch posts.

When I do, it's usually because I feel like

• I have either hijacked the thread to a new topic, or
• I've talked about myself too much and feel self-conscious/self-absorbed, or
• what I've said is something that someone else has already said before, so I'm really not contributing anything new/worthwhile, or
• I tried to make a joke and realized it really wasn't funny at all.

[Zergling]

I do a lot.

Pretty much, if I write something in a post, I'm looking for it to have some effect (responses, extra talking about it, etc.). for some reason, those things never seem to happen to a lot of them, so it's hard ot actually get the thoughts out and written down.

[Langrenus]

Zergling, are you saying that your previous posts have not elicited a response (or as much of a response as you'd hoped) and so you've begun to back out more? (self-doubt? self-critique? more time spent considering what you're about to submit?)

[Varelse]

Normally I back because I'm sitting there thinking "I'm just a kid. What do I know anyway?"

[Randomnity]

I often back out because my thought when expressed in words isn't quite what I had intended to say. Or I change my opinion mid-writing as I consider the flaws in my argument. Or I think I'm getting too personal. Or I just think, eh, nobody wants to read that anyway. Or I realise that I'm not really adding anything as someone else has already said what I mean to say. Or I just get bored of writing and don't feel like finishing the transcription of my thought process. Or all of the above.

[Zergling]

Originally Posted by Langrenus

Zergling, are you saying that your previous posts have not elicited a response (or as much of a response as you'd hoped) and so you've begun to back out more? (self-doubt? self-critique? more time spent considering what you're about to submit?)

Pretty much, it has occurred on a number of forums where I think up some bigger than usual ideas for a forum post, write them down, and they seem to get lost. It also seems to happen a lot with odd joke posts, which seem to be the "social" way of posting but oftentimes doesn't seem to work.

With the longer or bigger idea posts, I'm often hoping for people to talk about the idea, or add their own, but this seems to happen very little.

[ptgatsby]

Most of the time I'll either lose interest in the thread or have nothing else to contribute. I feel like a sniper sometimes, waiting for a mistake to correct or to offer up my own little bit of information...

Most of the time I end up posting back to back is when I need to engage my mind in something and can't find anything... at those times I rarely back down. If I have an argument, I've pretty much resolved it in my head and don't really care about it the next day.

[Natrushka]

I started to reply but backed out because I figured who'd care why I posted or didn't post.

[Langrenus]

"Care" might be too strong, but I'd be interested in your response (or else I wouldn't have bothered posting)

pt, the sniper analogy is brilliant