You're welcome.
What is attention whoring? Attention whoring, I'd say, is about doing things where the primary objective (or maybe sole objective) is to draw attention to yourself. Making a thread serves practical purposes of information gathering and intellectual investigation. So, even though you might get attention as a byproduct of making a thread, I certainly wouldn't consider it attention whoring. The closest thing to attention whoring on this site is probably making a silly nonsense thread, like a thread where the OP just says "I see you!" or something like that. I wouldn't even call that attention whoring, though, because it comes out of playfulness, not neediness. The precise emotion that motivates the post is the key.
Why do people attention-whore? Ask Jeffster! (Kidding.) The head teacher of the school of zen I used to study said that people have 5 needs, one of which is fame. I imagine attention whores have this need more than the norm. Erick Berne, the inventor of Transactional Analysis (therapeutic model) believes that people play games in order to get "strokes." A stroke is some form of recognition, and it's a need that carries over from childhood. It replaces the need for physical affection from one's mother/parent. Instead of collecting physical strokes, people collect psychological strokes, and have ingenious ways of doing so. Making a thread that purports to discuss something interesting while really serving as a vehicle to collect recognition (attention whoring) is one type of game.