SethAZ 

I could never tell if that guy was just trolling or he really did like to think of himself as some sort of bicycling vigilante who was going to dial it up to 400 W and drop people who had no idea they were even racing, just to teach them a lesson.

I've accepted that some of what I post is niche in terms of who will be interested in it, but I post it anyways because it leaves a trail that others searching for info on a topic might someday find. Perfect recent example is the post I made comparing the Brooks B17 saddle with steel rails to the Gilles Berthoud Galibier saddle with ti rails. Tensioned leather saddles are already niche, and of the tensioned leather saddles the Brooks predominate, so the pool of folks genuinely interested in something like the Gilles Berthoud is already going to be pretty small. Still, when I search for info on ti rails for leather saddles and one of the few threads I find was a question I myself posted several years ago on the subject, there's just not much out there. I posted that, it got looked at many dozen times, zero comments. I'm sure the post was just too long. I don't really care, though: I post what I'd want to read if I were searching online for experiences someone had with that saddle, hoping that it contributes something to the online corpus. At least trolls and sharpshooters didn't descend on that thread to rip me to shreds over whatever it was they found issue with.

indyfabz

I highly recommend reading “Blink”, by Malcom Gladwell.

Now excuse me. I have to add water to my hydraulic brake lines.

dedhed

I can see some of you are kind of new around here.

Barry2 

I think we are all a little on the torqued side.... and I don't mean wrench.

8-)

Barry

Oneder

There's some good posters here and lots of bicycle knowledge but his forum has always kind of sucked sucked and was always full of snobs and know-it-alls who learned all they needed to know in kindergarten, at least for the last few years anyway.

downhillmaster

It’s just you.
If you don’t believe me you can do a quick thread search from however many years you would like to go back.
Try searching ‘We're going to yell at you’ or any thread about LBS price structure, or any thread about MUP etiquette.
BF was not impervious to standard internet behavior then and it is not now.

pdlamb

My (warped) mind keeps coming up with some truly snarky responses to some inane threads. Examples:

Recommend some bike shorts: OK, I recommend you wear bike shorts when you ride a bike.

Recommend a wheel for (fill in condition). No, it's better to ride a bicycle with TWO wheels. That's why it's called a BI-cycle.

What's the best chain lube? The one that's on your chain when you go for a ride. Anything in a bottle isn't doing the chain any good.

Many intelligent people have amused themselves for many, many years with similar comebacks. Most of mine don't quite make the "Post" button. On bikeforums we're a cross between Samuel Johnson and the roomful of monkeys trying to recreate the complete works of Shakespeare -- some of those responses are going to slip out into the wild.

CAT7RDR

Whatever happened to civility?

A couple times I was dismissed or my advice was discredited rather rudely by a know-it-all. I thought about giving the youngster an internet tongue lashing but what is the point? I would just be another interweb tough guy with no soul.

There are several BF members that are really skilled at dispensing great detailed information. Bravo to these members! Those are the posts I am most interested in.
When a thread approaches two pages, I already know the subject has been beat to death. . I just scroll on to another thread.

Reynolds 

Other good topics are:
CF vs metal
Disc vs rim brakes
Carrying while riding
Waving
Average speed
...and many more

livedarklions

Walmart
Dogs
MUPs
Cadence
Ebikes
Hoods vs. Drops
Diet

shelbyfv

I'm new to cycling but clearly you've all been doing this wrong....

DMC707

Lots of us out there have more time on our hands ----- I wandered into the P&R section last week and almost got sucked into a black hole of back and forth negativity

And it was like was said about Howard Stern -- people who like him listen for 45 minutes a day -- people who Dis-like him listen for 3 hours a day ! (or something like that - and I assume that was back in the shock-jock terrestrial radio days )

Jim from Boston

Sign of the times

Quote:

Originally Posted by Senior Ryder 00

Hi Folks,

Is it just me or are the threads getting increasingly argumentative, snarky and convoluted? When I started with BF a few years ago, members were friendly, courteous and helpful.

Recently, we’ve had rambling threads about inconsequential subjects. Seven pages ragging on a member because he was putting his “trophy bike” in storage. Another four pages on the accuracy of tire gauges. And so forth.

Are other members sensing this? Could it be just the stress of the times?

@Senior Ryder 00, I note that your avatar is entitled “Old bikes, older guy,” so you may be amused by my reply to this thread on the Fifty-Plus Plus Forum: ˅˅˅˅

Jim from Boston

˄˄˄˄

indyfabz

^^^And just like that, the thread grows longer than a CVS receipt.^^^ An unfortunate sign of the times that nothing will be done about.

shelbyfv

Saving every comment one has made on BF and able to recycle them at will! Remarkable.... Wasn't Howard Hughes rumored to have saved his toenail clippings?

PDKL45

My favorite was some guy jumping on me for telling some cat that using an 11-40 cassette with a 30-39-50 road triple might be problematic in terms of derailleur and chain tension, implying that I was being unreasonable for using math to calculate rear derailleur total capacity ("theoretical nonsense"). I think a helpful person from these forums had actually shared it with me in the first place? People get crazy here at times, like a well-known poster of wacky non-sequiturs who once accused me of being a member of the dangerous Jan Heine low-trail supple cult. The surprisingly bitter feud between the fully-loadeds and the fast'n'lights in the touring subforum was another highlight, as was the troll who messaged me, asking me to make a thread calling for a general public apology to be made to him, after I encouraged him to be more conciliatory once, in a single thread. You might also post a 1x thread for road bikes to see the type of reaction you get (triples for life, b1tc6!).

However, there are supportive individuals here who are genuinely helpful in offering advice and who generously give of their time in answering queries and questions about bikes and cycling in general. I don't think rancor in the forums is a sign of the times, it's really just business as usual. You can tune it out relatively easily and engage with the helpful and supportive, rather than the hostile and grumpy.

downhillmaster

Thanks for the history lesson Jim from the planet Boston.
Who knew the 50+ forum started out as a small, tight-knit group of weirdos with little to no tolerance for new members that did not fit their mold?

Thomas15

I actually enjoy reading posts that begin with "I'm new to the bicycling scene and I just got a smokin deal on a ....(30 year old entry level road bike). All it needs are new brakes, tires, tubes, bar tape, cables and chain. I don't like the seat, gearing and pedals so I want to replace them. The wheels are a bit rusty but nothing a little steel wool can't fix".

indyfabz

Yes. They key is to buy the bike first and then ask if you got a good deal.😂

Koyote

It's difficult to not be snarky or argumentative when someone offers up a post that is (1) easily verified to be factually incorrect, or (2) a question that would have been easily answered with a quick google search, or (3) an opinion masquerading as fact.

Jim from Boston

Sign of the times?Thanks for the nod, @downhillmaster, though frankly my interpretation is diametrically opposite.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Jim from Boston

…I have been an avid cyclist, as a lifestyle since about 1972…I happened serendipitously on Bike Forums in 2008, and it was frankly incredible to find a community that shared so many concerns I had kept to myself as a lone cyclist.

So with my experiences in cycling, and my frequent posting over the years, if I have replied on a recurrent topic [or read another subscriber's good one], written to my satisfaction, I’ll just quote it.

So when I joined Bike Forums, I was a new kid on the block. When I found the 50+ Forum, I could tell it was a work already in progress with inside references as noted by @qcpmsame.

I indeed was unaware of the subsequent turmoil as described by qcpmsame but realized there was change as frequent subscribers fell away .

Quote:

Originally Posted by qcpmsame

...The big dust up was actually a confluence of a couple of events. See the stickie post, by Tom Stormcrowe, in the top of the forum threads, for a date to pin on the event(s).

A few members didn't care for the "clubbiness" that evolved over the first years of the 50+ Forum. The things like Pie, pie rides, pie day, mentioning colonoscopies, Tombay falls and Club Tombay, rubbed them the wrong way. they also felt that these topics weren't bicycle related and should be eliminated/deleted somehow. Several folks got their feelings hurt, or just plain got angry about the tone, as Tom put it, and they either left, or got hostile towards others.

Now, we have some new folks that have come in as they found the forum, or some just hit the 50+ age and started posting here. They weren't a part of the original group, and don't carry any of the baggage or memories about who and what transpired here earlier.

Most members don't care, or weren't aware of what happened, and other things drove members away. Some just lost interest in posting and drifted away. No blanket answers to the issues, or even all of the issues that have effected how the forum is viewed.

So IMO, the original subscribers to 50+ were an affable and welcoming group, and I have met several members in person, a few who came to planet Boston to cycle. The weirdos then were the new subscribers with little to no tolerance for old members that did not fit their mold.

During one of the economic slowdowns in the past, a commentator noted that when long term associates in a corporation or institution leave, that entity loses a part its corporate memory.

˅˅˅˅

Jim from Boston

ɅɅɅɅ

There is a thread on the Northeast Regional Discussion Forum, that I consider the de facto Metro Boston thread that since 2009 IMO has maintained that comeraderie I found on Fifty-Plus several years ago.

StarBiker

Is that the same as packing?
People were waving at me yesterday and I didn't know who they were........

rydabent

In this day and age some snowflake is always offended about something. Virtually anything someone may do offends someone.