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Title: FAQ on FAQ thumpers.
Introduction. In my years of computing experience
which began back in the days of the Coleco Adam,
I've had the pleasure of meeting many helpful
folks who shared my love for these wonderful
machines that have changed our lives so much.
I've had the privilege of running my own BBS for
many years and then I made the transition to
being in on the ground floor of one of the first
ISPs in my area. During my years of experience
online I've always found that a certain
personality type kept turning up regardless of
what online venue I was using. As a BBS sysop,
there were always a few people who wanted to
"help" me run my board.. Once the internet
became a household word, I started noticing the
same types of "helpful" people popping up in
just about every newsgroup I'd examine. Unlike
those who irritated me on my BBS though, since
these folks had no sysop to tell them their
"help" was unwanted, they became emboldened and
completely abandoned the facade of trying to
be "helpful." Thus, emerged the FAQ thumper.
Thus, also, came the need for this FAQ.
This FAQ will most likely contain a lot of
omissions, so I hope that its readers will feel
free to add to it as time goes on. Unlike the
FAQs that the FAQ thumpers regard as their Holy
Grail, feel free to fold, spindle and mutilate
this document as you see fit.
NOTE: This FAQ applies solely to unmoderated
newsgroups.
Q. Where did the term "FAQ thumper" come from?
A. When I first encountered these strange people
who could quote their newsgroup's FAQ verbatim
and did so at every chance that presented
itself, I was instantly reminded of the
born-again Christian types I've known throughout
my time. Like "Bible thumpers" who can recite an
appropriate verse from Scripture for almost any
topic of conversation that they are presented,
the FAQ thumpers exhibit the same skill and
fervent zealotry as their Christian zombie
brethren in embracing and quoting their hallowed
FAQs.
Q. Who appointed/elected the FAQ thumpers?
A. Nobody! It's a job they took on by
themselves. These wanna-be dictators of
cyberspace don't even enjoy popular support in
most newsgroups they infest.
Q. Why do they take on their self-appointed roles?
A. Mainly to enjoy the illusion of power. There
are other reasons (covered later), but the desire
for some measure of authority is the essence of
their motivation. Chances are excellent that this
tiny minority of aspiring cybercops have little
in the way of power in their real lives so they
desperately attempt to fill that void on the net.
Q. Do they have any real authority? In other
words, do they present any threat to me?
A. None whatsoever. Despite their threats about
complaining to ISPs, they realize that no ISP is
going to dump a paying customer on the basis of
some self-righteous twit lodging a complaint
about your violation of an FAQ. It would be a
different situation if you were posting porn
someplace where it doesn't belong or spamming a
newsgroup with commercial ads, but any reputable
ISP would promptly dump any complaint about
anything as utterly trivial as posting requests
or questions anywhere. Furthermore, complaints
about newsgroups of "questionable" repute are
almost universally dumped by ISPs regardless
of what sort of so-called abuse is taking place
within them. "Questionable" newsgroups are those
which are magnets for people engaged in the
distribution of either pornography or copyrighted
materials such as "warez," or media products
which have been digitally copied (mp3, mpeg, wav,
jpg etc.). Complaints from such newsgroups are
viewed by ISPs as the proverbial "pot calling the
kettle black" types of indictments and are
generally sneered at,... if they receive any
attention at all.
Q. Why do they use such threats if they can't
really get action from most ISPs?
A. Simple. Such threats are very effective when
leveled at novice internet users. The FAQ
thumpers are essentially cyber versions of
schoolyard bullies without the muscle to back
them up. Since a newcomer to the newsgroups has
no idea of how things work until they've been
around for awhile, if someone pounces on them and
makes ominous-sounding threats, until they learn
they really have little to fear, they acquiesce
to the bully's demand... at first. A good
analogy is to watch the way someone who has never
been stung by a bee or wasp reacts when one flies
around them as opposed to how someone who has
been stung reacts.
Q. Are their any types of complaints other than
spamming or posting pornography inappropriately
that are taken seriously by ISPs?
A. Yes, but the effectiveness of the complaint is
nearly always dependent upon the content of the
newsgroup it concerns. In other words, if you
post messages containing profanity in a newsgroup
which contains "adults only" content such as
those newsgroups dealing with pornographic images
or texts dealing with sex acts, your complaint
will be given no attention whatsoever. On the
other hand, if you post that same kind of
profanity in a newsgroup dealing with
intellectual, family-oriented or religious
subjects, a complaint against you has a much
better chance of getting you warned or summarily
dumped by most ISPs. Usually, you'll receive a
warning e-mail before any decent ISP dumps your
account though. Any ISP that terminates your
account without first giving you a chance to
present your side of the story isn't one you want
to pay your hard-earned money for, so if you do
get summarily dumped, consider it a favor from
the dunces who run such an ISP.
Q. I've seen claims on the part of FAQ thumpers
that their activities act as a bulwark against
the newsgroup being overrun by spam. Is that
true?
A. Not at all. Spammers generally aim their
efforts at newsgroups based on how germane to
what they are peddling the content of the
newsgroup is. A small amount of spam is
therefore the norm in just about every newsgroup
on Usenet. The only time spam "overruns" any
newsgroup is if it proves lucrative for the
spammers to advertize their products and services
in it. For instance, you see little, if any spam
in the newsgroups dealing with "warez" and other
copyrighted materials because the last thing a
software maker or media artist wants to do is
attract attention to their products in areas
where their product might wind up being freely
distributed without generating any revenue.
Q. Do FAQ thumpers have any positive effects
whatsoever in the NGs they try to control?
A. On the contrary, they normally do far more
harm than they do good. Even the most casual
examination of NGs where FAQ thumpers are most
active will reveal a much higher number of
unproductive and genuinely "off-topic" text posts
taking up bandwith and making life miserable
for those seeking the kind of help or files the
newsgroup is presumably designed to provide. FAQ
thumpers behave like packs of wolves waiting to
pounce upon the weakest members of the herd. Once
one does so, the rest pile on the targeted prey
so that a single alleged infraction of their
revered FAQ generates dozens of "read the
#!!!$*&!! FAQ you #%$^!!!*{?!! newbie!" type
posts. Inevitably, people who don't take kindly
to cyber-fascism chime in to defend the poor
novice the FAQ thumpers are gang-banging so that
the initial flurry of admonishments winds up
generating an exponentially growing number of
counter responses. Egotists that they are, FAQ
thumpers never let anyone get in the last word
besides themselves, so they invariably respond
with rebuttals to anyone who comes to their
victim's defense. Compounding the problem further
is the fact that many FAQ thumpers are very
prodigious in their zeal to police their little
domains. It's not at all unusual for a single FAQ
thumper to post over 50 messages a day.
Q. Do FAQ thumpers also contribute "on-topic"
posts to the NGs they patrol?
A. One would think that those who profess to be
most dedicated to the well-being of a NG would
also be amongst the most prolific contributors
of assistance and files, but alas, this is
universally not the case. In fact, FAQ thumpers
are generally little better than so-called
"lurkers" when it comes to actually contributing
content to their NGs. Hypocrisy is an integral
part of the psyches of most FAQ thumpers. Their
real interest in most NGs is to flex their
imaginary muscles by sniping at others.
Q. Being an FAQ thumper seems to be a huge
expenditure of wasted time and energy. There's
just got to be more to their motivation than the
illusion of power. What else drives these
creatures?
A. There are a lot of frustrated, lonely and
secluded people in our society. Many of the most
active FAQ thumpers are likely to be unemployed
people living off of personal assets and/or
government assistance. It is entirely plausible
that many are shut-ins who are permanently
disabled. This may seem like a cheap shot, but
two things are obvious about FAQ thumpers. They
all seem to have far more time to spend at their
computer keyboards than most of us do and they
all carry around chips on their shoulders. Some
disabled people remain very bitter about the
cards fate has dealt them and are in an ideal
position to devote large amounts of time to
cyberspace. What better way to feel connected
while in seclusion than to participate in the
online community and what better way to
experience the illusion of being empowered when
one is feeling otherwise helpless?
Those FAQ thumpers who are not shut-ins are
almost necessarily loners with little in the way
of a normal social life. Think about it. What
time could such people possibly devote to
socializing after working an 8 hour day and then
spending so much time ferreting out as many FAQ
transgressors as they do on a daily basis?
In any case, FAQ thumpers are universally people
with severe emotional problems. You couldn't pay
most of us to sit at a keyboard for hours at a
time every day with the sole task of composing
messages that almost always drip with sarcasm,
condescension, anger and self-importance. No
mentally healthy person would dream of taking on
such an onerous chore of their own volition.
PARTING ADVICE. FAQ thumpers are irrepressible.
Like death and taxes, there's no escaping them.
They have been with us throughout our lives
and will hound us to our graves. They were our
kid brothers and sisters who tattled to our
parents about everything we did in an effort to
vent their frustration at being the weakest
members of the family. They were the teachers'
pets in school who were keepers of the erasers
and appointed as class monitors (stool pigeons)
whenever the teacher had to leave the room. In
high school they were the hall monitors. In
college, they began to find fewer outlets where
they could enjoy any sort of empowerment so they
became the withdrawn loners who went through
four years or more of virtual invisibility to
most people on campus. As adults, they are the
neighbors who peer out from behind their curtains
every time they hear so much as a car door
slamming. They are the people who call the cops
at the most trivial or imagined violation of
their peace or property. They maintain mental
dossiers on all of their neighbors and are eager
to share them with anyone who gives them an
opportunity to recite their gossip. As coworkers,
they are the boss's informers. They'll tell you
how lazy a coworker is and as soon as you are out
of earshot, they will tell someone else how lazy
they think you are. If they outlive you, you can
be certain that they will have no qualms
whatsoever about verbally diminishing your
existence before your corpse has even grown cold.
Given all the aforementioned, the best thing to
do with FAQ thumpers is to simply kill filter
them. You can be sure that by doing so, you
wont miss any genuine content in whatever NG
you're in.
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