Do you care about online life? Is the internet meaningful?

[exploited]

[Kane]

[PoS]

[Kane]

No...not that bob.

[PoS]

Oh.

[The Comrade]

i just spent about 5 hours playing video games with a guy who lives in kansas that i met in 8th grade while playing starcraft.

sometimes you can form a pretty solid friendship with someone via the internet.

[Sazari]

[jimmyz]

[Sazari]

big boy bobby from the apple yard

[Sandman]

The internet, like most things, is what you make of it. I joined a small hip hop forum around the same time I joined PCF, stayed on there for years until it finally died, and for whatever reason the core group of 15-20 frequent posters on there, we all became real life friends who still talk all the time via facebook, etc, and over the years I've met and hung out with almost all of them in the real world many, many times. We've slept on eachother's couches. It's gotten to the point where I'm pretty sure none of us view ourselves as internet acquaintances anymore, or at least not in the context of that old forum. I can't even remember half of their forum screen names. I haven't been a part of many forums, really only a handful, but I'm vaguely aware that my experience with that hip hop forum isn't the norm. I know Fark has regular meetups in different cities, and I've seen a few real life relationships spring out of PCF over the years. But I think in general, smaller communities probably allow for it more than big sprawling forums with thousands of members.

And this is just my own opinion, but I think the reason why there's a certain disconnect with people on PCF is because, quite simply, the whole central conceit of the site is debate. It's adversarial from the jump. It's not like, say, a forum devoted to a specific music genre or hobby or sport, or whatever, where the whole idea is to be able to connect with others with the same interests, rather than coming to a site specifically to say, "I see your beliefs, you've laid them out passionately and succinctly, now let me tell you why you are full of dog shit" LOL. Even the real life friendships I've seen on this site over the years, have mostly been between people who are on the same political wavelength, basically.