• No exaggeration here, but I lurked here for 6 months before making my first post. In all honesty it took that long to think of something that I didn't think would be taken the wrong way or start a flaming war. I like the hardness of this place though - to use a bit of media-speak, it's more 'core', and it's good that there are relatively few threads on totally non-bike-related issues. I have been a member of other forums, such as Runner's World, where people seem to live - literally - on the forum. In the end I had to go because I couldn't stand all the crap threads about what they ate last night, or what happened in Eastenders yesterday.

    As singlespeed and fixed grow in popularity though, more 'normal' (i.e. non-cyclists) people will join up, and as a result, you'll find that while they have an interest in ss/fixed, they're more interested in other stuff, hence a growth in crap threads and 'noob' C+ style questions. You will get people who don't know their nipples from their nipples and their bottom bracket from their bumhole, but hey, maybe they'll stick around and contribute something useful eventually.

    I'm sat firmly on the fence over whether more people joining is a good thing or a bad thing, but one of the things someone might want to consider is developing a front page information resource that people can click through that answers most FAQs - there's a similar thing on http://www.southerndownhill.com/ that acts as an information resource that answers some key questions and prevents people from heading straight to the forums to post something inane.

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