2y ago

How does a polite and grateful person navigate the internet?

I care a lot about what other people think (not good) and if someone tries to help or helps me, I can't stay without saying thank you. I really want to thank people who comment on my posts. But many times I ask a lot of questions and I thus reply to a lot of comments and try to be polite and show how grateful I am. So, now, I have seen many people abandoning their posts after they get their answer without upvotes or replies or followups, I am pretty sure they are better at time management than I am. Now, what do you think?

What is the right way to behave when you post and random strangers help you? I know you all don't think about me all the time and if you made a comment you probably will forget about it, so is it ok to just upvote and forget even the people who help you? I have an exam in a few months and I should not be wasting my time rn, what would you do if you were in my place?

Don't say "dont' create posts" because I like the people here and the answers they give, but yeah, it's a hell of a job to reply "satisfactorily". Again, should I just "upvote and ignore"?

Also, I just want to say that people here are amazing. You guys are very helpful! Like, especially on c/linux! Such helpful communities are one of the things that make Linux great and more usable! Thank you to the folks at c/linux btw

46 comments

That's why upvotes exist. If somebody helps you, upvote their comment.

Could try editing in how grateful you are in your original posts so you wont have to reply to each individual comment

You will never find a satisfying answer to this question because there isn't one and social relationships are not transactional. Acknowledgements are nice, upvotes or comments but no one really expects replies. I generally only reply if I want to continue or add to a conversation. Nevertheless, it doesn't frankly seem like you want advice here. If you want to study, literally just get off of Lemmy and back to studying, there isn't a way around it.
- You will never find a satisfying answer to this question because there isn’t one and social relationships are not transactional. Acknowledgements are nice, upvotes or comments but no one really expects replies.
  thank mate! I will consider this from now on

If you get a lot of replies, too many to individually thank, you could update your post with an "ETA: Thanks for all of the helpful replies" or something like that.
I usually just upvote and thank the especially helpful replies, or the ones that resonate with me.in particular.
- That’s very nice of you, very bad Janet
- Username does NOT check out.

I care a lot about what other people think (not good) and if someone tries to help or helps me, I can’t stay without saying thank you.
Since you consider this to be a bad thing, have you tried changing yourself? I recommend chillin' and hangin' out.
- Beef stroganoff and chill?
  
  Beef stroganoff AND chill? this is getting out of hand, now there are two of them!

I usually just throw a "thanks in advance" in the OP ¯(ツ)_/¯

I always respond to people who comment on my posts, but I don't post often. Generally speaking if I feel like the conversation has concluded, I'll stop replying. If the reply to my comment doesn't need a reply of its own (like if it's a joke, or an addition to what I said, etc) then I also don't reply.
Or I do. Whatever. There are no set rules for interacting with stuff. If you're finding it hard to keep up, just don't. For example, don't respond to this comment. Like, for practice.

I recognize this, i'm a bit of a 'thank you'er' too. Sometimes i upvote, but particularly if someone sent me an elaborate reply, or they share something personal, or they took the effort to look something up or share a link, i will thank them. However, i don't thank them so much from a feeling of low self worth (so, not because i don't want to seem ungrateful), but because i want to make them happy, or feel good. It's a bit of a shift of perspective, i think. We live in a world that can be pretty cold and harsh and i have no idea how the person that replies feels. They might be social, reply to me, move on without a second thought. But they might also be someone who generally feels depressed or worthless and in that case my sincere thanks might make their day, or at least brighten a moment in their day.
- Great comment, thank you. This is the only one I have seen so far that I really agree with. All the other replies are a bit self-absorbed, imo.
  
  Thanks for the compliment, stranger, and have a great day/evening :-)

I would say upvotes are thanks enough. But if you have something extra to say, then I'd say thanks in a comment and then give your extra information there.
For example, just "Thanks! That was useful/entertaining/enlightening/etc." as a comment is pretty pointless, as an upvote conveys that exact message. Nothing more and nothing less.
If you have something more to say, then a comment would be appropriate. Perhaps something like: "Thanks! I did your X method with a bit of extra Y and now my car runs so much quieter!".
This is especially true if your extra information would be useful to others who may also be reading the thread.

Just ask and say thank you somewhere. You don't need to thank everyone. Just thank one or two people or write it as an Edit in your post so it doesn't look abandoned. And upvote helpful answers.
I don't like the people who ask open questions and then don't clarify or reply once, don't upvote answers and abandon their post. I assume they also don't read their replies and it's just wasted time. That'd be the thing to avoid.
Regarding your time-management: Maybe write a list of things to do and a schedule for the remaining days. You can do other things if you also finish your tasks for a day. If you're behind: focus on the important stuff.

An upvote is enough. If something really helps you out and you want to say "real" thanks, once per thread is enough, even if there are follow up questions.
- 😠

I don't usually say it out loud, but I do thank people with either upvotes, faves, following them, or depending on my resources, replying with a vocaroo of me giving thanks if the acquaintanceship is semi-personal. It's sometimes better.

🥰

Eh do what feels natural to you, but if you are short on time don't go around saying thank you to everyone. Prioritize, how impactful was this interaction in the grand scheme of your life? Did the other person spend a lot of thought and time typing to answer? Those things weigh in too.
It's ok to not reply and don't take it personal if people don't reply.

This question makes me think about how would I protect precious Mr Rogers from the heinous things in the Internet (RIP if he were still with us today) because quite honestly I would love it if there were a space like his show somewhere on it.

I am a bit like you in that I do spend a lot of time replying to people who leave comments on my post...they took the time to read and reply so I figure it's just polite to respond. But also it's nice talking to people, you know? Never know when some innocuous reply you make will kick off a whole deeper conversation.
PLUS on a platform like Lemmy it also has the advantage that more comments = more visible in feeds = more replies from more people.
All that said, you do have to prioritise. Nobody's thinking you're rude if you just edit your post or make one comment saying "thanks for the input everyone, sorry I can't reply to you all individually but I appreciate the advice" or whatever. We're all busy, and most people probably don't expect a personal reply anyway. Maybe start thinking of upvoting and making a universal reply as the baseline, and doing individual replies just as a stretch goal when you have the time spare.

If it's a one or two sentence reply, then just upvote and move on. If you feel you really got something out of the effort someone took to reply, even just a "Thanks!" comment is fine, but you can elaborate on what you liked, what you learned which really shows appreciation.
Don't sweat it though, people aren't expecting anything by default.

My very small gripe with this sub is that this post will likely be removed over rule 3.
- I don't think so. It's not a support question, is a genuine and open-ended prompt for discussion. Rule 3 is more to prevent the huge amount of spam of people asking about some extremely specific technical issues that they are having.
  
  I had a post about peoples upvote/downvote habits deleted 2 days ago which wasn't a support question either. What you're saying is infact the rule but idk.

Replying to slow your gratitude seems like a nice thing to do, like holding a door open, but hardly necessary or expected. I feel like many people answering questions are just hurling their knowledge into the ether to be picked up by whoever comes across it. They know the op and perhaps more people will see it but don't expect a response. If you don't have the time just hit that upvote button, you've done nothing wrong. But if you do have the time don't feel like you are doing something wrong by responding, it's the unexpected things that are the most precious.
- thank you man!

There’s a lot of trolls and bad people out there. When talking to people or debating someone, a handy tip is to try to assume the other person is acting in good faith until they give you a reason to doubt them. That way you’re not attacking a person for asking a legitimate question.

I don’t have much insight for you, but thank you for sharing.

I reply "thank you" a bunch. Do it if it makes you happy, don't if you don't wanna. It'll all work out.

I've never posted asks for help that exploded, so that helps.
Simple comments that don't really add anything to the thread I'll upvote just cause unless they're shitty.
I'll reply with an emoji or or a short "thanks for the help" if anything that was offered was legitimately helpful.

Disabling NSFW is a start
- The Internet is for porn
  
  polite and gratefull person
  🤔

- This is extremely childish. I don't think about my waiter once I leave the restaurant but that doesn't mean that I won't be polite while I'm there. There are (usually) real people reading your words. That interaction is real.

You show your appreciation by giving all your money to big tech.
Edit: Thanks for the gold, kind stranger!

46 comments