Web forums - what drives these people?

I mean, I was googling for stuff about cbrxx jumping out of gear, and a
post of mine (from here) about cornish pasties turned up as a post in a
web forum called "bike forums", in which I had posted as "guest". If you
poke around the page, this ng is mentioned, so they're not claiming it as
their own, but it does to the untrained eye, suggest that I posted in
their poxy forum.

So a web forum that harvests usenet stuff and re-pushes it out to appear
like it's a popular forum with millions of posters, and adds a bunch of
google ads to make a few bob. You can reply to my pastie post - if you're
a registered user on that forum. So your reply will only appear there and
not where it was posted ie; I wouldn't see the reply.

What a load of old tosh.

 

and there is the answer to your question.

 

Quite. Some forums have been doing that for years, it started back when
Usenet was more popular.

 

I remeber coming across a site a few years back that was getting into
that. Aggregating content and making it look original, making lots of
money. These sites are thankfully fairly obvious. And pointless.

 

Well, yes, we know that to be true

But when you reply to a post in google groups, that originated in a
"proper" ng, the reply goes there via usenet, doesn't it? Not to a
"google group".

 

Yes, but user of 'google groups' that was unaware of usenet, wouldn't
know the difference.

 

The I don't post

simples

 

Using the patented Mavis Beacon "Hunt&Peck" Technique, YTC#1

<signs off YTC's licence for another month>

These re-qualifications seem to come around more and more often.