When people on a social site, such as this one, complain about "time wasting questions", does that mean they have too much time on their hands?

There are probably other issues floating about. Let’s say that someone is only a member of Fluther in order to ask, read and respond to questions regarding serious current events. There are features in place that allow members to customize what gets sent their way. Easy-peasy. Maybe they just haven’t figured out how to manage their account, or maybe they cannot resist temptation to spend more time on the site then they desire. Or…maybe they feel like the site should cater to a very specific type of Q&A.

Yes what @Pied_Pfeffer said.

YARNLADY is crafting a response…

This should be good ;)

I don’t like it when every time the season changes, there are multiple questions about which season you like best. How many times can or should we answer the same questions? Or are the more seasoned members just supposed to skip them, and only new people answer?

You can’t waste time. You always do what you choose to do, given the constraints of the situation. If you are complaining about wasting time, then it’s because you want to do that, and you want to call what you do names. It’s a form of self-denigration.

People don’t like to admit to denigrating themselves, so they blame it on the question. Yeah. The question forced me to answer it. What could I do? I hate wasting time, but really, it was beyond my control.

Yeah. Right.

What @wundayatta said.

@YARNLADY So I can’t tell if you were being rhetorical or not, so if you were, just ignore this:

Yes. You are supposed to skip over them. Or reply, and let new people know how you feel about the various seasons. Just like if you don’t want to help someone with their yeast infection, you skip that, and if you don’t want to talk politics, you skip that, and if you couldn’t possibly care about etymology, you skip the questions about that.

@papayalily A little of both. So eventually, the older users will simply be weeded out by the simple fact that the majority of questions are duplicates, and nothing is left.

@YARNLADY Yup. And that’s the circle of life.

I’ve answered similar questions twice, sometimes my mood has changed, or maybe even my opinion by the time they are asked again!

Hopefully older members won’t be weeded out due to repetitions, maybe they could provide links to previously posted questions that were of similar content, that way the asker can see lots more resposes to their question that may be missed due to more estblished members not wanting to repeat their answers!

No. It just means that some folks aren’t happy unless they’re unhappy. If it wasn’t time wasting questions it would be unfair moderation. If it wasn’t unfair moderations it would be number of questions I can ask. The waste of time lies in trying to appease people like this.

The best one can do is sit smugly above the rabble and snicker.

I have the slowest computer on the planet (til my new one is loaded with cool stuff and ready) and yet I have no problem skipping over stuff I’m not interested in and clicking on stuff I want to read, and my “Just For You” section is as off base as everyone else’s. Unless one is very seriously disabled, having to push a couple of extra buttons really shouldn’t get your knickers in a twist. If you don’t like a question, Don’t click on it! Is that so hard?

Edit to add; I guess I didn’t answer your question, just wanted to bitch a bit…:-)

@JilltheTooth MUST NOT CLICK ON IT

OK, with a name like “coffeenut” how could I not!!!!?????!!! By the way, I’m covered with those!

@coffeenut XD! Real cute. Talk about time wasting…and to think we use to pass those kind of e-mails around at work.

@YARNLADY Do you seriously believe that all the questions there are to ask will have been asked on fluther?

I can’t imagine that. I think there are smart people here and there will be smart people here and they have interesting thoughts and come up with interesting questions, and that will go on as long as fluther maintains its current form.

@wundayatta No, I still find enough to spend several hours here, but I’m talking about if no one else even cares. I will be the same thing as (that other site) when the same questions are asked over and over. Thank goodness many of the users do care, but more and more duplicates and nonsense are coming in.

@sakura I frequently do answer again, and I try to find previous questions when I spot a duplicate for the very reason you have suggested.

@YARNLADY that’s great I would too if I knew how!
ps I hope you don’t get weeded out!

what @wundayatta said. On the internet, nobody can FORCE you to waste your time. You have to choose to spend the time to do so, and how can you complain about it!
I still stand by my stance that asking duplicate questions is just FINE. If you got exactly the same answers from exactly the same people, then it would be bad. But you don’t. You get totally different answers from different people, and a whole new perspective.

@Dutchess_III Well, as you know, I still think that the users have a right to see all the answers to a question, not just the latest ones, which is why I link the previous questions whenever I find them.

If I see another duplicate question or even if I don’t, I’ll be getting weeded out later today. ;-)

@YARNLADY Uh….I rarely exercise my right to read ALL the answers to a question! I’m bad.

@Dutchess_III It is my pleasure to provide that choice to people who could exercise that right.

I don’t have the time.

Each person is responsible for their own time. If they think a question is a waste of time, they don’t have to spend their time answering it.