To Post or to Search?
Posted: Thu May 08, 2014 5:48 pm
Hmm, I've been chewing on this, Duane. Certainly we all get to do what we want to do. I get to type (since I like it so much) just as you get to not type (because you don't like it so much). So why discourage somebody who want's to know from posting questions here on Boxerworks, which is of course on the internet?Duane Ausherman wrote: I have to disagree with Ken. He likes typing and I hate it. Or, maybe he is looking for something to do. That is why I have a website devoted to this subject of BMWs. I am only willing to type it up once and then it is your job to go read it. Google finds it very easily and instantly.' About 5 websites hold nearly everything that you could want to know about your /5. Put them in your favorites. Read them in detail for future reference. One person showed me a print out of my website and it took an entire ream of paper.
The implication would seem to be that superior advice would be forthcoming from somebody who went to the trouble to obtain a domain and put up a website. Perhaps so, but would would that necessarily diminish the value of what information is exchanged on Boxerworks. Is it about credentials?
There are several people posting here on Boxerworks whose advice I greatly respect. You are one of them, for perhaps obvious reasons such as your long term dealer experience and personal shop experience. Major Softie is another, if only because he is very careful in his posting, making sure what he posts is accurate and defensible. Plus he has made it his business to know a lot of things about a lot of things. And that's just two people who I choose to name.
Now I'm going to go, once again, into a direction that I often go. Boxerworks is as much, if not more, a social network of disparate people (as opposed to desperate people) gathered together because of a common interest/infatuation. That is BMW motorcycles. There is also a huge element of mutual support. We are communicating with people who know where we're coming from. Just as we might ask a friend about some problem in our life, we ask here, before even thinking about consulting with a professional. Here we communicate with our friends (met and unmet) about problems we're having with our motorcycles.
Why not ask here? We still have the option of going out on the internet to the "expert" sites. Who would we just talk to if Boxerworks shut down? We all have some experience with that last concern. Boxerworks has often gone down, sometimes for extended periods. That empty feeling we have on those occasions would seem to tell us something about the value of Boxerworks, just as it is.
And that's all I have to say about that--until the subject comes up again.