Fodors Addiction??
 

I came across an old thread last night whilst looking up Holland,about becoming addicted to this site!
It was started a few years ago and I'm sure there will have been many others along the same lines.

It was very interesting and funny to read, but I noticed there are a lot of new names on this board now.
So instead of bringing it back to the top and having to go through hundreds of posts, I thought it would be easier to start a new thread, and some of the newer 'Fodor Addicts' could have their say!

As I said on an earlier post today I only discovered Fodors when I was planning my trip to Prague for last month.
I now find myself wondering about the pro's and con's of people's trips sometimes if they seem a bit too much, or am really happy for people who are excited about their trip, even if it's somewhere I've never been!

Anyone else going to admit to being an addict?
My name is Angel, and I haven't refreshed the Fodor's page for at least .....ooh half an hour :D

" and I haven't refreshed the Fodor's page for at least .....ooh half an hour"

Then at least you're not a true addict and have a chance. It's when you start clicking the refresh button every few minutes that the 12 Step Program is recommended. By the way, I love when UK people use the word "whilst" instead of our "while". Sounds much cooler.
((H))

One morning I woke up at the computer at about 3 AM. My hands were on the keyboard and the screen which had a "post a reply" window from Fodors was filled with thousands of odd letters. Do you think I qualify?

maitaitom : 'whilst' I may have mentioned 'half an hour' I was just pretending not to be too addicted!

In fact I divide my time equally between my local football team messageboard and this one, so I can't be so addicted can I......REFRESH,REFRESH,REFRESH.....did I miss anything :D

My name is Cindy, and I am a Fodors addict. I like read about where people are going and gather info for my trip files. My next trip is in July - 5 days in Paris and then 8-9 days in Switzerland. For me, researching and planning is half the fun of trip.

Addiction? Oh PuhLEEZE! How dare you? You must be joking? I could go WEEKS without signing on here, really, believe me. I don't ever even think about it. Never. Addiction? No, never, jamais!
I suppose you'll say I'm in denial?

patrick, sounds like a typical posting from me :D

Cindy, nice to hear from another addict, hope you have a great trip :)

I can quit any time I want. I just don't want to quit.

Oh no! I seem to be coming down with many of the symptoms you all mentioned . . . refreshing often, falling asleep at the mouse, reading threads that are over six years old. I've only been reading this board for a month. Can I be a fodor-holic already? Say it isn't so.

Guilty as Charged!~
I can't seem to get enough!

What I'm wondering is what makes it so addictive.
I am not a regular, but also find myself frequently attracted to the site. I usually don't live vicariously, but I start researching a trip to Paris, and suddenly find myself reading about Moscow subways or Italian honeymoons. Can't figure it out....

Yes, Angel_UK, I am an addict. Have been. Will be, till they pull my "cold dead hands" from the refresh button! ;-) Judy

I CONFESS...I Am GUILTY...I cant stay away from Fodors...

I was a lurker before, then came the SF GTG and I got hooked! So many great people all in one place! The people are actually as nice as they sound online!!! :)

Is there a "refresh" button? Quick, where is it? :((

No.
Denial IS a river in Egypt.

Yes I think I am addicted, I think it is fun to read all the different trips, plans and questions.

But sometimes I worry about myself when I think about someone's thread when I am not even on the computer! Yesterday I was showering and thinking about how I could answer someone's question about a honeymoon!

I think our little Fodor reply boxes are like windows onto the world.

I think this site is extremely helpful, and I find the members on here incredibly knowledgeable!! Sometimes though, people throw a lot more than their two cents in without knowing the full story, and I've seen and experienced unnecessary personal "attacks." Maybe some Fodorites need more entertainment in their lives, I don't know.
Overall though, this place is a really fantastic and wonderful travel resource!!

After reading this post, I feel so much better. My husband thinks I'm addicted, but I have never used the refresh button, so obviously I'm not.
Thanks!

LOL Patrick. QWERTY wasn't emblazoned upon your forehead, was it?

It's difficult to live down that tell-tale sign at an FA (Fodors Anon) meeting.

You don't have to click on the refresh/reload button. Just click on Europe in red at the top of the topics list. Works the same way.

Definitely a head-over-heels addicted pin-wearing Fodorite. Since 1998.

Addicted? Every time I get up to go to the computer, my husband asks if I'm going to "smoke crack"!

Yes and no. I go through periods when I'm addicted and periods when I couldn't care less aboput it. Right now I'm somehwere in between.

I've learned a lot of fascinating information from people who post here. It has been exciting to be exposed to people with vastly different personalities and characters from many different regions of many countries, just by clicking on this gizmo attached to my computer. Some messages sound so bright, funny, articulate, that reading them energizes me. Others are so mean spirited that it's discouraging.

In general, I'm not very proud of being a "regular" here, because I do think that, while it's entertaining and often enlightening, it is not worth the amount of time that it gobbles up--time that maybe could be spent outdoors or drawing or doing work or being with people face-to-face, or even simply e-mailing more with the people I know instead of exchanging posts with strangers. But, even knowing that, I keep checking Fodors anyway, and posting now and then, so I suppose I am addicted.

The thing I find most fascinating, even more than the great travel info, is observing the personalities--how some people reveal SO much personal info. on a huge, busy, very public board, and how some people create a whole superficial public "persona" that may or may not be much like their real selves, and how we all interact and almost THINK we know one another, just based on the bits and pieces revealed on the board. When I first came to Fodors in 2000, I was very leery of becoming too much of a "public" figure on a big public Internet forum, and in a way, I still am. So for that reason, while I do like to "talk" (and write), I read a lot more than I post here, and I'm not really addicted to posting and I'd rather not be TOO much of a "personality" when I post. Right now, it's late, and I just felt like being honest.

Iregeo, LOL!

Yeah, all you people are fooling yourself that you aren't so far gone as to click the "refresh" button (which is F5, EasyTraveler). Clicking on the board forum (Europe or whatever) or on your own name also refreshes, so you're probably a lot farther gone than you realize.

I would question my sanity if there weren't so many other people who are obviously just as hooked as I am.

There is an amazing amount of information for we travel junkies, but you must also admit - some days, some threads are way better than any daytime soap opera.

Groan! Gotta admit it, I'm an addict, too!

But where else can you get so much useful, specific information delivered with wit and humor (also, at times, some hilariously bizarre commentary) just for the asking?

I'm so grateful to posters like StCirq who helped me snag a great room in a quiet hotel, grateful for the soothing kindess of Scarlett at a time when I was hesitant about flying, the long distance encouragement of Marilyn, the lightheartedness of OliveOyl, the detailed trip reports from Bookchick, as well as, in the past, advice from S.Fowler.

Degas, Lord of the Catfish, is a world unto himself. Ira is precisely informative. Maitaitom makes me laugh. BTilke knows her stuff. Patrick, gentlemanly yet tart, qualifies as our ambassador to the world at large.

Like an Oscar winner, I could go on and on naming those deserving of our appreciation. Instead, on behalf of this community of enthralled and entertained addicts, I'll just send out a gigantic THANK YOU from all of us to all of you! We're a circle that goes round and round.

Marilyn: Thanks a mil!

Croque Madame: Right on!

Recently I asked about Sonoma and was given terrific information by PamSF, razzledazzle, and others. SAB gave me a great recommendation for tapas on a different thread.

Keep the great advice and tips coming - please!

You're welcome, EasyTraveler.

What a lovely post, Croque Madame! I share the sentiment. This is the most amazing travel resource I've ever found, but that still doesn't explain why I spend so many hours here!

Addiction?? I'm afraid so. Came to the computer just now to do some "real" work. But the lure of Fodors was just too strong. Still, if I have to have an addiction, I think this is a good one!

Who? Me?? Addicted?
Noooo!! I can quit anytime I want!!
Really I can.

What's the Refresh button for?

I note that if you pull down all the talk on a particular country, in time the system "self-refreshes" back to "Europe". Very annoying!

Fodor's is third on my favourites list right below Hotmail and Lonely Planet. But in four years of reading it I have yet to follow up on any tip - too highbrow and too 'top-end of the market' for me I'm afraid. Still, it is interesting to see how the wealthy half experiences their travels, and ask oneself if they enjoy it any more than others do on the budget trail.

If only this was the sole addiction...

Harzer: While many people tell about their travels in a rented car, which would be much too expensive for me when I travel alone, I don't think all or even most of the advice posted is necessarily so "high-end." For example, one of the people I find most helpful is Steve James, who posts excellent information about public transportation in Italy, and for me, that's a much less expensive and slower way to travel than renting a car and whizzing around over vast distances. It's just that many of the posters travel much more often than the average person, and many of them go repeatedly to the same country or city, so their advice is very sophisticated and may therefore sound high-end.

I think that Fodors are aware of the bizarre addictive nature of this Forum and are looking at ideas to bring it back to information for travelers by travelers.What changes would you like to see on this Forum !

3713 posts by ira in less than a year,is that addiction,obsession or not !.

There are days when I wonder if this is running away from reality and other days when coming here means confronting reality.

Days when I feel like Darwin visiting the Galapagos Islands and days when I feel like **I'm** one of the creatures on the Galapagos Islands. :)

But maybe that's why I'm hooked - because either way, we are living, breathing, fallible, wonderful human beings and not robots.

<<I think that Fodors are aware of the bizarre addictive nature of this Forum and are looking at ideas to bring it back to information for travelers by travelers.>>

What are the indications that they are thinking this?

I think they can't do THAT much to "manage" this forum, though clearly two changes instituted - - almost one year ago today - - HAVE improved it; registration has sharply curbed the nasty, mudslinging environment that used to get out of hand. And the ability to cite a URL for an old thread makes it much easier to point newcomers to information that has been well compiled in the recent, or not-so-recent past.

I have to chuckle to myself that I was roasted publicly, when I called for both of these things - - in a very outspoken way (too outspoken, perhaps; I guess that was part of the problem) - - well before they ever implemented.

Indexing is the one area where "performance" could be improved. Unique place names are more or less completely reliable, but "common" words are so difficult to use in a search. Someone posted on this stumper just in the past week: how do you find info - - easily - - on the Hotel Amsterdam in England? The city of York is another hard one (though you can use the rarely useful Boolean "not", as in "York not new").

And the "country designators" might well be better used, though it would depend heavily on those who post, and I can't think of any easy to retro-convert the million or so posts already here. It mkes very little sense to be able to search specifically on the countries Andorra, or Belarus, or San Marino - - yet not have a similar designator for Rome or Venice.

One final comment: I found it interesting and enjoyable to read the longer and more thoughtful post by cmt. I feel like Carol is a personality here, and, as a corollary, one of the things I know about her is that she is not so keen on that.

My addiction has waxed and waned, perhaps to greater and lesser degrees, just as hers has. All during the last six months or so - - what with moving and building a new house - - I actually thought I was on my last wane here. No trip since last May, and none currently on the horizon for perhaps a year - - big family splurge in California, post-graduation for us - - though there is always a "next trip" loosedly kicking around in my head.

But January always rejuvenates this forum, and I am back on a wax again. There is nothing wrong with this forum that isn't helped with all the newcomers, their fresh questions and perspectives - - the lifeblood of this forum. There's been a big influx of fresh energy here in January every year times four, in my experience, and I was glad to see it happen again this year.

Addicted? well almost certainly for another 11 months, it seems.

Best wishes,

Rex

Hello Folks,

Thanks, angel, for refreshing a good thread!

So, how do you know you're addicted? Mine: I have a few cozy inns picked out and a workable list of activities planned for destinations I have no earthly intent or desire to go to.

You?

My best,

s

Does my husband's threats to divorce me if I don't "get off that damn Fodor's message board" qualify me as an addict? :O

I loath this cellphone age; continuous e-mail deluge; etc. I confess, however, to a Fodor's addiction. Why? For two reasons:

1. It is an invaluable help in getting personal travel experiences about particular places and things.
2. It can help suggest new places to go and things to do.

Since it has helped me I try to share information on things I know something about to other Fodorites. Let's hope we can all continue to experience the thrill of entering the Musee D'Orsay, or walking through St.Stephen's Green, or crossing the Ponte Vecchio. I thank God for the privilege of travel.

Statia, my husband's given up! He used to rant; now he just sighs. I don't post nearly as much post-trip as prior, but that doesn't mean that I don't check in every day and read what's going on! I'm logged in on every computer in the house, just 'in case' I want to take a peek, no matter what floor I'm on! Now that's bad. I press the red FIND button to refresh. Is that what everyone else does?