This might be a silly question, but why do we even allow NONMEMBERS on these boards?

[tank_monkey]

There are currently 3000 users online. 58 members and 2942 guests
Most users ever online was 12,460, 01-17-2013 at 12:40 AM.

There are only 58 of us actual members, and there are 2942 "Mystery" anonymous persons who can't be bothered to even make an account. Why is all of our stuff open to these mystery people?

Some of you guys talk a bout your personal lives, personal problems, etc. I figure you guys have become comfortable enough with speaking about such matters with the membership as we have it now. But it kinda bugs me that there are literally thousands of extra 'eyes' on everything we post that we have no idea who they are. And WHY are they all remaining anonymous? It's just a little creepy, that's all.

Thoughts?

[l921428x]

People do join forums after lurking. My deal is something else. Where do you join? Where do you send money?

[recon]

Agree! We still have good info on this site. Most of the people that were causing issues here are gone. You basically have including this one 4 others sites that deal with this type of weapon. Most of those site are way busier than this one. But your right there are a lot of lurkers everyday here. Not sure how to increase people to join us. It seems that only a hand full of us are here everyday. I find it interesting also that we have as of today 7,341 Members with only 99 Active ones. Not really a good thing.

[rci2950]

I am just glad that they find us interesting enough to lurk on.

[skorpion]

What I find interesting is it's like that every day at any given time. There are always thousands of lurkers. Threads from this board do end up on top of Google searches quite often, so that's my non-expert theory as to why there are so many lurkers.

[imanaknut]

It would be nice to see more firearm owners join Gunsnet. It would be nice to have more on-going firearm discussions like "the good old days".

We would just have to be more careful since the rules of this site differ from virtually every other, as we allow discussions that many other sites ban.

[JTHunter]

There are 4 forums I keep reading beside this one. Those are Gun Rights Media, Open Carry (.org), the High Road, and Illinois Carry (.com). For the last 2-4 months, GRM and Open Carry seem to have the least amount of traffic with THR and Illinois Carry being one and two steps up. I don't know if the reason was the impending election, the holidays, or what, but the most valuable information I get comes from IC, possibly because that's where I live. They have people that monitor the State House in Springfield and keep us apprised of upcoming or impending legislation and votes.
One site seems to have a penchant for taking a "holier-than-thou" attitude and almost seems afraid to get "down & dirty" and fight the fights that need to be fought against both the antis and the pols that are their shills. Another concentrates on one form of carry with seemingly little interest in other forms.
All these sites have tidbits of info that can be interesting/useful as well as some interesting discussions. They all have a few "bad apples" that seem to delight in creating chaos. We just need to learn to ignore (or eject) those malcontents.

[jet3534]

It might be interesting to set up a place for lurkers to post (as a guest without registration) and ask them why they are lurking.

[tank_monkey]

I've heard 'rumors' (unsubstantiated of course), that many lurkers on gun forums can be of the following: 1) anti gun activists - looking for something or something to pin on 'gun owners'. Usually it's a long term job, constantly screening innocuous stuff in the hopes of finding something that is damning to the gun rights cause 2) law enforcement - again some bored persons who are not necessarily pro gun, but looking for any evidence of criminal activity (as if anyone on here was dumb enough to post that publicly .... try facebook if you really want to catch people breaking the law). I for one have never seen anyone (other than jokingly) talk about any activity that's illegal. In fact we often discuss the actual LAWS themselves and educate everyone within earshot as to what is legal and not legal. No one has ever 'bragged' about doing something illegal on any gun forum I've seen in the last 25 years. 3) Media - again, some intern keeping tabs on 'those gun nuts' - casually browsing the threads to see if anything 'sensationalist' pops out at them. They are not friends of RKBA but casually surfing the net on the side, looking for something to jump on. 4) Generic stalkers - persons who just enjoy watching everyone else but never participate in any conversations. If they ARE up to no good, they never post any way because the majority of the membership would come down hard on them, or else a MOD would ban them immediately. 5) Introverts - aka those who just want to read everything we post because they find it interesting, but never chime in on anything. 6) Federal agencies types - a lot of government agencies have to justify their positions and budgets. I've heard in the past that places like the SLPC counts Civil War Reenactor groups as 'extremist groups' and the FBI accepts their reports without question. It's lazy and it's padding of the stats of 'domestic threats' by government bureaucrats to keep as an ace up their sleeve, when they have to justify their budgets. I'm sure that 'some' fed agency is surfing ALL of the forums and boards (NSA) as a general rule of thumb to look for any 'domestic terror' groups. If they were smart, they'd concentrate on any Islamic or Jihadi boards, rather than American gun owners. But I think that's the case now. The 'hey day' of blaming angry white Christian Males came after the OKC bombing and the WACO raids of Bill Clinton and Janet Reno. Remember when "militias' were the boogeymen of the day, in entertainment and the new media. Then those pesky MUSLIM terrorists went and had to ruin it for the liberal media, by becoming the single largest threat to human existence in the world. Even though the Feds have their hands full, trying to catch and monitor Islamic groups, I know that some moron, somewhere is still tracking all 'alt right' (in their eyes) groups like Tea Party, Patriots, NRA types, et al.

[NAPOTS]

that is a lot of people that don't belong for sure. Some might actually be members. I usually don't log on until I respond to a post.

Any chance some of them are bots for google, data collection, etc? I am honestly not sure how all of that works.

[imanaknut]

Good point on the possibility that some are bots for data collection by either federal agencies, anti-gunners or search engines.

[O.S.O.K.]

Yes I believe that the "guests" number includes search hits and bots. I would suspect that most of that number are such.

[5.56NATO]

The multitude of lurkers can click ads and generate revenue for the site owner.

[l921428x]

Good point on the possibility that some are bots for data collection by either federal agencies, anti-gunners or search engines.

I got laughed at and scolded on another gun forum when I said "you know they monitor this place" and a mod basically told me to prove it
or I did not know what I was talking about and couldn't prove it. Got banned from there btw. I hate the high road you are on their shit list if you say ak.

[Helen Keller]

unless they clear their cookies/cache it will count as a guest if they have ever been here.

[rci2950]

My work computer resets gunsnet whenever i close the browser. So usually i only log in if i want to say something.

[Helen Keller]

no it doesn't. only your IT guy can do that.


unless they totally remove all cookies/caches of any form it will still show as if you are looking at this.

[l921428x]

Yeah you have to clear your cache which leaves all blank.

[Helen Keller]

Got to count the bots too.

[rci2950]

no it doesn't. only your IT guy can do that.


unless they totally remove all cookies/caches of any form it will still show as if you are looking at this.

You are probably right. It is Wondows after all I don't use windows personally so i don't know