AARoads Forum

Hi, I am here just to do a quick experiment. Id like the see the average age of an AARoads forum user. I am pretty young, at 13 years old. What bout you guys? Answer down below.  :bigass: :bigass: :bigass: :spin: :spin: :spin: :-D :-D

Suggestion:  Open any thread on this forum with some length - some posters have their age shown.  Likely enough do to be a representative distribution of ages.

My guess is the average is 44.

Quote from: JayhawkCO on August 26, 2022, 09:16:01 AM
My guess is the average is 44.

I guess that makes me about average as possible then.

I am one of the younger users on the forum as I am 20 and still in college. But I would say 40s is about accurate.

Quote from: BlueOutback7 on August 26, 2022, 09:20:14 AM
I am one of the younger users on the forum as I am 20 and still in college. But I would say 40s is about accurate.

I'd think a bit younger.

I'll guess somewhere between 35-40.

Quote from: Mapmikey on August 26, 2022, 09:12:56 AM
Suggestion:  Open any thread on this forum with some length - some posters have their age shown.  Likely enough do to be a representative distribution of ages.

Thanks for the suggestion man.

I actually think it's significantly less, maybe 27.

Quote from: 1 on August 26, 2022, 10:57:52 AM
I actually think it's significantly less, maybe 27.

If you do it post by post maybe it skews that young.  :biggrin:

There may be a few outliers in the ages posted.  Some people put their DOB as some time in the 22nd century, so they'll appear with a negative age.   :spin:

Quote from: JayhawkCO on August 26, 2022, 10:58:37 AM

Quote from: 1 on August 26, 2022, 10:57:52 AM
I actually think it's significantly less, maybe 27.

If you do it post by post maybe it skews that young.  :biggrin:

This might actually be true, with younger users posting about topics that older users had already answered before this forum existed (e.g. on MTR, etc)

Quote from: SectorZ on August 26, 2022, 09:16:54 AM

Quote from: JayhawkCO on August 26, 2022, 09:16:01 AM
My guess is the average is 44.

I guess that makes me about average as possible then.

Me too, starting today at least.

If I had SQL access like Alex and rickmastfan do, I could write a script that would offer a definitive answer to this.

I probably wouldn't, because I'm both lazy and have other things I should be doing instead, but I could do it.

make a poll with couple of 5-year age brackets. Below 10 and above 80 can be safely omitted.

Quote from: JayhawkCO on August 26, 2022, 10:58:37 AM

Quote from: 1 on August 26, 2022, 10:57:52 AM
I actually think it's significantly less, maybe 27.

If you do it post by post maybe it skews that young.  :biggrin:

Thankfully tolbs17 was banned before he could reach having 50% of the forum's posts.

It would be easy enough to run through the top-100 or so users and take an average... if I find the time...

Quote from: webny99 on August 26, 2022, 11:03:32 PM
It would be easy enough to run through the top-100 or so users and take an average... if I find the time...

Not necessarily.  A quick look at the 21 users who have 10K+ posts shows that 5 of them (myself included) do not list their age.  5 others just in this thread alone also do not list their age (although the OP did mention his).  So you may well have some skew regardless of how you look at it.

I'm a fair bit older than the number shown on my mixup-shield avatar.  Think I've mentioned here that the NPS "America the Beautiful" lifetime pass is only a few months away...

I'm assuming over 18 because Chris Hansen hasn't shown up at any of our roadmeets.

I refuse to age. I'm gonna live forever.  :pan: :)

The age I show is my legal age, which differs from my real age because I had to cancel my birthday once :sombrero:.

Quote from: cjk374 on August 29, 2022, 05:58:03 AM
I refuse to age. I'm gonna live forever.  :pan: :)

Yeah I wish :-D :-D :-D :-D :bigass: :bigass:

Quote from: CNGL-Leudimin on August 29, 2022, 08:17:25 AM
The age I show is my legal age, which differs from my real age because I had to cancel my birthday once :sombrero:.

I've never heard of separate legal/real ages before...  :confused:

Quote from: vdeane on August 29, 2022, 01:02:31 PM

Quote from: CNGL-Leudimin on August 29, 2022, 08:17:25 AM
The age I show is my legal age, which differs from my real age because I had to cancel my birthday once :sombrero:.

I've never heard of separate legal/real ages before...  :confused:

In some East Asian cultures, you start off as 1 year old at birth instead of 0, so your "real age" is 1 higher than what it legally is. I'm not sure if Spanish culture have something similar.

Quote from: JayhawkCO on August 26, 2022, 10:58:37 AM

Quote from: 1 on August 26, 2022, 10:57:52 AM
I actually think it's significantly less, maybe 27.

If you do it post by post maybe it skews that young.  :biggrin:

On the flipside, If we rank by road meets attended... the numbers will skew older. There are reasons for this, namely that younger folks (teens) are less likely to have a license, reliable car, or spending money.

Quote from: SkyPesos on August 29, 2022, 01:31:49 PM
In some East Asian cultures, you start off as 1 year old at birth instead of 0, so your "real age" is 1 higher than what it really is. I'm not sure if Spanish culture have something similar.

Nope, age reckoning in Spain is like in the USA. I claim to be one year younger than I actually am because my birthday, in April, was in the middle of the coronavirus lockdown in 2020, and as result I was forced to cancel it that year and thus I don't count it.

Almost 22, been here since I was 18/19 ish.

Quote from: cjk374 on August 29, 2022, 05:58:03 AM
I refuse to age. I'm gonna live forever.  :pan: :)

Fame https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nqMmquNLnHg

Quote from: CNGL-Leudimin on August 29, 2022, 02:18:50 PM
I claim to be one year younger than I actually am because my birthday, in April, was in the middle of the coronavirus lockdown in 2020, and as result I was forced to cancel it that year and thus I don't count it.

You canceled your birthday party?  That's not at all the same thing.  I mean, if I don't have to count any birthdays just because I didn't have a party, then I could do the same thing but for different reasons.  For example, on one of my birthdays I was in the middle of a huge fight with my girlfriend, she told me she "needed space", and it was about the worst birthday ever.  Does that count as a -1 instead of a +1 to my age?

Quote from: kphoger on August 29, 2022, 06:21:58 PM

Quote from: CNGL-Leudimin on August 29, 2022, 02:18:50 PM
I claim to be one year younger than I actually am because my birthday, in April, was in the middle of the coronavirus lockdown in 2020, and as result I was forced to cancel it that year and thus I don't count it.

You canceled your birthday party?  That's not at all the same thing.  I mean, if I don't have to count any birthdays just because I didn't have a party, then I could do the same thing but for different reasons.  For example, on one of my birthdays I was in the middle of a huge fight with my girlfriend, she told me she "needed space", and it was about the worst birthday ever.  Does that count as a -1 instead of a +1 to my age?

This is the guy who unilaterally changed the name of the 2020 Olympics and refuses to call K-96 by its real name.

Quote from: CNGL-Leudimin on August 29, 2022, 08:17:25 AM
The age I show is my legal age, which differs from my real age because I had to cancel my birthday once

Quote from: CNGL-Leudimin on August 29, 2022, 02:18:50 PM
I claim to be one year younger than I actually am because my birthday, in April, was in the middle of the coronavirus lockdown in 2020, and as result I was forced to cancel it that year and thus I don't count it.

Wait a minute.  Let's back up here a bit.

In that first quote, you imply that your "real age" is one year younger than your legal age.  This, because I assume your legal age didn't skip a year, and therefore you legally turned one year older on your canceled birthday.

However, in the second quote, you admit that the age you claim to be is one year younger than the age you "actually" are.

So aren't you saying that your "real age" is not the same as the age you "actually" are?  Isn't that a contradiction?  Aren't reality and actuality the same thing?  (I'm not asking Immanuel Kant.)

Quote from: cjk374 on August 29, 2022, 05:58:03 AM
I refuse to age. I'm gonna live forever.  :pan: :)

Barring accidents?  ;)

Quote from: kphoger on August 29, 2022, 07:28:44 PM

Quote from: CNGL-Leudimin on August 29, 2022, 08:17:25 AM
The age I show is my legal age, which differs from my real age because I had to cancel my birthday once

Quote from: CNGL-Leudimin on August 29, 2022, 02:18:50 PM
I claim to be one year younger than I actually am because my birthday, in April, was in the middle of the coronavirus lockdown in 2020, and as result I was forced to cancel it that year and thus I don't count it.

Wait a minute.  Let's back up here a bit.

In that first quote, you imply that your "real age" is one year younger than your legal age.  This, because I assume your legal age didn't skip a year, and therefore you legally turned one year older on your canceled birthday.

However, in the second quote, you admit that the age you claim to be is one year younger than the age you "actually" are.

So aren't you saying that your "real age" is not the same as the age you "actually" are?  Isn't that a contradiction?  Aren't reality and actuality the same thing?  (I'm not asking Immanuel Kant.)

Actual age likely means the number used to buy alcohol, while the real number is kept secret and is only revealed to girls ...

So my 80 year old grandma can be 60 if she just cancels her last 20 years worth of birthdays? She'll be thrilled. We've solved one of the greatest problems faced by humanity.

Hey, sports fans believe you can cancel a team winning a game by administrative fiat. If that's possible, anything is.

Quote from: kphoger on August 29, 2022, 06:21:58 PM

Quote from: CNGL-Leudimin on August 29, 2022, 02:18:50 PM
I claim to be one year younger than I actually am because my birthday, in April, was in the middle of the coronavirus lockdown in 2020, and as result I was forced to cancel it that year and thus I don't count it.

You canceled your birthday party?  That's not at all the same thing.  I mean, if I don't have to count any birthdays just because I didn't have a party, then I could do the same thing but for different reasons.  For example, on one of my birthdays I was in the middle of a huge fight with my girlfriend, she told me she "needed space", and it was about the worst birthday ever.  Does that count as a -1 instead of a +1 to my age?

I think he's saying it counts at +0, not +1 or -1

Quote from: webny99 on August 30, 2022, 08:23:27 AM

Quote from: kphoger on August 29, 2022, 06:21:58 PM

Quote from: CNGL-Leudimin on August 29, 2022, 02:18:50 PM
I claim to be one year younger than I actually am because my birthday, in April, was in the middle of the coronavirus lockdown in 2020, and as result I was forced to cancel it that year and thus I don't count it.

You canceled your birthday party?  That's not at all the same thing.  I mean, if I don't have to count any birthdays just because I didn't have a party, then I could do the same thing but for different reasons.  For example, on one of my birthdays I was in the middle of a huge fight with my girlfriend, she told me she "needed space", and it was about the worst birthday ever.  Does that count as a -1 instead of a +1 to my age?

I think he's saying it counts at +0, not +1 or -1

For him, yes, because of COVID.  I was just supposing that maybe having to cancel a birthday party with plenty of advance notice isn't quite as bad as finding oneself in the middle of relationship purgatory.

Quote from: Scott5114 on August 30, 2022, 03:21:19 AM
Hey, sports fans believe you can cancel a team winning a game by administrative fiat. If that's possible, anything is.

I don't think they do, actually.

My favorite is that IOC pretends that the 1906 Intercalary Games never took place.

If a birthday only counts if you had a party, then I'm exactly 0 years old.

Quote from: hbelkins on August 30, 2022, 12:06:19 PM
If a birthday only counts if you had a party, then I'm exactly 0 years old.

You've never had a birthday party?

Quote from: hbelkins on August 30, 2022, 12:06:19 PM
If a birthday only counts if you had a party, then I'm exactly 0 years old.

Even when you were one year old?

Quote from: US 89 on August 30, 2022, 01:31:00 AM
So my 80 year old grandma can be 60 if she just cancels her last 20 years worth of birthdays? She'll be thrilled. We've solved one of the greatest problems faced by humanity.

Oh, how nice it would be to be under 40 again. No HBP pills. No waking up and discovering I hurt myself yesterday but didn't notice until today. No waking up to pee five times/night. Actually having hair above my eyebrows. Of course, I'd have to go back to work and cell phones would be the size of a shoebox, but at least my friends could meet me as I got off the plane rather than at baggage claim. :spin:

There are 16 members of the AARoads forum with post counts over 10,000 who give ages on their respective profiles that are not obviously unreasonable.  The average of these stated ages is 40.

Quote from: J N Winkler on August 30, 2022, 08:50:26 PM
There are 16 members of the AARoads forum with post counts over 10,000 who give ages on their respective profiles that are not obviously unreasonable.  The average of these stated ages is 40.

I'm 41, for what it's worth.

Quote from: J N Winkler on August 30, 2022, 08:50:26 PM
There are 16 members of the AARoads forum with post counts over 10,000 who give ages on their respective profiles that are not obviously unreasonable.

Pointing out the obvious here, that excludes NE2.  :-D

I'm one of the youngest users on here, but not the youngest. I know of at least one younger one. I used to reference being the second younger forum member in my signature, but I believe the youngest quit. I wonder who the oldest user is. And I have noticed that the younger users tend to post a lot more than the older users.

Quote from: Roadgeekteen on August 31, 2022, 02:51:16 AM
I wonder who the oldest user is.

I'm fairly sure we have users somewhere in the 70-80 range. I'm not sure if we have anyone older than 80.

Of course, it's kind of hard being able to tell that accurately, because if a user has their birthdate on their profile, their displayed age will continue to increase, even if, ah, the user's actual age is no longer increasing.

Fred Defender is listed as 107 now and made his last post in 2016. That would put him as 101 when he (likely) died.

https://www.aaroads.com/forum/index.php?action=profile;u=12936

Well, there you go, then (assuming Mr. Defender's birthday was accurately entered). I can't imagine it's terribly likely that there's anyone older than 101 on the forum.

(In case anyone is wondering why nobody's gotten onto him for his Republican-themed avatar–he stopped posting about 2 years before that was against the rules. I noticed it not too long after the rule change, but figured it was kind of pointless to send a message about it to someone who had been inactive for 2 years.)

Quote from: Roadgeekteen on August 31, 2022, 02:51:16 AM
And I have noticed that the younger users tend to post a lot more than the older users.

Quantity versus quality.

Quote from: Rothman on August 31, 2022, 06:39:12 AM

Quote from: Roadgeekteen on August 31, 2022, 02:51:16 AM
And I have noticed that the younger users tend to post a lot more than the older users.

Quantity versus quality.

And time to burn, unlike many of the older users.

Quote from: webny99 on August 30, 2022, 09:34:14 PM

Quote from: J N Winkler on August 30, 2022, 08:50:26 PM
There are 16 members of the AARoads forum with post counts over 10,000 who give ages on their respective profiles that are not obviously unreasonable.

Pointing out the obvious here, that excludes NE2.  :-D

Who actually is around that average age.

Quote from: 1 on August 31, 2022, 06:06:10 AM
Fred Defender is listed as 107 now and made his last post in 2016. That would put him as 101 when he (likely) died.

https://www.aaroads.com/forum/index.php?action=profile;u=12936

There's no way I believe that age even for a second. His first post was in 2014; that would mean he started posting at 99 years old.

Honestly, NE2 being 14 years old (even though I know he's not) is more believable than this.

Quote from: webny99 on August 31, 2022, 09:01:30 AM

Quote from: 1 on August 31, 2022, 06:06:10 AM
Fred Defender is listed as 107 now and made his last post in 2016. That would put him as 101 when he (likely) died.

https://www.aaroads.com/forum/index.php?action=profile;u=12936

There's no way I believe that age even for a second. His first post was in 2014; that would mean he started posting at 99 years old.

Honestly, NE2 being 14 years old (even though I know he's not) is more believable than this.

And indeed, here's some evidence (https://www.aaroads.com/forum/index.php?topic=204.msg2024737#msg2024737) as to his approximate age, showing that his posted age is off by at least 30 years.

Quote from: JayhawkCO on August 30, 2022, 12:08:27 PM

Quote from: hbelkins on August 30, 2022, 12:06:19 PM
If a birthday only counts if you had a party, then I'm exactly 0 years old.

You've never had a birthday party?

Quote from: kphoger on August 30, 2022, 12:19:35 PM

Quote from: hbelkins on August 30, 2022, 12:06:19 PM
If a birthday only counts if you had a party, then I'm exactly 0 years old.

Even when you were one year old?

Nope. Didn't have birthday parties when I was a kid with other kids invited. Of course I had cake and a special meal at home, but that was the extent of it. Of course, living in small quarters with a birthday in December wasn't conducive to having a bunch of people over for what would have needed to be an outdoor event. And an after-school event wouldn't have been feasible given how early it gets dark.  :-D

Well, so far the average age of posters in this thread (if they have it listed or put it out explicitly) is 37. I think some of the folks that don't have it listed are older than that, and I think a younger audience would probably be more likely to post in this thread in the first place (and have it listed in their profile). So, I'm sticking with my guess of 44.

The reason why I chose 27 initially, which is probably too low, is for these reasons:

1. I know the average human age is 28 as of a few years ago. I forgot that this number is worldwide and life expectancy is higher in the US in addition to this average including people under 15, of which we have had almost none.
2. Very few people, if any, are over 70 on this forum.
3. The younger users are more prolific, as mentioned in a previous post, which makes them more noticeable.
4. Previous post: "I think some of the folks that don't have it listed are older than that", and I'm treating them as unknowns.

Quote from: Roadgeekteen on August 31, 2022, 02:51:16 AM
I'm one of the youngest users on here, but not the youngest. I know of at least one younger one. I used to reference being the second younger forum member in my signature, but I believe the youngest quit. I wonder who the oldest user is. And I have noticed that the younger users tend to post a lot more than the older users.

Digging through some old posts, it seemed like Noel was the youngest on this forum for a while. I wasn't on the forum then, so not completely sure.

Now, youngest could probably be the op of this thread, as they said that they're 13.

Quote from: SkyPesos on August 31, 2022, 01:53:41 PM
Digging through some old posts, it seemed like Noel was the youngest on this forum for a while. I wasn't on the forum then, so not completely sure.

Yes, he was 10 when he joined.

I joined the forum in 2013 when I was 14.

In the early days of the forum (it was gone when I joined), there was a "must be 13" rule on the forum, and someone was even banned until their 13th birthday for it.

Quote from: 1 on August 31, 2022, 01:04:55 PM
The reason why I chose 27 initially, which is probably too low, is for these reasons:

1. I know the average human age is 28 as of a few years ago. I forgot that this number is worldwide and life expectancy is higher in the US in addition to this average including people under 15, of which we have had almost none.
2. Very few people, if any, are over 70 on this forum.
3. The younger users are more prolific, as mentioned in a previous post, which makes them more noticeable.
4. Previous post: "I think some of the folks that don't have it listed are older than that", and I'm treating them as unknowns.

US is 38 or so. And while few users are 70+ over here, equally very few users are in <15 (what is the minimum legal age to join? I believe 13, even if it is not really enforced)
(https://populationeducation.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/04/usa-population-pyramid-2020-red-blue-6x5.jpg)

Quote from: kalvado on August 31, 2022, 02:45:04 PM
(what is the minimum legal age to join? I believe 13, even if it is not really enforced)

There's no minimum. COPPA says no personal information without parents' consent under 13. Many websites don't want to have to deal with whether things are violations or not and blanket ban everyone under 13, but here, someone under 13 (such as noelbotevera when he joined) is allowed as long as they don't give out personal information.

Quote from: 1 on August 31, 2022, 06:06:10 AM
Fred Defender is listed as 107 now and made his last post in 2016. That would put him as 101 when he (likely) died.

https://www.aaroads.com/forum/index.php?action=profile;u=12936

I don't think that was his real age. This post in conjunction with the visible age of the poster he references above it suggests he is around 60 this year.

https://www.aaroads.com/forum/index.php?topic=204.msg2024951#msg2024951

Quote from: CNGL-Leudimin on August 29, 2022, 02:18:50 PM

Quote from: SkyPesos on August 29, 2022, 01:31:49 PM
In some East Asian cultures, you start off as 1 year old at birth instead of 0, so your "real age" is 1 higher than what it really is. I'm not sure if Spanish culture have something similar.

Nope, age reckoning in Spain is like in the USA. I claim to be one year younger than I actually am because my birthday, in April, was in the middle of the coronavirus lockdown in 2020, and as result I was forced to cancel it that year and thus I don't count it.

I don't think I've ever laughed so hard at a post on this forum.

Quote from: thspfc on August 31, 2022, 03:34:36 PM

Quote from: CNGL-Leudimin on August 29, 2022, 02:18:50 PM

Quote from: SkyPesos on August 29, 2022, 01:31:49 PM
In some East Asian cultures, you start off as 1 year old at birth instead of 0, so your "real age" is 1 higher than what it really is. I'm not sure if Spanish culture have something similar.

Nope, age reckoning in Spain is like in the USA. I claim to be one year younger than I actually am because my birthday, in April, was in the middle of the coronavirus lockdown in 2020, and as result I was forced to cancel it that year and thus I don't count it.

I don't think I've ever laughed so hard at a post on this forum.

OK, you can put that one in your signature instead of mine then.  :-P

Quote from: webny99 on August 31, 2022, 03:53:14 PM

Quote from: thspfc on August 31, 2022, 03:34:36 PM

Quote from: CNGL-Leudimin on August 29, 2022, 02:18:50 PM

Quote from: SkyPesos on August 29, 2022, 01:31:49 PM
In some East Asian cultures, you start off as 1 year old at birth instead of 0, so your "real age" is 1 higher than what it really is. I'm not sure if Spanish culture have something similar.

Nope, age reckoning in Spain is like in the USA. I claim to be one year younger than I actually am because my birthday, in April, was in the middle of the coronavirus lockdown in 2020, and as result I was forced to cancel it that year and thus I don't count it.

I don't think I've ever laughed so hard at a post on this forum.

OK, you can put that one in your signature instead of mine then.  :-P

Maybe I will.

SidS1045 is 71.

Sparker is 72-73 IIRC, but hasn't been active in about a year.

I'm 21, and I joined when I was 12. Looking back, I still find that crazy. And I know I lurked a bit before then. It's possible I started looking at AARoads when I was 11.

If we go by users who are at least semi-active, I bet the age is late-20s or early-30s. A standard answer, I know, but it makes the most sense.

With some SQL queries on the database and some Excel help from flaroads:

• of the 4,390 member accounts, 3,701 have no birthday added
• throwing out the outliers on birth years, such as the year 9999, there are 657 member profiles with legitimate birth years
• the oldest member is 74; the youngest is 15
• members born in 1987 make up 4.1% of the forum, which is the highest percentage of any birth year
• the average age of a forum user is 38.2

Quote from: Alex on September 03, 2022, 12:13:54 PM
With some SQL queries on the database and some Excel help from flaroads:

• of the 4,390 member accounts, 3,701 have no birthday added
• throwing out the outliers on birth years, such as the year 9999, there are 657 member profiles with legitimate birth years
• the oldest member is 74; the youngest is 15
• members born in 1987 make up 4.1% of the forum, which is the highest percentage of any birth year
• the average age of a forum user is 38.2

How boring and expected.

The age is going to skew high if you include inactive members.

Quote from: Alex on September 03, 2022, 12:13:54 PM
With some SQL queries on the database and some Excel help from flaroads:

• of the 4,390 member accounts, 3,701 have no birthday added
• throwing out the outliers on birth years, such as the year 9999, there are 657 member profiles with legitimate birth years
• the oldest member is 74; the youngest is 15
• members born in 1987 make up 4.1% of the forum, which is the highest percentage of any birth year
• the average age of a forum user is 38.2

Was wondering if the median age (as opposed to the mean age, 38.2) was computed.  As we know from Statistics 101, the mean and median of a data set aren't necessarily the same.

The mean age is about where I expected it would be (just a SWAG on my part).

Quote from: 1 on September 03, 2022, 01:12:59 PMThe age is going to skew high if you include inactive members.

How?  For members with over 10,000 posts each who disclose a plausible age, the average is 40.  Alex's calculations cover a much wider subset, including inactive members, and the average is lower--38.2.

Hypothesis:  Average age of all forum members is in the upper 20s/lower 30s.  Conclusion:  Not testable.

Hypothesis:  Average age of forum members with plausible disclosed ages (hereinafter PDAs) is in the upper 20s/lower 30s.  Conclusion:  Not true.

Hypothesis:  Younger members with PDAs are more prolific, so the average age of members in the 10,000+ post count bracket with PDAs is lower.  Conclusion:  Not true.

Hypothesis:  Younger members with PDAs are more prolific, so they are better represented among members in the 10,000+ post count bracket with PDAs than in the wider population of members with PDAs.  Conclusion:  Not tested.

They'll skew high because they posted at an earlier age than their current age.

Quote from: webny99 on August 31, 2022, 09:10:02 AM

Quote from: webny99 on August 31, 2022, 09:01:30 AM

Quote from: 1 on August 31, 2022, 06:06:10 AM
Fred Defender is listed as 107 now and made his last post in 2016. That would put him as 101 when he (likely) died.

https://www.aaroads.com/forum/index.php?action=profile;u=12936

There's no way I believe that age even for a second. His first post was in 2014; that would mean he started posting at 99 years old.

Honestly, NE2 being 14 years old (even though I know he's not) is more believable than this.

And indeed, here's some evidence (https://www.aaroads.com/forum/index.php?topic=204.msg2024737#msg2024737) as to his approximate age, showing that his posted age is off by at least 30 years.

Right you are. I graduated in 1974 and turned 66 this summer, so I was one of the 25% or so of my class who couldn't drink legally upon graduation (drinking age in Wisconsin being 18 back then). Since he said Summer 1978 was right after graduation, that would make Fred 3-4 years younger than me or about 62-63.

Quote from: 1 on September 03, 2022, 03:24:44 PMThey'll skew high because they posted at an earlier age than their current age.

How would that make a difference?  Displayed age is updated and does not stay static.  None of these calculations depend on individuals' ages at the time of posting--the groupings are based on cumulative post count.

Edit:  Having thought about it some more, I think I understand the hypothesis you are making:  their age continues to update (leading to upward skew) while they remain inactive.  FWIW, I suspect that for any definition of this population (e.g., members with PDAs but no posts in last six months, members with PDAs but no posts in last 12 months, etc.), the average age will be similar (late 30s/early 40s) to those already calculated for other population subsets.  One reason is that the forum is still young (just 13 years) and thus has not had enough time to accumulate a lengthy "tail" of members who are inactive because they are dead.  (MNHighwayMan and Randy Hersh come to mind; Sparker has not been active in quite a while.)  Moreover, the inactive-user population is constantly being refreshed with new members, often quite younger than the PDA average, who either never post or essentially quit the forum after just a few posts.

I don't think Randy Hersh ever posted to this forum, for what it's worth.

But there is no way to know whether a forum member not well known to the community has died or merely lost interest in the forum, regardless of their age. At about the midway point of the pandemic, whenever I saw users who had their last login dated 2020, I found myself briefly wondering as to whether they had perhaps been stricken down by the virus, or if their inactive state was due to other circumstances.

Quote from: Scott5114 on September 03, 2022, 08:26:16 PM
I don't think Randy Hersh ever posted to this forum, for what it's worth.

I want to say he did a couple times in the old days, but I have no conclusive proof.

Quote from: US71 on September 03, 2022, 08:32:47 PM

Quote from: Scott5114 on September 03, 2022, 08:26:16 PM
I don't think Randy Hersh ever posted to this forum, for what it's worth.

I want to say he did a couple times in the old days, but I have no conclusive proof.

Ditto.

Quote from: Rothman on September 03, 2022, 09:36:17 PM

Quote from: US71 on September 03, 2022, 08:32:47 PM

Quote from: Scott5114 on September 03, 2022, 08:26:16 PMI don't think Randy Hersh ever posted to this forum, for what it's worth.

I want to say he did a couple times in the old days, but I have no conclusive proof.

Ditto.

He has (had) 56 posts under username sammack (https://www.aaroads.com/forum/index.php?action=profile;u=354).

Quote from: Scott5114 on September 03, 2022, 08:26:16 PMBut there is no way to know whether a forum member not well known to the community has died or merely lost interest in the forum, regardless of their age. At about the midway point of the pandemic, whenever I saw users who had their last login dated 2020, I found myself briefly wondering as to whether they had perhaps been stricken down by the virus, or if their inactive state was due to other circumstances.

About 1% of the US population dies every year.  However, I think we have fewer accounts inactive as a result of death than that number would imply, because we undersample the extreme ends of the age pyramid, though for different reasons.  Newborns aren't signing up for this forum (the floor is effectively around age 10 because of not just literacy but also developmental readiness for adult conversation), and neither are the very aged (Web forums are only 20 years old and I suspect members in their 80s, if we have any, picked up the necessary tech familiarity in their 60s).

However, we are none of us getting any younger, and a few of us will fail to achieve full life expectancy for a variety of reasons, cancer being a big one.

As for people going silent during the time of covid, I see that as having many distinct proximate causes.  It was psychologically traumatic even for people who didn't catch it and, it turned out (but was not necessarily known at the time), had reasonably good insulation from the risk of catching it.  I can see us having members who gave up on the forum because of long covid, or because someone close to them caught it and didn't survive and the experience prompted them to reconsider their ties to this forum.

To throw yet another wrench in the works, it's interesting that around 75% of members with 10,000 posts (granted, very small sample size) display their age, while less than 20% do so when expanded to include all forum members. My guess is that publicly displaying your age and other personal information is at least loosely correlated to ones' commitment level to the forum, since doing so can help build credibility.

One one hand, this means users displaying their age is probably a relatively good proxy for "active" members, since you'd expect the share to go down for less active users. On the other hand, it's not really fair to include the age of anyone with 0 posts in the analysis (and at a quick glance, that would exclude about 2100 of 4349 members, nearly half).

There's also many regular contributors with less than 10,000 posts that are aren't being included in the arbitrary 10,000+ analysis, which I'm not sure is fair to them. I've made a lot of posts here in a short time by most standards, but I don't think my age should have more weight simply because I've posted more. 1,000 posts would be a better cut-off point, but that becomes more complicated to calculate too.

Quote from: webny99 on September 04, 2022, 11:42:55 PM
To throw yet another wrench in the works, it's interesting that around 75% of members with 10,000 posts (granted, very small sample size) display their age, while less than 20% do so when expanded to include all forum members. My guess is that publicly displaying your age and other personal information is at least loosely correlated to ones' commitment level to the forum, since doing so can help build credibility.

I think it's less having to do with building credibility, and more because as time spent on the forum increases, so does the inclination to take a look at the forum profile page and fill it in.

Put another way, if my intent is to join a forum, ask a few questions, and then forget about it, I'm going to the trouble of filling in every blank on the forum profile is not a good use of my time. If I intend for a forum to become one of my regular haunts and I want to become part of the regular community, however, I'm more likely to want others to know a little more about me.

One thing that is unique about this forum is the percentage of people who have their location accurately filled out. That's a base SMF forum feature that goes unused on a lot of forums (does it really help anyone to know that an answer to your tech support question came from Oklahoma?) but is practically required here. Even those who don't fill out the location in textual form tend to give some hint of it with their choice of avatar.

Quote from: webny99 on September 04, 2022, 11:42:55 PMThere's also many regular contributors with less than 10,000 posts that are aren't being included in the arbitrary 10,000+ analysis, which I'm not sure is fair to them. I've made a lot of posts here in a short time by most standards, but I don't think my age should have more weight simply because I've posted more. 1,000 posts would be a better cut-off point, but that becomes more complicated to calculate too.

We do have high-value contributors on either side of the 1,000-post threshold.  I focused on the 10,000+ post group purely for convenience--there are few enough to make it manageable to load each person's profile in a separate browser tab, read off the age (if given), and use Windows' calculator app to compute the average.  Working with larger groups (such as the ~230 with more than 1,000 posts) gets into needing scripts to pull data and then spreadsheets to crunch numbers.

BTW, I estimate that members in the 10,000+ post group account for about one-third of the slightly more than 1 million posts on this forum.

Quote from: J N Winkler on September 05, 2022, 03:54:14 AM

Quote from: webny99 on September 04, 2022, 11:42:55 PMThere's also many regular contributors with less than 10,000 posts that are aren't being included in the arbitrary 10,000+ analysis, which I'm not sure is fair to them. I've made a lot of posts here in a short time by most standards, but I don't think my age should have more weight simply because I've posted more. 1,000 posts would be a better cut-off point, but that becomes more complicated to calculate too.

We do have high-value contributors on either side of the 1,000-post threshold.  I focused on the 10,000+ post group purely for convenience--there are few enough to make it manageable to load each person's profile in a separate browser tab, read off the age (if given), and use Windows' calculator app to compute the average.  Working with larger groups (such as the ~230 with more than 1,000 posts) gets into needing scripts to pull data and then spreadsheets to crunch numbers.

BTW, I estimate that members in the 10,000+ post group account for about one-third of the slightly more than 1 million posts on this forum.

I wonder how difficult is it to modify forum script, at least temporarily, to include age or DOB in the userlist - for example instead of icq field.

Quote from: kalvado on September 05, 2022, 07:34:14 AMI wonder how difficult is it to modify forum script, at least temporarily, to include age or DOB in the userlist - for example instead of ICQ field.

I don't have admin rights, so I can't be sure, but it would not surprise me if the fields that are shown in the member list can be set in a configuration file or Web application.

One quick and dirty way of retrieving the information would be to write a NT batch script that loads each page of the member listing, dumps the 100 profile links per page to a text file, and then takes that file and loads each profile, dumping the age/DOB information (if provided) to a CSV file.  That would take about 4500 page loads and so maybe two hours to run over a reasonably fast broadband connection.

Quote from: webny99 on September 04, 2022, 11:42:55 PM
There's also many regular contributors with less than 10,000 posts that are aren't being included in the arbitrary 10,000+ analysis, which I'm not sure is fair to them. I've made a lot of posts here in a short time by most standards, but I don't think my age should have more weight simply because I've posted more. 1,000 posts would be a better cut-off point, but that becomes more complicated to calculate too.

Even 1000 posts may be a bit high of a lower bound.  I've thought of myself as an "average" contributor and have been on the forum since 2018, but I am still short of the 1000 post mark.  Maybe someday.

Quote from: dlsterner on September 05, 2022, 07:07:10 PM

Quote from: webny99 on September 04, 2022, 11:42:55 PM
There's also many regular contributors with less than 10,000 posts that are aren't being included in the arbitrary 10,000+ analysis, which I'm not sure is fair to them. I've made a lot of posts here in a short time by most standards, but I don't think my age should have more weight simply because I've posted more. 1,000 posts would be a better cut-off point, but that becomes more complicated to calculate too.

Even 1000 posts may be a bit high of a lower bound.  I've thought of myself as an "average" contributor and have been on the forum since 2018, but I am still short of the 1000 post mark.  Maybe someday.

Eh, you're just a low achiever.

I think an algorithm that records the base 2 logarithm of the number of non-quoted characters would be a better metric, as currently short posts and long posts each count for 1. I know it's impossible with the forum software, but a script could measure it with existing posts. As an example for how the scoring works, a 200-character post would count as log2(200)≈7.64.

Note that I do not want a karma system; that would be this forum's downfall.

Quote from: kalvado on September 05, 2022, 07:34:14 AM

Quote from: J N Winkler on September 05, 2022, 03:54:14 AM

Quote from: webny99 on September 04, 2022, 11:42:55 PMThere's also many regular contributors with less than 10,000 posts that are aren't being included in the arbitrary 10,000+ analysis, which I'm not sure is fair to them. I've made a lot of posts here in a short time by most standards, but I don't think my age should have more weight simply because I've posted more. 1,000 posts would be a better cut-off point, but that becomes more complicated to calculate too.

We do have high-value contributors on either side of the 1,000-post threshold.  I focused on the 10,000+ post group purely for convenience--there are few enough to make it manageable to load each person's profile in a separate browser tab, read off the age (if given), and use Windows' calculator app to compute the average.  Working with larger groups (such as the ~230 with more than 1,000 posts) gets into needing scripts to pull data and then spreadsheets to crunch numbers.

BTW, I estimate that members in the 10,000+ post group account for about one-third of the slightly more than 1 million posts on this forum.

I wonder how difficult is it to modify forum script, at least temporarily, to include age or DOB in the userlist - for example instead of icq field.

It wouldn't be hard to do, but if you have the access to do it, it would be easier to just do an SQL SELECT statement to get the data you wanted.

Quote from: Scott5114 on September 05, 2022, 08:34:13 PM

Quote from: kalvado on September 05, 2022, 07:34:14 AM

Quote from: J N Winkler on September 05, 2022, 03:54:14 AM

Quote from: webny99 on September 04, 2022, 11:42:55 PMThere's also many regular contributors with less than 10,000 posts that are aren't being included in the arbitrary 10,000+ analysis, which I'm not sure is fair to them. I've made a lot of posts here in a short time by most standards, but I don't think my age should have more weight simply because I've posted more. 1,000 posts would be a better cut-off point, but that becomes more complicated to calculate too.

We do have high-value contributors on either side of the 1,000-post threshold.  I focused on the 10,000+ post group purely for convenience--there are few enough to make it manageable to load each person's profile in a separate browser tab, read off the age (if given), and use Windows' calculator app to compute the average.  Working with larger groups (such as the ~230 with more than 1,000 posts) gets into needing scripts to pull data and then spreadsheets to crunch numbers.

BTW, I estimate that members in the 10,000+ post group account for about one-third of the slightly more than 1 million posts on this forum.

I wonder how difficult is it to modify forum script, at least temporarily, to include age or DOB in the userlist - for example instead of icq field.

It wouldn't be hard to do, but if you have the access to do it, it would be easier to just do an SQL SELECT statement to get the data you wanted.

It's more about giving at least temporary access to the data to those with enough enthusiasm....

Quote from: kalvado on September 05, 2022, 09:10:42 PM

Quote from: Scott5114 on September 05, 2022, 08:34:13 PM

Quote from: kalvado on September 05, 2022, 07:34:14 AM

Quote from: J N Winkler on September 05, 2022, 03:54:14 AM

Quote from: webny99 on September 04, 2022, 11:42:55 PMThere's also many regular contributors with less than 10,000 posts that are aren't being included in the arbitrary 10,000+ analysis, which I'm not sure is fair to them. I've made a lot of posts here in a short time by most standards, but I don't think my age should have more weight simply because I've posted more. 1,000 posts would be a better cut-off point, but that becomes more complicated to calculate too.

We do have high-value contributors on either side of the 1,000-post threshold.  I focused on the 10,000+ post group purely for convenience--there are few enough to make it manageable to load each person's profile in a separate browser tab, read off the age (if given), and use Windows' calculator app to compute the average.  Working with larger groups (such as the ~230 with more than 1,000 posts) gets into needing scripts to pull data and then spreadsheets to crunch numbers.

BTW, I estimate that members in the 10,000+ post group account for about one-third of the slightly more than 1 million posts on this forum.

I wonder how difficult is it to modify forum script, at least temporarily, to include age or DOB in the userlist - for example instead of icq field.

It wouldn't be hard to do, but if you have the access to do it, it would be easier to just do an SQL SELECT statement to get the data you wanted.

It's more about giving at least temporary access to the data to those with enough enthusiasm....

Yeah, but I mean, if you're going to hack some PHP anyway, why faff around with the forum software at all, when you could just dump the SQL results to a CSV or something for easy import to Excel?

Quote from: Scott5114 on September 05, 2022, 09:48:09 PM

Quote from: kalvado on September 05, 2022, 09:10:42 PM

Quote from: Scott5114 on September 05, 2022, 08:34:13 PM

Quote from: kalvado on September 05, 2022, 07:34:14 AM

Quote from: J N Winkler on September 05, 2022, 03:54:14 AM

Quote from: webny99 on September 04, 2022, 11:42:55 PMThere's also many regular contributors with less than 10,000 posts that are aren't being included in the arbitrary 10,000+ analysis, which I'm not sure is fair to them. I've made a lot of posts here in a short time by most standards, but I don't think my age should have more weight simply because I've posted more. 1,000 posts would be a better cut-off point, but that becomes more complicated to calculate too.

We do have high-value contributors on either side of the 1,000-post threshold.  I focused on the 10,000+ post group purely for convenience--there are few enough to make it manageable to load each person's profile in a separate browser tab, read off the age (if given), and use Windows' calculator app to compute the average.  Working with larger groups (such as the ~230 with more than 1,000 posts) gets into needing scripts to pull data and then spreadsheets to crunch numbers.

BTW, I estimate that members in the 10,000+ post group account for about one-third of the slightly more than 1 million posts on this forum.

I wonder how difficult is it to modify forum script, at least temporarily, to include age or DOB in the userlist - for example instead of icq field.

It wouldn't be hard to do, but if you have the access to do it, it would be easier to just do an SQL SELECT statement to get the data you wanted.

It's more about giving at least temporary access to the data to those with enough enthusiasm....

Yeah, but I mean, if you're going to hack some PHP anyway, why faff around with the forum software at all, when you could just dump the SQL results to a CSV or something for easy import to Excel?

Let me put it so - that is probably 1 line of php that I could probably do myself vs... vs solving a separate problem and messing with database.
This may echo another thread here:
https://www.aaroads.com/forum/index.php?topic=32110.0
For me a small fix is a good enough one.

It's a few lines of PHP, sure. But now you have a bunch of HTML output you have to sift through if you want to do anything interesting (like calculate the average age of whatever slice of the membership) with it, and that's way, way more code to write (see J.N. Winkler's post about NT batch scripts, but Perl would be a far more suitable tool) than if you just exported the data to CSV in the first place.

No matter the average age, from what I've seen since I joined, we all have the sense of humour of a 12-year-old.  :spin:

So it's 38.

Got it.

Quote from: Scott5114 on September 05, 2022, 12:14:15 AM
I think it's less having to do with building credibility, and more because as time spent on the forum increases, so does the inclination to take a look at the forum profile page and fill it in.

Put another way, if my intent is to join a forum, ask a few questions, and then forget about it, I'm going to the trouble of filling in every blank on the forum profile is not a good use of my time. If I intend for a forum to become one of my regular haunts and I want to become part of the regular community, however, I'm more likely to want others to know a little more about me.

I just don't see the point in publicly revealing PII for no apparent reason.  I've mentioned my age or my birth year occasionally, when it seemed pertinent to the conversation, but generally my age just seems kind of irrelevant to the purposes of this forum.

Heck, if you hunt hard enough, you can find threads in which I posted my name and address.  It isn't that I'm worried about people knowing that information, necessarily, but rather that I just never thought there was any point to including it in my profile.  (Besides, with that PII buried in a mountain of thread posts, a person would have to do a LOT more hunting in order to do something nefarious.)

Quote from: Scott5114 on September 05, 2022, 12:14:15 AM

Quote from: webny99 on September 04, 2022, 11:42:55 PM
To throw yet another wrench in the works, it's interesting that around 75% of members with 10,000 posts (granted, very small sample size) display their age, while less than 20% do so when expanded to include all forum members. My guess is that publicly displaying your age and other personal information is at least loosely correlated to ones' commitment level to the forum, since doing so can help build credibility.

I think it's less having to do with building credibility, and more because as time spent on the forum increases, so does the inclination to take a look at the forum profile page and fill it in.

Put another way, if my intent is to join a forum, ask a few questions, and then forget about it, I'm going to the trouble of filling in every blank on the forum profile is not a good use of my time. If I intend for a forum to become one of my regular haunts and I want to become part of the regular community, however, I'm more likely to want others to know a little more about me.

Your second point is basically what I was trying to say. I guess "building credibility" was poor word choice, but I just meant that it displays an intent to be around for a while and be taken seriously as a regular contributor.

Quote from: kphoger on September 06, 2022, 02:32:30 PM

Quote from: Scott5114 on September 05, 2022, 12:14:15 AM
I think it's less having to do with building credibility, and more because as time spent on the forum increases, so does the inclination to take a look at the forum profile page and fill it in.

Put another way, if my intent is to join a forum, ask a few questions, and then forget about it, I'm going to the trouble of filling in every blank on the forum profile is not a good use of my time. If I intend for a forum to become one of my regular haunts and I want to become part of the regular community, however, I'm more likely to want others to know a little more about me.

I just don't see the point in publicly revealing PII for no apparent reason.  I've mentioned my age or my birth year occasionally, when it seemed pertinent to the conversation, but generally my age just seems kind of irrelevant to the purposes of this forum.

Heck, if you hunt hard enough, you can find threads in which I posted my name and address.  It isn't that I'm worried about people knowing that information, necessarily, but rather that I just never thought there was any point to including it in my profile.  (Besides, with that PII buried in a mountain of thread posts, a person would have to do a LOT more hunting in order to do something nefarious.)

I sort of agree, in that nobody should feel obligated to fill out the forum profile information completely, particularly if they feel there is no need for anyone to know that information. But I tend to take a pretty cavalier attitude about my own PII because all of it is very easily available through public records request. Because I own a public-facing LLC, you can query the Oklahoma Secretary of State about it and get my address, which, since I own a house, you can then confirm with county property assessment records. All of this is easily done from the Internet without needing to interact with a human at all.

That being said, I don't go out of my way to post my home address on the forum. But knowing all of this was possible made it feel pretty silly whenever customers at work would argue about being made to sign their credit card because they didn't want their identity to get stolen. (Certainly everyone in the US has their signature on some FOIA-able document or another, so it's not like your signature is secret. Even if it was, most people get so lazy with their signature that it is useless as an identity verification tool).

Yeah, it's pretty rare to see a signature in which all letters of both first and last name are clearly legible. In my own signature you could probably make out the letters of my first name and middle initial, but the way I sign my last name is more or less a line of varying degrees of waviness with no distinguishable letters.

My own signature is a very, very, very stylized version of just my first and last initials.

Amazingly, when I was crossing the border into Mexico one year, the agent processing my temporary vehicle importation decided my signature didn't quite match my tourist card (which I had just gotten on the other side of the room) well enough, and I had to try signing twice more before she decided it was good enough–and then only after grabbing her supervisor to peer at it with her for a while.  That's the only time I've been grilled about my signature.

The only time anyone has given a shit about my signature is when I filled out my Utah mail ballot maybe 3 years ago. Apparently what I put on the envelope wasn't similar enough to the one they had on file - in other words, the one I had put on a shitty DMV pinpad when I was 16 and first got my drivers license. I had to fill out another form, this time wanting my drivers license number in addition to a bunch of more typical personal information, then email a scan of it to the county clerk.

As someone who makes a point of signing legibly for my own personal satisfaction, I loathe the things that pin pads do to signatures. I've gotten pretty decent at signing on them (although screens with a matte finish are far preferable to the glossy ones–why do those even exist?). More than once, though, I've made a pretty acceptable render of my signature on a sucky pad, only to be handed a printout of the transaction with my signature horizontally stretched to twice the width it was when I signed it. (For some reason, this tends to happen most frequently with automotive-related transactions.)

Anyone that forces anyone to sign anything with just a finger, not even giving the benefit of a stylus, should be sentenced to interacting with electronics with only their nose for the rest of their life.

I have 3 different signatures. I've used them as watermarks on my photos on FB & Flickr.

Quote from: Scott5114 on September 06, 2022, 11:22:02 PM
As someone who makes a point of signing legibly for my own personal satisfaction, I loathe the things that pin pads do to signatures. I've gotten pretty decent at signing on them (although screens with a matte finish are far preferable to the glossy ones–why do those even exist?). More than once, though, I've made a pretty acceptable render of my signature on a sucky pad, only to be handed a printout of the transaction with my signature horizontally stretched to twice the width it was when I signed it. (For some reason, this tends to happen most frequently with automotive-related transactions.)

Anyone that forces anyone to sign anything with just a finger, not even giving the benefit of a stylus, should be sentenced to interacting with electronics with only their nose for the rest of their life.

My dad's signature always looked like ArchLBa

Quote from: webny99 on September 06, 2022, 08:02:45 PM
Yeah, it's pretty rare to see a signature in which all letters of both first and last name are clearly legible. In my own signature you could probably make out the letters of my first name and middle initial, but the way I sign my last name is more or less a line of varying degrees of waviness with no distinguishable letters.

My signature is usually illegible. Basically the first letters of my first, middle, and last names are kind of legible, with each usually followed by a squiggle (unless I can get by with just the initial for my middle name).

When doing online transactions with my state or local government, such as for applying for an absentee ballot, typically I can supply ID info that lets the computer system use my signature on file with the DMV. That's not real legible either, but it works OK.

When I was taught to sign my name in school, we were specifically told NOT to make it legible, because it would be easy for someone to forge it.

Side note: I give zero fucks about whether they're teaching kids to write in cursive these days, but I do wonder how they're learning to sign their name if they don't know cursive.

Quote from: abefroman329 on September 08, 2022, 10:22:48 AM
Side note: I give zero fucks about whether they're teaching kids to write in cursive these days, but I do wonder how they're learning to sign their name if they don't know cursive.

I'm more insistent that kids are taught how to read cursive than write it.  It would be awfully embarrassing to find a note from your boss on your desk after lunch, and then have to go ask him what it says because you can't read cursive.  It would also be a detriment to research if you can't even read historical documents from before the typewriter era.

Quote from: kphoger on September 08, 2022, 10:53:41 AMI'm more insistent that kids are taught how to read cursive than write it.  It would be awfully embarrassing to find a note from your boss on your desk after lunch, and then have to go ask him what it says because you can't read cursive.

By the time my kid enters the workforce, it's highly likely that his boss won't know how to write in cursive, either. 

Quote from: kphoger on September 08, 2022, 10:53:41 AMIt would also be a detriment to research if you can't even read historical documents from before the typewriter era.

If that's what they want to specialize in, they can learn it as part of their post-secondary education - we don't teach the Phoenician alphabet in school, either.

Quote from: abefroman329 on September 08, 2022, 11:28:22 AM

Quote from: kphoger on September 08, 2022, 10:53:41 AMI'm more insistent that kids are taught how to read cursive than write it.  It would be awfully embarrassing to find a note from your boss on your desk after lunch, and then have to go ask him what it says because you can't read cursive.

By the time my kid enters the workforce, it's highly likely that his boss won't know how to write in cursive, either. 

Quote from: kphoger on September 08, 2022, 10:53:41 AMIt would also be a detriment to research if you can't even read historical documents from before the typewriter era.

If that's what they want to specialize in, they can learn it as part of their post-secondary education - we don't teach the Phoenician alphabet in school, either.

Forget Phoenician. I have a difficult time reading documents in many of the fonts used before the 20th century with all the extra serifs and other embellishments even when they're in English. It's near impossible for me to read the text in German or Latin in those fonts, and I have a basic familiarity with both languages (HS German classes and Latin Catholic masses).

Quote from: abefroman329 on September 08, 2022, 11:28:22 AM

Quote from: kphoger on September 08, 2022, 10:53:41 AMIt would also be a detriment to research if you can't even read historical documents from before the typewriter era.

If that's what they want to specialize in, they can learn it as part of their post-secondary education - we don't teach the Phoenician alphabet in school, either.

Part of the problem is that paleography is a dying field (https://www.theguardian.com/education/2010/feb/09/writing-off-last-palaeographer-university).  And while this is less of an issue in English since the forms of cursive in current use are all at least loosely based on an 18th-century copperplate, there are handwritten documents in other European languages that are difficult for even native speakers to read because the handwriting systems as well as the orthographies have changed.

This said, I expect handwriting to hold its own in some form since pen and paper helps keep surveillance capitalism at bay.

Quote from: skluth on September 08, 2022, 12:10:23 PM

Quote from: abefroman329 on September 08, 2022, 11:28:22 AM

Quote from: kphoger on September 08, 2022, 10:53:41 AMI'm more insistent that kids are taught how to read cursive than write it.  It would be awfully embarrassing to find a note from your boss on your desk after lunch, and then have to go ask him what it says because you can't read cursive.

By the time my kid enters the workforce, it's highly likely that his boss won't know how to write in cursive, either. 

Quote from: kphoger on September 08, 2022, 10:53:41 AMIt would also be a detriment to research if you can't even read historical documents from before the typewriter era.

If that's what they want to specialize in, they can learn it as part of their post-secondary education - we don't teach the Phoenician alphabet in school, either.

Forget Phoenician. I have a difficult time reading documents in many of the fonts used before the 20th century with all the extra serifs and other embellishments even when they're in English. It's near impossible for me to read the text in German or Latin in those fonts, and I have a basic familiarity with both languages (HS German classes and Latin Catholic masses).

Forget fonts. Once upon a time I wanted to look at a book written by James Maxwell - physicist who introduced Maxwell equation, the basics of electrodynamics, published in 1860s or 1870s.  Book was (re?)printed in perfectly legible font, but I struggled with notations in equations. I could understand every symbol, I went through those things many many times...

Quote from: abefroman329 on September 08, 2022, 11:28:22 AM
By the time my kid enters the workforce, it's highly likely that his boss won't know how to write in cursive, either. 

What makes you think that?  Most children still learn cursive in school, and it's reasonable to expect a fair number of them to adopt it as their regular handwriting.

My middle son's cursive (he turns 12 today) is neater than his print, so he prefers to write in cursive.  And it wasn't even at our prompting that he first started learning cursive to begin with:  we didn't start teaching him until after he'd already started practicing on his own, based on cursive that he was seeing as a normal part of his everyday life (on TV ads, brand logos, greeting cards, flyers, etc).

Quote from: kphoger on September 08, 2022, 02:18:01 PMWhat makes you think that?

Oh, I made the mistake of believing the Boomers who were screaming  they weren't teaching cursive in any public schools any more.

Which was silly of me, considering they also believe no school districts anywhere start the day with the Pledge of Allegiance.

[I don't think my son does, but he's in pre-K.]

Quote from: kphoger on September 08, 2022, 02:18:01 PM

Quote from: abefroman329 on September 08, 2022, 11:28:22 AM
By the time my kid enters the workforce, it's highly likely that his boss won't know how to write in cursive, either. 

What makes you think that?  Most children still learn cursive in school, and it's reasonable to expect a fair number of them to adopt it as their regular handwriting.

My middle son's cursive (he turns 12 today) is neater than his print, so he prefers to write in cursive.  And it wasn't even at our prompting that he first started learning cursive to begin with:  we didn't start teaching him until after he'd already started practicing on his own, based on cursive that he was seeing as a normal part of his everyday life (on TV ads, brand logos, greeting cards, flyers, etc).

Congratulations on teaching your kid a dying and soon to be extinct art.

Quote from: Rothman on September 08, 2022, 04:39:52 PM

Quote from: kphoger on September 08, 2022, 02:18:01 PM

Quote from: abefroman329 on September 08, 2022, 11:28:22 AM
By the time my kid enters the workforce, it's highly likely that his boss won't know how to write in cursive, either. 

What makes you think that?  Most children still learn cursive in school, and it's reasonable to expect a fair number of them to adopt it as their regular handwriting.

My middle son's cursive (he turns 12 today) is neater than his print, so he prefers to write in cursive.  And it wasn't even at our prompting that he first started learning cursive to begin with:  we didn't start teaching him until after he'd already started practicing on his own, based on cursive that he was seeing as a normal part of his everyday life (on TV ads, brand logos, greeting cards, flyers, etc).

Congratulations on teaching your kid a dying and soon to be extinct art.

On one hand, "a note on a desk" is getting replaced with "instant message / email"
On the other hand... I have hard time thinking of doing quick calculations (formulas, not numbers) and sketches without a paper or a whiteboard. So paper may actually last a bit longer than you assume...

Quote from: Rothman on September 08, 2022, 04:39:52 PM
Congratulations on teaching your kid a dying and soon to be extinct art.

Until such time as there is no longer any need to read anything that's been handwritten–or any computer-generated script designed to look like handwriting–it will remain a useful skill to be able to read cursive.

Quote from: kalvado on September 08, 2022, 05:00:14 PM

Quote from: Rothman on September 08, 2022, 04:39:52 PM

Quote from: kphoger on September 08, 2022, 02:18:01 PM

Quote from: abefroman329 on September 08, 2022, 11:28:22 AM
By the time my kid enters the workforce, it's highly likely that his boss won't know how to write in cursive, either. 

What makes you think that?  Most children still learn cursive in school, and it's reasonable to expect a fair number of them to adopt it as their regular handwriting.

My middle son's cursive (he turns 12 today) is neater than his print, so he prefers to write in cursive.  And it wasn't even at our prompting that he first started learning cursive to begin with:  we didn't start teaching him until after he'd already started practicing on his own, based on cursive that he was seeing as a normal part of his everyday life (on TV ads, brand logos, greeting cards, flyers, etc).

Congratulations on teaching your kid a dying and soon to be extinct art.

On one hand, "a note on a desk" is getting replaced with "instant message / email"
On the other hand... I have hard time thinking of doing quick calculations (formulas, not numbers) and sketches without a paper or a whiteboard. So paper may actually last a bit longer than you assume...

Psst: We're talking about cursive, not paper.

Quote from: kphoger on September 08, 2022, 05:07:02 PM

Quote from: Rothman on September 08, 2022, 04:39:52 PM
Congratulations on teaching your kid a dying and soon to be extinct art.

Until such time as there is no longer any need to read anything that's been handwritten–or any computer-generated script designed to look like handwriting–it will remain a useful skill to be able to read cursive.

I don't understand your defensiveness on this issue.  It's just a form of handwriting that is clearly and slowly disappearing.  So, teach away in the name of preservation, but you're kidding yourself in terms of its ongoing usefulness. 

Personally, I can't think of very many times that I've needed to read cursive over the last decade.  Maybe in Christmas cards from my aunts, who are aging Boomers.

It's just gone from "this is how adults handwrite" to "Boomer scrawling code."

Now then, Russian cursive is still quite useful, since no one writes anything in print...

Quote from: Rothman on September 08, 2022, 11:35:54 PM
Personally, I can't think of very many times that I've needed to read cursive over the last decade.

You can't think of it because it's ubiquitous, and you're reading it all the time without even thinking about it.  Forget handwritten notes:  just look at other media...

Every time you see the Kellogg's logo, you're reading cursive.  If, say, you were to go into this store (https://goo.gl/maps/2yURygdhDBMNoDQP7) or this one (https://goo.gl/maps/CGi75UpGuGGJKhuS7), it probably wouldn't even occur to you that you wouldn't be able to read the store name without knowing cursive.  Or if the menu you're looking at has "Appetizers" and "Drinks" in cursive, I bet you read it and know which section to look at without even realizing you're doing it.

This is why, as I said, my son started figuring out cursive before my wife and I even decided to start teaching him:  he was encountering cursive all the time in his everyday life.  And not because my wife and I use cursive handwriting, because we don't.  In fact, I usually write in all caps.

Quote from: Rothman on September 08, 2022, 11:30:15 PM
We're talking about cursive, not paper.

They're not the same thing, no.  But as long as writing on paper is still a thing, there will be people who write in cursive.  I'm struggling to think of a writing system that used to have cursive but no longer does.  It just isn't the type of thing to go away.  The only way I see cursive going away is with a complete transition to non-handwritten language.

Quote from: Rothman on September 08, 2022, 11:35:54 PM
Now then, Russian cursive is still quite useful, since no one writes anything in print...

I don't speak Russian, but I learned the alphabet at some point.  Then, once I had mastered the alphabet, I learned the cursive script.  However, since then, I've forgotten the cursive.  If you don't use it, you lose it, I guess.

Quote from: kphoger on September 09, 2022, 10:11:08 AM

Quote from: Rothman on September 08, 2022, 11:35:54 PM
Personally, I can't think of very many times that I've needed to read cursive over the last decade.

You can't think of it because it's ubiquitous, and you're reading it all the time without even thinking about it.  Forget handwritten notes:  just look at other media...

Every time you see the Kellogg's logo, you're reading cursive.  If, say, you were to go into this store (https://goo.gl/maps/2yURygdhDBMNoDQP7) or this one (https://goo.gl/maps/CGi75UpGuGGJKhuS7), it probably wouldn't even occur to you that you wouldn't be able to read the store name without knowing cursive.  Or if the menu you're looking at has "Appetizers" and "Drinks" in cursive, I bet you read it and know which section to look at without even realizing you're doing it.

This is why, as I said, my son started figuring out cursive before my wife and I even decided to start teaching him:  he was encountering cursive all the time in his everyday life.  And not because my wife and I use cursive handwriting, because we don't.  In fact, I usually write in all caps.

Yes, cursive will never die because it's used in corporate logos and headings on some menus...less and less...:D

Your son will be one of the proud few to keep cursive going.  I mean, calligraphers and the like do have followings on TikTok up to a couple thousand or so...

Quote from: Rothman on September 09, 2022, 10:24:15 AM

Quote from: kphoger on September 09, 2022, 10:11:08 AM

Quote from: Rothman on September 08, 2022, 11:35:54 PM
Personally, I can't think of very many times that I've needed to read cursive over the last decade.

You can't think of it because it's ubiquitous, and you're reading it all the time without even thinking about it.  Forget handwritten notes:  just look at other media...

Every time you see the Kellogg's logo, you're reading cursive.  If, say, you were to go into this store (https://goo.gl/maps/2yURygdhDBMNoDQP7) or this one (https://goo.gl/maps/CGi75UpGuGGJKhuS7), it probably wouldn't even occur to you that you wouldn't be able to read the store name without knowing cursive.  Or if the menu you're looking at has "Appetizers" and "Drinks" in cursive, I bet you read it and know which section to look at without even realizing you're doing it.

This is why, as I said, my son started figuring out cursive before my wife and I even decided to start teaching him:  he was encountering cursive all the time in his everyday life.  And not because my wife and I use cursive handwriting, because we don't.  In fact, I usually write in all caps.

Yes, cursive will never die because it's used in corporate logos and headings on some menus...less and less...:D

Your son will be one of the proud few to keep cursive going.  I mean, calligraphers and the like do have followings on TikTok up to a couple thousand or so...

You may consider gothic script along same lines. It exists, it is being used in certain situation, there are certainly some professionals who knows how to write it. Not a big deal to read a line or two...

In this household we still use handwritten grocery lists--it's just much more convenient than setting up a text file multiple users can edit on their phones, and it also means I can simply lock up my phone in the trunk of my car when I go grocery shopping.

Along with the Kellogg's logo, the following logos are also in cursive

Coca-Cola
Campbell's
Instagram (yes, really)
Hallmark
Cadillac and Ford
Eddie Bauer
Sports teams like the Dodgers, Royals, and Indians (and the Guardians, kind of)
And young girls children see script the first time they get a Barbie

Yes, the use of cursive is going away, but it's demise is very much overexaggerated

For cursive, I believe that reading cursive is an important skill because of historic documents. Writing it I see less of a use for.

Quote from: Roadgeekteen on September 09, 2022, 03:54:04 PM
For cursive, I believe that reading cursive is an important skill because of historic documents. Writing it I see less of a use for.

How many of us read historic documents written in cursive on a regular basis?

I do not.

Quote from: Rothman on September 09, 2022, 04:33:44 PM

Quote from: Roadgeekteen on September 09, 2022, 03:54:04 PM
For cursive, I believe that reading cursive is an important skill because of historic documents. Writing it I see less of a use for.

How many of us read historic documents written in cursive on a regular basis?

I do not.

How many of use knowledge of the crusades on a regular basis? How many of us use chemistry on a regular basis?

Quote from: Roadgeekteen on September 09, 2022, 07:11:01 PM

Quote from: Rothman on September 09, 2022, 04:33:44 PM

Quote from: Roadgeekteen on September 09, 2022, 03:54:04 PM
For cursive, I believe that reading cursive is an important skill because of historic documents. Writing it I see less of a use for.

How many of us read historic documents written in cursive on a regular basis?

I do not.

How many of use knowledge of the crusades on a regular basis? How many of us use chemistry on a regular basis?

How many of us believe that k-12 curriculum needs no changes at all?

I reluctantly have to agree that reading cursive is still useful, but I see no reason to teach writing it.  I always hated it.  I stopped writing in cursive in school as soon as it was no longer required.  Writing it legibly take too much effort.  I never use it now except for a signature, which is barely more than a scribble and rarely similar to previous signatures.  I almost never write at all these days.  My hand starts to hurt when I fill out a slip at the bank.

I'd never thought about my average age before, but it's a little more than half of my current age.  It looks like as you get older, the average gets closer to half.  When you're 2 years old, 1+2=3 and 3/2=1.5, so your average age is close to your current age.  It gets further as the years add up.

I don't think you can "average" the age of one person, because it is not actually an integer that only updates once a year, but rather a floating-point duration that is  constantly increasing. For example, today I am 32.60821917808219178082 years old, tomorrow I will be 32.6109589041095890411, and so on and so forth.

Quote from: Scott5114 on September 12, 2022, 02:56:20 AM
I don't think you can "average" the age of one person, because it is not actually an integer that only updates once a year, but rather a floating-point duration that is  constantly increasing. For example, today I am 32.60821917808219178082 years old, tomorrow I will be 32.6109589041095890411, and so on and so forth.

Nerd

Quote from: Scott5114 on September 12, 2022, 02:56:20 AM
I don't think you can "average" the age of one person, because it is not actually an integer that only updates once a year, but rather a floating-point duration that is  constantly increasing. For example, today I am 32.60821917808219178082 years old, tomorrow I will be 32.6109589041095890411, and so on and so forth.

Well, you could...it'd just be half of whatever that floating point number is at that instant

Unless you've traveled at an appreciable fraction of the speed of light for any time, or if you live in Georgia where life legally begins at -0.65 years old.

Of course in Japan, you are considered oneyear old at birth,

Quote from: JayhawkCO on September 12, 2022, 07:37:28 AM

Quote from: Scott5114 on September 12, 2022, 02:56:20 AM
I don't think you can "average" the age of one person, because it is not actually an integer that only updates once a year, but rather a floating-point duration that is  constantly increasing. For example, today I am 32.60821917808219178082 years old, tomorrow I will be 32.6109589041095890411, and so on and so forth.

Nerd

Taking nerdness to the next level.. a  year is 3.15e7 seconds. So you're giving numbers down to picosecond, which is longer than what it takes to type the number. Not to mention that birth is a long process, and even cutting the cord may take a few seconds.
Next thing is the definition of the year, which seem to be not defined too well. Sidereal years or tropical years? To make it worse, tropical years vary by as much as half an hour.
It is relatively easy to define age down to a year, maybe to a few day. It becomes more difficult after that.  How do you account for an average year being 365.2425 days, for example?

(taking off nerdy glasses)

Quote from: US71 on September 12, 2022, 10:50:09 AM
Of course in Japan, you are considered oneyear old at birth,

How old was Jesus in year 1 AD?

Perhaps we should count these ages in seconds, as to account for leap years. For example, I, being one of the youngest on the forum, am approximately 457,825,386 seconds old (give or take). This is about as exact as you can get unless you want a live number or put it in microseconds.

Quote from: jlam on September 12, 2022, 11:14:03 AM
Perhaps we should count these ages in seconds, as to account for leap years. For example, I, being one of the youngest on the forum, am approximately 457,825,386 seconds old (give or take). This is about as exact as you can get unless you want a live number or put it in microseconds.

OK, throwing another wrench into all this.. How do you account for time zones if you move? Keeping straight second number may be straightforward that way.   But how do you celebrate birthdays?

Quote from: kalvado on September 12, 2022, 11:08:52 AM

Quote from: US71 on September 12, 2022, 10:50:09 AM
Of course in Japan, you are considered oneyear old at birth,

How old was Jesus in year 1 AD?

Approximately 4 or 5. Maybe as much as 7. (They didn't pinpoint his birth very accurately when they decided to divide time by it.)

Quote from: US 89 on September 12, 2022, 09:27:10 AM

Quote from: Scott5114 on September 12, 2022, 02:56:20 AM
I don't think you can "average" the age of one person, because it is not actually an integer that only updates once a year, but rather a floating-point duration that is  constantly increasing. For example, today I am 32.60821917808219178082 years old, tomorrow I will be 32.6109589041095890411, and so on and so forth.

Well, you could...it'd just be half of whatever that floating point number is at that instant

I don't think it's that simple.  We tell our age by whole-number increments, after all.

I was two years old for 365 days, but this is only my 64th day of being my current age.  That messes up the numbers.  Also, for the first year of my life, I was zero years old.

I'm 41 years old, and my wife is 40 years old.  Yet, at my life's midpoint, I was the same age as my wife was at her life's midpoint.

I intend to live forever...barring accidents ;)

Quote from: Roadgeekteen on September 09, 2022, 03:54:04 PM
For cursive, I believe that reading cursive is an important skill because of historic documents. Writing it I see less of a use for.

I used to know cursive, I was taught it in third grade, but since I never needed to use it, I no longer know. This is despite our teachers telling us cursive would be required in middle and high school.

I still know how to read it, but have no use for that either. Nobody I know uses cursive. I don't even really need to know it for my signature either. It's my first two initials with the first letter of my last name plus a squiggly line at the end that has two loops thrown in.

I think cursive is useful because it can be faster to write than print. I tend to write slowly because I don't like sloppy handwriting, so if I chose to use cursive, I could probably write faster. However, I admit I don't use cursive outside of a handful of aesthetic purposes on things like greeting cards.

I can write cursive slowly.  For it being speed writing, it quickly becomes illegible if I use it fast.

I remember learning cursive briefly in school (maybe Grade 3 or 4?), but it was too quick for me to fully learn it. I can't write cursive (except my own name), and even reading seems to depend on how it's written. For example, I find this first example much harder to read than the second (there's several words in the first example I can't figure out). I've encountered cursive it so rarely in my life that I don't think it's a big deal and it's not mandatory in Ontario schools. (https://kitchener.ctvnews.ca/irrelevant-and-obsolete-schools-moving-away-from-teaching-cursive-writing-1.2960629)
(https://i.pinimg.com/originals/30/f7/d9/30f7d9ddafa89ac6821cc4c6f6edaf0e.jpg)
(https://loopsandtails.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/04/cursive-handwriting-sample-paragraph-2.jpg)

Quote from: index on September 12, 2022, 05:10:09 PM

Quote from: Roadgeekteen on September 09, 2022, 03:54:04 PM
For cursive, I believe that reading cursive is an important skill because of historic documents. Writing it I see less of a use for.

I used to know cursive, I was taught it in third grade, but since I never needed to use it, I no longer know. This is despite our teachers telling us cursive would be required in middle and high school.

I still know how to read it, but have no use for that either. Nobody I know uses cursive. I don't even really need to know it for my signature either. It's my first two initials with the first letter of my last name plus a squiggly line at the end that has two loops thrown in.

This is exactly my situation: I learned it, but never kept up. No one uses it. Everything for school must be typed. My signature is a doctor's signature (exactly cursive would be way too easy to copy??). I never see anything written with it anymore. Bleh.