[Judith Anne]

Newbies told to take a hike will, however, go running to other sites exclaiming what a bunch of snobs are at Free Republic, and with the momentum this site has got going for itself, word of mouth needs to be kind words.

A lot of times, a newbie posting (what should be a response on a related thread as) a vanity gets exactly that response. That's okay with me. We're proud of FR, and it's solid, we DON'T accept advertising, we fund it ourselves--we pay our own way. Newbies posting one-line vanities are sometimes -- not always -- useless freeloaders. WE pay for the bandwidth to host them, and we aren't hurting for hits. WE pay for the expansion, the hardware and software. JR runs it, he started it, it's his place. He makes the rules. He's asked that people not start threads that are better posted as replies on existing threads, but some don't read. Juvenile attention-getting behavior, in my opinion.

[endthematrix]

I will add that I spend more of my FR time reading, searching and learning. Posting is about refuting erroneous claims or substantiating your own claims. Definitely addicting!