I almost didnt post this

How often do you start typing a post and give up? Does it take a while for you to conclude that replying to this random person on the internet is futile and ultimately a wasted effort?

Depends where. Here? Less likely. On Reddit? Like 99% of the time.

More often than I'd like honestly, although I have neither an idea why I do it or why it bothers me that I do it. Maybe it's just the wasted effort because it's usually 50-95% done when I decide not to bother.

I'm the opposite. I write something i wish i didn't post and then i post it.

Sometimes I look at the situation and decide the argument isn't worth continuing. Maybe the other person is trying to troll me or I just find myself getting super pissed about the other person and just need to walk away for a day or two.

A hard lesson I've learned over the years is exercising proper judgment as far as which situation to properly invest myself in. There have been more times than I'd like to admit in the past where I've written posts and then regretted it. So I'm a lot more cautious when it comes to responding to most things nowadays.

i usually just go out and say it i've already typed enough of my shit posts, might as well go full ass and let it out to the public

if it is a controversial thing i usually back out and don't get myself involved, especially if i am not well versed in it. if it's like light hearted or whatever ill get myself involved usually.

I've done it a couple of times here in PC, but it's not something I go through very often

More often than I'd like, tbh.

I've had many (big) posts in the working. The reason why I never posted any of them usually was "does it really matter if I post this? Do people even care?"

Just recently, somewhat as a test, I did post something similar of a kind somewhere else and lo and behold: nobody bothered.

Often enough. When it's on Discord, it's usually a case of starting to type something out and then realizing it's going to take much longer than I expected to finish the thought, so I give up.

When it's on Reddit, it's usually because I'm afraid to post it. Some of my gaming subs lean a little too conservative and I have no interest in actually getting into those kinds of conversations, but sometimes it's cathartic as all hell to type up a response and get those thoughts and arguments out of my head and then never send it.

...On PC it's usually because I left the thread open in a tab for half a week and then closed it without checking it when I got fed up with how cluttered my browser was and I don't remember it's unfinished until I check the thread a week later and see my draft still sitting in the quick reply box.

Sometimes.

It happens way more on Reddit -- I'll be typing something up and go "is anyone actually gonna care" and just exit out. Also, I don't want to rock the boat if at all possible, because most subs I post on are gaming related, and gamers can be... gamers.
Here on PC I'm posting on easy subs and y'all are cool so I usually post regardless. But even then sometimes I'll be like "eeeeeh" and exit out of the post.
Then on Discord I usually lurk, but last night I typed something up in #general, gave up, and went "I hope no one noticed I was typing whoops".

Ironically I was planning on posting in this thread before but I had this exact problem lmao

A fair few times. Sometimes I start writing with the knowledge that more than likely I won't actually send it but I just find it therapeutic to write it out.

It's usually on topics of a serious nature when my opinion may go against the typical consensus and just can't be bothered to deal with how hitting post may go. As in (and has happened when I have hit send in the past, only one time I can [possibly] think of here but I mean just in general on the internet) a fair amount of people can't help but box people in to why they think that other people must have that kind of atypical opinion. "OK you think that so it must be because of X Y and or Z, now let me explain to you why those reasons are stupid and why you can't have thought about this in great detail"...actually no my opinion is not because of any of those reasons and I took the liberty of preemptively explaining why someone may (fairly) make those assumptions but my actual reason is something different...but thank you for ignoring that completely to go ahead and box me into your world view of the only reasons people can hold that kind of opinion so you can come off trying to sound clever and not at all condescending!

Then there's the whole if you call out someone (clearly) being condescending towards you because you challenged their ego that kind of person will likely play innocent and try to make out that you're angry (and therefore not fit to be reasoned with) when in fact you're just calmly pointing out that there's no need for that kind of tone towards someone that thinks differently than you.

I'm more than comfortable with calling someone out on their behaviour but more often than not those kinds of people aren't worth the effort as they'll never let it go because want to get the last post, and also because they probably love the attention.

So most of the time, if I think this is how it's going to go down, it's just not worth it. As I think it's pretty easy to tell beforehand (no matter how many preemptively prepared disclaimers you put in) when there's an agenda and people don't want to be challenged, but if they are they can't help but argue to get the last post. Again, this is commentary on the posting on the internet in general... Look at that I'm even doing some preemptive disclaimers now! Haha

Yeah, I was starting a post for this thread the other day, and never ended up finishing it. I used to do it a lot more years ago, but I still do it from time to time here on PC.

Twitter is a different matter though- I think 90% of the stuff I start writing over there I give up on right before posting.