And what are the hidden agendas, the implicit value systems, the no go areas?  I get the impression that liberal/social democrat, human rights, environmental ethics and even a bit of anti-capitalism is almost de rigeur - but then I may be doing you all an awful disservice because I haven't been here a wet week (as we say in Ireland) and have read only a tiny sample of diaries and comments.

You've got the right impression, generally.  Someone somewhere has a graph plotting the political spectrum of the members...  Still, I think most people are welcome here so long as you are respectful and your ideas can be intelligently defended.  Even if they are unpopular.  We have a way of getting people to come around ... ;)

Are we all frustrated journalists here, failed academics, or seers whose genius the world just plain refuses to recognize?

Lord help the poor journalist who finds themselves here.  Academics, some.  Failed?  Define "failed."  Seers?  I think you can get banned for any mention of the occult.  Or at least you have to put up with Jerome complaining it.  The world does not refuse to recognize our genius.  They just haven't been properly made aware of it yet.

Or is this just that wonderful human institution, an Irish pub without any beer, but where everybody gabs just for the sheer fun of it?

Yes.

Every newcomer wonders how and where they will "fit in", and whether they would be better off going elsewhere.  Just what is your unique selling point?

Selling?  Has someone asked you for your money?  Ignore them.  They'll just waste it on beer and obscure economics texts.

I don't expect you all to rush off to justify yourselves, particularly to the new kid on the block, but what exactly are your brand values and why should I spend time here rather than elsewhere?

Brand values?  What part of "anti-capitalist" do you not understand?!  ;)  Why should I tell you where to spend your time?  ...

Is it a mutual admiration society, a community learning experience, an opportunity to brag about how much I know on certain topics, a forum to exercise my debating skills or just a nice friendly place to be?

Yes.

In other words, what have YOU gotten out of it, being a participant here, and, given the chance, would you do it all over again?

LOL.  Not only would I do it all over again, but I have!  Several times!  

I can't speak for everyone, but I like that I can come here and let my mad thoughts out and sometimes people even listen to them.  And I enjoy the mad thoughts of others.


"Pretending that you already know the answer when you don't is not actually very helpful." ~Migeru.

I like chatting and I like learning and I like being around people who challenge my thinking process and who I feel overall are 'good eggs' even if I don't always agree with what they say or some things they stand for.

Sometimes ET brings me clarity, sometimes it confuses but whenever I have a diary in me, on whatever topic, this is the perfect place for my rants, thoughts, observations, attempts to pass my own knowledge onto others. I like seeing what topics are important to others, and what their take on things may be.

I've learnt so much about Europe, and America, and many other places.  I've learnt about political parties, political structures and how they vary, cultural differences and norms in other countries, I've learnt about people's localities, their specialisms, their thoughts and feelings.  Bits of information feed into how I do my job, how I view myself, my neighbourhood, my country in the grand scheme of all these sometimes incomprehensible goings-on.  

I feel as though I am part of a great community here.
The only thing I would change would be to have started posting earlier.

Is it a mutual admiration society,

Occasionally, but usually tongue in cheek, and only when you've been a very, very good boy.

a community learning experience,

Like no other.

an opportunity to brag about how much I know on certain topics,

God help anyone who tries to brag on this site! Your knowledge will speak for itself.

a forum to exercise my debating skills

Absolutely, and from entirely unexpected directions.

or just a nice friendly place to be?

... just about sums ET up.

"The future is already here -- it's just not very evenly distributed" William Gibson

I feel like a stranger who has wondered into a new club where everyone else seems to be a long-time member.

Indeed most comments are by regulars rather than hit-and-run posters (probably selection by registration has that effect), though there are regulars who comment maybe once a month.

Yes, I am interested in the EU, and, coming from Ireland, I may have a different perspective on things.

Should be interesting. So far we have two Irish regulars, one of whom is soon-to-be site administrator Colman, but he prefers short snarky remarks when it comes to Ireland (or anything else) :-)

But who are the readers? Is it just a few midnight nerds with words to spare? How many are there? Why would I bother writing here?

The last everyone answers for him/herself. According to Sitemeter, we have much more readers than commenters. Registered number over two thousand, regular commenters I recognise (including those activising once every month) are maybe two hundred. They are very varied: geographically (from Japan through Egypt to New Zealand, in-between from Russia through Hungary to Spain, and Norway through Germany to Greece), age-wise (from students to retirees), job-wise (from bankier through railway engineer to housewife), and within the left spectrum, even politically (from liberal centrist through social democrat and Green to communist).

And what's all the this HTML stuff?  do I really have to learn all that to prepare a presentable story?

No, but it helps :-) It's all in the New User Guide. An ET reader even made a Firefox extension to make things easier. It is said that on ET we like graphs. We certainly like to see arguments supported by linked data.

You know the inverted snobbery stuff -it can't be good if it's popular or accessible and easily usable by the masses who don't even know html!

No worry. Daily Kos is just about the biggest blog around, and it runs on SCOOP.

And what are the hidden agendas, the implicit value systems, the no go areas?

If you stick around, you'll see that different regulars and even different frontpagers have different agendas, value systems and no go areas. But you got the big picture about right. I will emphasize a general disdain for 'neoliberalism', and 'reform' talk, and that not infrequently with a France vs. Britain angle (that comes from ET having been created by Jerome a Paris, but may get consent from non-French too...)

Or is this just that wonderful human institution, an Irish pub without any beer, but where everybody gabs just for the sheer fun of it?

That, too.

Just what is your unique selling point?

"If you expect agreement, go someplace else." "Do you have graphs to prove it?"

Is it a mutual admiration society, a community learning experience, an opportunity to brag about how much I know on certain topics, a forum to exercise my debating skills or just a nice friendly place to be?

The first s bit, but admiration must be earned hard. The second definitely. The third definitely not, expect to be cut to pieces. The last two too, with the addition that one must stay friendly in situations when on other blogs a flame war would break out.

_{*Lunatic*, n.
One whose delusions are out of fashion.}

Now I turned into a 1am (CET) nerd. G'night!

_{*Lunatic*, n.
One whose delusions are out of fashion.}

I'm not quite a lurker on this site, but I'm far from a regular.  I know enough to keep up with most of the disucssions on the site, and as such am able to learn new things constantly.  I'm rarely qualified to comment substantively on much of anything, but that doesn't stop me from making the occasional snarky asides, or from requesting clarification here and there.  I sort of feel like the slightly annoying younger brother who's always trying to hang out with the infinitely cooler older kids.

I also read DKos, but I've long since stopped bothering with the comments on that site.  Too much for too little of value.  Here, on the other hand, there's almost always something worth reading.

Finally, I absolutely love the morning News Roundup and Klatsch diaries.  Thanks Fran, Metaone, and everyone else who posts stuff there!

There are so many ways to describe this site, and all of them would leave something out. For me, it suffices to say that ET is a place with a high signal-to-noise ratio. The most universal implicit value is probably that Firefox is the preferred browser. Once you start posting, the rest of your questions will answer themselves.

Except perhaps HTML, of course. Which is where Firefox comes in (via someone's TribEXT, and a few other goodies out there for the downloading).

The fact is that what we're experiencing right now is a top-down disaster. -Paul Krugman

ET is addictive, so be warned!

"what are you doing here?"

Meet people like me :) And well, maybe get some status.

Oh  and Nice to meet you.

A pleasure

I therefore claim to show, not how men think in myths, but how myths operate in men's minds without their being aware of the fact. Levi-Strauss, Claude

The salt of ET is its unpredictability and generally good level of discussions which is extremely rare even in professionals discussion as far as I know.

Most people here do not post too much but try to present some valuable ideas and information to others - even in ordinary comments, that's why it is not degenerated into banal mud-slinging which is the order of the day in majority of MSM outlets and popular forums like DK.

About "fit in" - I think there's absolutely no need to fit in discussions - we retain our individuality without taking contrary views as personal assaults on our integrity and just move on.

"Frustrated academics, journalists.." - no absolutely. I can speak of myself - my job has almost no relation to what I am writing about. I do not care to press for my ideas - they may be accepted or ignored, whatever.

yeah, frank, what are you doing here?

as if you have to ask..!

this is the last chance cafe, where doom meets snark and they both collapse into hilarity.

there's a right bunch of weirdos here, don't worry, you'll fit right in!

unless you have a prickly side, or too thin a skin...

welcome, you too can be splendidly wrong, and live to tell the tale.

the only taboo so far is astrology, lol.

'The history of public debt is full of irony. It rarely follows our ideas of order and justice.' Thomas Piketty

This merits a very long answer but I don't have time for that. So I'll say it without the nuance.

Like many left-wing blogs, ET is an antidote to the meaningless, self-satisfied and often spectacularly uninformed discourse in traditional media, which is pulling the centre of what is 'acceptable', 'serious' and the very idea of what we can do to the right. By participating we contribute to the antidote, co-create meaning, expand the scope of what is politically possible in our minds.

There are many other 'things' ET is 'about', but I say that is the main thing.

There are many other blogs out there doing the same thing, but ET is one of the best and at the same time the only one adapted specifically for Europe.

As a reference, see redstar/jerome's post Why we blog

aren't we all here just for the Meet-ups?

Next year in Paris, yeah baby!

I'm here because its such a good relief from the usual USA bullshit.  Really helps to get perspective and its a very bright bunch of people who write on a regular basis.  Its sometimes aggravating to read opinions that are critical of the US that seem to lump us together with the positions of the government, when many of us are trying to change the situation here, but it is pretty terrible what is being done in our name, and it is good criticism that focuses on specific faults generally.  It seems a bit disingenuous sometimes when one looks at the actions of some of the European governments that closely mirror the corporate visions of the US.  But, I like the proof that Europe gives that things can get better, and I appreciate the continual effort on the European left to fight against the slippage.

"I said, 'Wait a minute, Chester, You know I'm a peaceful man...'" Robbie Robertson

I come here to meet chicks!

Hey, Grandma Moses started late!

I am shocked no one's chosen the option:

"I am all screwed up and hope somebody else here can sort me out"

Someone's not telling the truth.

"Pretending that you already know the answer when you don't is not actually very helpful." ~Migeru.

Ok, Frank, I'm thanking your excellent diary; I have had a lot of fun at its expense.  A million thanks.

"Pretending that you already know the answer when you don't is not actually very helpful." ~Migeru.