This blog is not associated with Datalounge or Mediapolis in any way, shape or form. This is a personal blog containing nothing but my personal opinions and experiences with the Datalounge forum.
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Datalounge is an anonymous forum founded in the 1990s. The website was originally dedicated to LGBTQ gossip, news and information when it began, and forums were added a few years later. Now, in 2023, Datalounge is nothing but forums. The news and front page are long gone, and the once-simple Datalounge has become a complicated, confusing, and troll-filled board with many members who certainly don't seem to be part of the LGBTQ community, but rather appear to have joined because it's anonymous and only rarely moderated.
It's difficult enough to deal with the trolls; add in the board's confusing mechanics and unspoken rules, and the board can become completely incomprehensible to even regular users.
This blog is my attempt to make Datalounge easier to navigate.
However, one thing needs to be made clear: Datalounge does not provide any information to users or the public beyond what is listed in their FAQ.
Much of what I'm going to post here on the blog is going to be information I discovered through trial and error, and absolutely none of it comes from the company itself, or moderators, or anyone with any actual knowledge of the board.
It should be noted that Datalounge has always, as far as I know, deliberately kept its users in the dark as to the mechanics of the board. Any posts asking questions of the moderator or for technical help will be deleted, unanswered. Posts about specific trolls are also deleted, though sometimes a general topic thread about moderation or trolls will stay up, though no one has any idea if it's because a moderator simply never saw the post, or if they chose to allow it to remain.
My goal is to help, but at the same time, I offer no guarantees that anything I write here will actually work if you attempt it. It's possible that I'll be wrong about something, or that I'll mention a glitch and it will get fixed, or a feature on Datalounge will be changed or removed.
The first post I wrote was posted to r/Datalounge on Reddit, and was copied over here with a few additions and corrections. My final post is the one below this one.
