Once again, I either have too much time in my hands or am procrastinating.

Thing is, I’m thinking about the seemingly overwhelming need some internet users have to perform the (always welcomed) cyber flounce.

In my relatively limited experience (I’ve been online just over a dozen years, but mostly I have stayed put in my little corner of the intratubes, so… limited experience), there are two main types, whether performed on a blog or wider forum.

The brief one consists of a relatively short post, usually ending with, “and I’ll never come back here again!” (for a recent example, check out this comment)

The… well, I’ll call it epic flounce, for it’s really much bigger than the previous one. The epic flounce has a few minor variations, but for the most part it’s a longer post (or even a series of posts) giving a helluva lot of unasked-for information, explaining all the reasons that have led the poster to “never come back here again!” (In a few cases, it can be about how other people have forced the poster to close her blog, or to make it private—after posting all about it, of course— or how she’s been banned by the mean girls, etc.)

And I have to wonder at the need to point out that a person is “never coming back here!” Wouldn’t that person’s absence say it for her? (more…)