The dormant person feeling is a feeling I find myself having on the Internet often. Casually browsing the Internet, I find myself reading through threads and websites that don’t look like they’ve been updated since 2009, or 2010, or ${currentYear - 10}. Profiles that haven’t posted in so long either.
When I see just how long ago their last activity was, it gives me the feeling, which I can only describe as a mix of concern, curiosity, and empathy. In my head, I go “I wonder how they are doing now”, and “are they alive and well?”. Sometimes I find myself “investigating” them or looking them up to see if they are still alive just so I can satiate this feeling of mine.
Do other people experience the dormant person feeling too? Is it wrong to have such a feeling? But hey, if I feel the dormant person feeling, it does show that I do have empathy for strangers, a good quality, I suppose.
A place where most of the people are both friendly and active. No dormant effect there.
I bet the Germans or the Japanese have a word for that feeling that can’t be translated in any other language.
That’s just the act of lurking, it doesn’t say anything about the feelings you get while lurking.
I am a Tagalog speaker too (but I had to look usyoso up in the dictionary lol)
I do this with old musicians. I listen to a lot of Indy type stuff and ill see they haven’t released in years… It makes me wonder. At the same time the entertainment industry and life is pretty bullshit so good on them if they left it.
Also old YouTuber before things were viral and completely soulless.
I’m really big on indie musicians too, can relate. One indie musician I found had their last release in March 2024. YouTube put one of their in my feed from 8 years ago (which made me investigate). I told another indie musician I know about the person and it turns out that they have cancer. They are still alive and battling it, and I really hope they get better soon.
Yes I also wonder about some musicians. Sometimes they had success with one album, release another and then silence. Sometimes only one album exists. For example Gotye, but I found a video of him basically saying he didn’t like the business and just stopped.
On the Youtube Side, I hope Jake Roper of Vsauce3 is doing fine. He had cancer then I think it was better but now it’s been a year again since his last video.
I come across ancient threads all the time when looking up tech problems. Sometimes you find still working solutions amidst the broken links and defunct profiles, other times it’s DenverCoder9.
I dont. I get a sense of happiness when I read through old threads and blogs because I’m basically looking through a portal to that year. Its like reading an old book it gives you perspective of how people felt at that moment in history.
