Ok, it's just me. I know. I am not the most patient or tolerant of souls. But....
So I've been looking at aquarium adverts, to get the fish tank set up for the rapidly growing squadron of baby corys. I have been to a half-dozen shops in town, scoured the Internet, and been on Gumtree and various hobbiest websites. I'm finding all kinds of tanks, and I am not familiar with all but a very few of the brands. So I've no clue about the quality of those other tanks. When you are dealing with that much water and the various creatures' lives, quality is really THE most important thing. The only comparison sites with reviews of the tanks that I found, when I looked at the fine print, turned out to be run by Amazon marketing, which doesn't leave me thinking they're unbiased.
I am on a couple of hobbiest boards and posted to one here in the UK stating I was looking for a tank, but didn't know anything about the various brands here in the UK/EU. I listed a half-dozen I was interested in and asked if anyone who had experience keeping fishes was familiar with any of them, and, if so, if they would recommend I purchase one or, from their bad experience with it as an experienced fishkeeper, avoid it. And why (on both counts).
So. Seemed straight-forward enough? I got several responses similar to "use Google to find fish tanks" and "you can go on Amazon and see lots of reviews from people who have bought them". (My faith in the people buying tanks on Amazon being experienced fishkeepers is not very high, really.) I got one, count 'em one, response about a tank not on my list from someone who'd had one for 20 years and loved it, and why. (Which was really helpful. Bless them. Unfortunately that tank isn't made anymore.)
So that's my beef. People who either have no reading comprehension skills or nothing useful to say who just have to respond. It's like asking a question about a product on the Amazon "ask a question" site and getting tons of responses like "I don't know, I bought it for a friend" or "not sure, sent it back". As if people read a question and feel like they absolutely have to respond with something, even if they have absolutely
nothing to say or no real information to pass along.* I don't mind the "good luck" or "that's a tough decision to make" responses. Just the ones that have literally no content at all or that address a question I did not ask and do not answer the question that was posed. What on earth makes people do that??? Just because an obviously blanket email gets sent doesn't make it a hanging offense to not reply....
*(In the case of Amazon, ok, perhaps some of the customers are really so clueless that they think I, a total stranger, emailed them personally. I'd like to think they're not that naive, but it's always a possibility.)
