What is your "Policy" on Following Other Members?

[The Recherche 29,967]

I'm sure most of us have followed a lot of members here, as well as being followed yourself.  With that said, I'm sure everyone has their reasons for following other members on the Forums, so I'm kinda curious...

What exactly makes you want to follow a member on the Forums? For me, I follow someone because they either:

• Follow me first.
• I've spoken to them enough.
• Or I just have a really good first impression for some reason. 

With my whole "policy" out of the way (if you can call it that), I'm kinda curious as to what yours are! 

[Scrubbed user 3,416]

I don't follow anyone, I'll come find you one way or another.

[The Recherche 29,967]

@Vulon Bii Would you mind if I asked why? I would guess that it's so you don't get a bunch of notifications, but is there some other reason why you don't follow anyone? 

[Scrubbed user 3,416]

I don't feel the need to.

[Longhaul 6,831]

I generally do a "follow first" only if I know the person from somewhere.  Otherwise, I let others come to me on their terms.  If they think I'm interesting enough to follow, I'll go and check them out a bit, and if I don't see any obvious red flags, I will follow back.  That's been my policy over all social media platforms.

[SharpWit 2,614]

I used to follow people but I was sick of the seemingly never ending notifications. And I don't imagine I'm the most fun to follow because 1.) my tastes, and 2.) I've been partaking in a drinking game this past week that goes up to 1,000. It's not only the notifications but the pointlessness in me reading some of them. No one cares that such and such pony has had a cider for the hundredth something time. It's only of interest to those who are playing the game. There's nothing to take away from that.

If I do follow someone, I have to have interacted with them for a long time and find most of what they say to be worth reading. I've followed a handful of people and I don' think they're active anymore.

[Sovereign Leader Rarity 12,006]

I've always taken it upon myself to have a complete open-door policy here on the forums. Anypony, regardless of if I know and/or like them at all can choose to follow me, and I will always, with NO exceptions, follow them back. The most important aspect of an online friendship/association in my opinion, is that the relationship HAS to be binary, mutually beneficial and a two-way street in general. For this reason I do not follow anypony before they follow me without the assurance that they will follow me back. Otherwise I view the relationship is more symbiotic than anything else.

It DOES prevent me from perhaps forming a great deal of relationships quickly, but in general, this is a policy which I still stand behind, and will continue to stand practice.

[Scrubbed user 3,416]

4 minutes ago, SharpWit said:

I used to follow people but I was sick of the seemingly never ending notifications.

Those notifications can be disabled.

[The Recherche 29,967]

@SharpWit Yeah, I know the feeling.  Though I'm not against following people and receiving notifications, I sometimes end up with 50 of them... just because I took a break to take a shower... 

@Rarity the Supreme I get that.  Though I generally try to be sparring with who I follow, I'm willing to follow someone even if they won't follow me back. I do agree that it's best for members to follow each other, though, just so the relationship doesn't seem one-sided.

[Guest]

Generally if I think I'd be interested in what their updates would be. It doesn't have to be more complicated than that. 

[Guest]

If a person has followed me first, I most often return the gesture. In some rare cases I've followed a person first too though. If I've got a good impression of the person or if they're a person I generally enjoy seeing around the forums, I might follow them if I feel like it's an acceptable thing to do. Sometimes there are many cool people around but I hesitate to follow them first as I don't feel like I'm the right person to do so - that probably doesn't make any sense but it happens.

[Envy 6,142]

What the heck even is 'following'? This isn't Twitter or FB, it's just a forum. I preferred it when it was just a simple they request to be friends and I say yes, and that's that. Now when people follow me, I'm just like "okay". I don't know what exactly it does, and I don't think I've ever chosen to follow anyone. It's nothing personal, I just don't know what it is. I like to keep notifications at a minimum. Like I don't want to be notified when people post or anything like that. Notifications should be for likes, quotes, messages to me, PMs to me, etc. I'm already so annoyed with Twitter and YouTube because for some reason both of them decided to start notifying me when posts are made even though I've done everything I can to turn that off. YouTube has even notified me of people I don't even follow uploading videos. Like what in the world? I mean especially on Twitter why would I want this when I can just scroll through my feed and read what people posted? I just don't get it!

I suppose I've just become old and grouchy. Lol. I've been using internet forums for 15 years and this kind of thing just isn't for me. If anyone has followed me, and I know people have, don't be concerned that I didn't follow back. When someone follows me, if it had just been a friend request like in the old days, I probably would have just clicked 'accept', but this following thing? I don't even know what it is all about.

[DubWolf 17,247]

Agreed I liked the old system better  .  Plus following someone doesn’t guarantee they’ll follow back :c .

I follow friends, or just people I know here pretty well  .

[Ruddboy Olaf 10,628]

My policy is that I don't follow people.

[SharpWit 2,614]

1 hour ago, Vulon Bii said:

Those notifications can be disabled.

I'd like to put forth that I am inept at everything computer based except MS Paint so thank you for enlightening me on that feature.

[Aqua shine 1,898]

haveing friends that like to know that there online

[Passion 3,484]

My "follow someone" policies are equally proportional to the amount of Rarity they have in their profile. Pretty much that. And the prerequisite is that I stumble upon them in correct moment to witness that Rarity changes to different Rarity. (I don't really find the "follow" option useful if you haven't guessed yet)

[Dreambiscuit 9,620]

I don't often single out someone and start following them except on rare occasions. Rather, I tend to mutually follow someone who follows me. But when someone catches my eye because of some aspect of their personality (interests, point of view, compelling posts) I like to make a note of them and see what they might come up with next.  

[TBD 17,254]

If they follow me then I'll give them back the favor. But here's the catch, I only do so if that person who's following me knows me first and not add me just for numbers.

waste of time and waste of space for me. 

[Silenz Veritas 171]

I haven't been here long enough to have any sort of policy yet. It's the sort of thing I tend to overthink though. I hesitate to follow anyone because what if they don't WANT to be followed. And I figure that because I am generally pretty quiet and an observer, I don't attract followers myself.

UPDATE - Now that I've been here a little while and actually have a few followers, I follow back folks who follow me. That is, I guess, my current 'policy'.

Edited May 2, 2018 by Silenz Veritas
Updated Info

[Telferi 6,906]

I just follow everyone  For throwing a biiig party later... >:3

[Messy Mane 9,032]

You follow me,I follow you (If you seem chill)

I follow you,I expect to be followed back.

(But sometimes people don't follow me back :c)

[Berry-Bliss-Sundae 1,274]

when I walk by some post or comment I notice that there are people who comment post that I like ... sometimes I empathize without knowing... or I think it has interesting things to say, which I start to follow!
 

[Snow Frostflame 3,568]

They need to follow these criteria, not necessarily all of them.

-Similar interests
-Friendly towards me
-Having history
-Similar beliefs
-Being awesome

Following me isn't a criteria, I don't follow back.

 

On 4/17/2018 at 10:09 AM, Princess Panzy said:

My policy is that I don't follow people.

Huh, I swear we were following each other at one point. Ah well.

[King of Canterlot 9,603]

I don't really have a "policy", I just kinda follow you if you seem nice or interesting, and all in all seem like not only a friendly person to me, but to everyone else on the forums 

I don't always follow people back, but for the most part the people who I do follow fall under being very friendly to me and everyone else here, and I think that they deserve a follow for being so nice to everypony