Discussion:Were they as good this year?

Tensions are up in the world at large, so tensions are up here too. Certain seeds sown in 1980 and forward are coming a cropper. We are destined to live through interesting times. I say interesting in a way that Huxley would anticipate.

The great thing about forums is the ability to post wrong things, answers, ideas, concepts and then by the discussion of others, they learn something, they <and the others that didn't know> find the correct answer, boost or help someone work through their idea. pointing out pros and cons and then we'd reinforce conceptual frameworks for each other, or help mold them.

Hey, some of the really good discussions started with DIYers. They ask the questions that not all pro's know and are sometimes afraid to ask, because we are supposed to know it. I say before and I say now, I like the DIYers and we need to be more tolerant of all questions.

I know a lot of discussion focused not only on ideas and taxes, but on goofy stuff. Not really sure who starts that crap. I think it was Tom. But I do think that helped a lot of us release stress.

Anyway, I am exhausted, no time for tequila. I do think this board is awesome and I cannot wait to release some of my ideas to you folks this summer. Off to bed.

Night

I would like to mention that there were some responses that I read that were unneccessarily condesending. No one knows it all because no two clients are ever really exactly alike... Let's appreciate the diversity of responses and opinions because we all know the tax code is anything but black and white.

I agree with Dsocpa..."I would like to mention that there were some responses that I read that were unneccessarily condesending. No one knows it all because no two clients are ever really exactly alike... Let's appreciate the diversity of responses and opinions because we all know the tax code is anything but black and white. "

Most people were very helpful & supportive.

Speaking only for myself, I try to ask people to search only if the question is one that is something along the lines of: "My client's girlfriend lives with him and has no income. Can he claim her as a dependent?" That one has been asked, answered and beaten to death. It just seems lazy to me to not look for an answer first before posting a question.

This is a great forum. But I think in some respects, computers and these types of forums have made us lazy as professionals. I often hear people say "Just Google it." We rely too much on the software to "give" us the right answer or we just pop on here post a question and get an answer. But how do we know the answer is right? My software told me that one of my clients was getting a huge refund, but my gut said something else. I was right. Wikipedia is the first source for many people in researching stuff on the Internet, but it also notoriously wrong in many cases. Kevin is correct that

Posters like Riley2, Solomon, D&T, JR1, Kevinh5, Dennis, RoyDaleOne and many others always guide you in the right direction by giving you keywords or first source information for you to expand on. Once you have that, you have the keys to find what you need.

There was a poster here who shall go nameless started dispensing advice. Something seemed strange about their advice. I asked them to put up a profile. None showed up. I asked again and again. The more they posted, the more I noticed their advice lacked something, like citations and sources and it was usually one sentence in length. Their advice was also becoming increasingly inaccurate and plain misleading. Then others noticed it. One frequent user here clued me into what might be going on and I contacted the moderator. It seems now that posted has temporarily disappeared.

Upthread, my buddy Fred mentions I bring "goofy" stuff to the board. Fine, so be it. That's part of who I am. I enjoy not taking myself too seriously. It seems he doesn't either. But I take what I do seriously.

What I would like to see here is a DIY forum and a student forum. I am not against these individuals. But we have had too many who come here thinking the Internet is a place for "free advice." As I've said, not everything in life is free. I've written about it on this forum before, I don't need to repeat myself.

I do think the discussions were a bit different this year. I tried emphatically to research my question first and bring it here after I "kicked the tires." It was refreshing for me to do that. I am a lot more confident as a result than I have been in years.

We also didn't have BeatleFred to kick around and by the way D&T, who was the "son of the boss"?

Tom

I am happy we have such a diverse group of professionals coming together to help each other, and am pleased there is generally a level of respect in our back and forth discussions. I get a real kick out of some of the posters senses of humor and sometimes the comic relief is hilarious. I do think some of the non-tax related discussions should be relegated to the "general chat" area, particularly the postings that are heavily peppered with religious points of view or dogma.

I wish I knew as much as some of the pillars of Tax Almanac, but the reality is that I don't. I'd bet that back when they first started, they didn't have all the answers either. I've been posting here since 2006, with the hope that I would get good enough to contribute on a regular basis. The tone of many posts earlier this year put me right off that aspiration. However, I came back and started posting here and there anyway, doing my best to ignore the jabs, but refusing to be drawn into a fight. If we left this forum to only those who already have all the answers, or most of them, what's the point? So I took the stance that I would plow ahead, making mistakes along the way, but hopefully learn a lot in the long run and be able to give that back. The CPA and long-time preparer I work with aren't always around to banter with, so I come here instead. If those of us in this position keep plugging away at it, maybe we'll know a lot more some day, but I encourage others to keep plodding along. For those experts correcting us, thank you, and thank you especially if you were gentle in your rebuke (Katie and D&T come to mind, but there are other kind souls out there too).

In a way, I miss some of the DIY questions, bc they were the ones I felt most comfortable contributing to. I'd like to become a master gardener some day. To do so, one must contribute volunteer time to answer gardening questions at the local farmers' market or other places. I considered the DIY questions to be like master gardener volunteer work. The were the first rung in the ladder to getting better at answering questions.

As D&T has mentioned, some non-pro questions are very interesting. I found one the other day on DPAD and software to be so. I wish we weren't so negative about taking up some of the threads of discussion and hashing out ideas sometimes. I know we're all busy, and there is probably a better way to wade through them, but I think if we pushed the search feature more, we would get rid of the repetitive questions, and be able to better focus on the more interesting questions, even if from non-pros.

Other than that, I really enjoy this forum and hope many will continue to participate. I look forward to seeing discussions in the off-season where we can focus on non-urgent topics. Thanks for all the posts.

Like several others, I also felt reluctant to ask certain questions. I worked around that by emailing certain people (you know who you are, and thank you!), but I think it is unfortunate that we do not all feel comfortable asking questions. That's why this forum is here in the first place.