Used to roll my eyes, but @sagemurphy has a point lol.

What kind of butter did you use? Some brands are way too soft and melt faster no matter how long you chill.

Look at it from the other side though. That person with the book idea might have been carrying it for years and finally met someone they think could help. It's not always a sales pitch, sometimes it's just excitement. I've had friends ask me for tech advice on dumb app ideas, but they're just sharing a dream. If you shut that down completely, you might miss a real chance to help someone take a first step. The transaction feeling only happens if you assume bad faith from the start.

Get that feeling completely. Had the same click with fishing terms in anime last year. Makes the whole thing way more fun to watch.

You ever see that pattern where asking for a simple choice gets more replies? Janac22 is right, it's like night and day. I tried the same thing with a video of my shed project, just asked if people liked the green or blue paint better. Got hundreds of comments arguing over color, and the video did way better than usual. Seems like those back-and-forth threads really feed the algorithm, like you said. Now I just pretend every video is a casual poll and watch the engagement tick up.