Also, I keep getting pestered by the mods, so sorry if I have been an annoyance. I fabricated a lot of my personal info just because im one of those people who dont like to give my life story to random strangers on the internet. Personally I feel it's rather irrelevant how old I am, where I live, what I do for a living, etc etc. They have gone so far is to do traceroutes on my ip and find my isp and regional location to see if it matches what I said, wtf? Yea I'm in South Carolina at the moment but I'm from Houston and I can tell you all about it. Anyway, I dont want something I say here to come back to me in my real life. But if my questions are a nuissance well then I apologize.
I'll tell you WTF. There are real military aviators on this site that you're talking to, not some asthmatic nerd who lives in his mom's basement surrounded by every copy of Jane's ever published. The wings next to someone's username mean they've earned them in real life. What does that mean?
First, you're probably going to get the straight dope if you ask a question here. That said, everyone who posts here does so out of the goodness of their heart and to help the next kid in line trying to do what they do now. Thus, like most volunteer organizations, we are giving of our free time, want to use it to help, but don't want to waste it with trolls.
Further, military aviators are a credible source for information in our chosen field compared to Joe Blow off the street. Thus, the mods like to know who we are talking to. It may not be a very likely scenario, but if someone starts asking detailed questions about aircraft, tactics, or things of that nature, the mods will probably do due diligence and make sure that they aren't posting from North Korea or something like that. Having a combat aviator or flight student say something carries more weight than the aforementioned asthmatic nerd. Generals and Admirals also lurk here, and have occasionally posted as well.
So we need to make sure that what we post doesn't A) put info out that could be of intel value to another country, B) piss off someone many paygrades higher than us, and/or C) give a reporter a reason to say "aviators on airwarriors.com stated X," which would probably in turn lead to A) or B). We don't want to get in trouble in real life over something we posted on the Internet any more than you do.
And if you think you're anonymous on the Internet, I've got this bridge near San Francisco I'm looking to sell. With the way the real estate market's going these days, it's an absolute steal.
