Nobody in my corporeal life cares about quinces the way I do. Nobody in my corporeal life can quote from cookbooks. Nobody in my corporeal life thinks up recipe names like Pierino. Nobody in my virtual life except A and M come to life in a pop up store with an attached brunch. Plus the Secret Santa plus the Piglet plus the actual recipes and columns. I could say more but that would be doing all the work for you!

Darius, even academics don't often think of their own behavior in terms of themes and motivation. If you break your question down, you'll be more likely to get answers. It is your job as the writer to decide what the themes are and you can do that by reading through and analyzing past postings. Good luck.

For me, I just like to help others out with whatever I've learned so they don't have to learn it the hard way or so they can accomplish something they couldn't before.

Hi Darius - I was unsure how to answer your question, since it was phrased as a question about the *community,* and I don't know what other people's motivations are -- only my own. You might get more / better answers if you asked for people's personal reasons for posting... And I agree with Audrey that it varies depending on the forum... I think for me personally, my motivation for posting a recipe is sharing the excitement that comes when I have created something new that I like... As well as to some extent hoping for the validation that comes from others enjoying a recipe I have shared...

Hi Darius. It seems there are all sorts of themes and motivations when posting about food. For the hotline It's generally food & cooking concerns and people post when help is needed with recipes or general cooking questions. But for the most part when posting about food it seems that people just want to share their love of food & cooking - posting photo's, news about great recipes they've tried or even restaurants they have been and loved.