Screwtaping
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Screwtaping is a term used in the world of internet forums. It is used to describe the action of bumping a particularly old topic thread by posting an ironic or humorous reply to a previous message.
It is not known whether the term refers to a particular poster, however the action of 'Screwtaping' is thought to have originated on the popular internet wrestling forum, Wrestlecrap[citation needed] , and since then has gone on to become a common occurrence on many forums, wrestling and non-wrestling alike.
Many advocates of the 'Screwtape' phenomenon talk about the 'Art of Screwtaping' which encourages it only to be used sparingly, and in an ironic manner. A typical example would involve a thread where posters discuss their predictions for the world title match at Wrestlemania. A 'Screwtaper' would then reply to the thread weeks after the event has taken place, stating their 'predictions' which describe the eventual outcome in detail.
EXAMPLE OF SCREWTAPING The main event of Wrestlemania 22 was John Cena vs Triple H. Assume that 2 months before Wrestlemania 22 occurred, somebody on a message forum created a thread asking people to give their predictions on who will win this main event. Then Wrestlemania 22 comes and goes, and it becomes public knowledge that John Cena won that match. Several months later, the original thread asking for predictions on who will win this match will be buried somewhere deep into the archives of the message forum since it had been months since anyone had posted in it. This is where the Screwtaper will come in. A Screwtaper would post a reply in this thread, offering a "prediction" that John Cena will win the match. The thread then gets bumped to the front of the message forum, which the Screwtaper's contribution being a prediction to a match outcome that already happened.
Over the years, this phenomenon has become more common to the point where now many posters will just 'Screwtape' a thread for the sake of it with no real sense of humor or irony. This has caused many other users to become highly irritated by these actions and as a result, several internet forums have banned the use of 'Screwtaping'. However, many users still continue to defy the odds and 'Screwtape' when they get the chance.
