I started puttering around on Wotmania in early 2001. Shortly after Winter's Heart came out, at least, lurking until I got an email address and could then sign up. I first contented myself with responding to the Quick Polls and Theory Posts, until I found the message boards, and mostly posted on the WoT board (or its wotmania equivalent - I am completely absent from those old archives we have here, though my name is mentioned by other people, so I guess my WoT posts made an impression). I started getting into the community stuff as the increasing times between book releases left me with less to say about WoT, and then began poking around in the community and other stuff.
I find it hard to make personal connections or relationships via this sort of medium, but the decrease in WoT discussion (and I think, the dwindling of the rafonaut community) has given me at least something of a sense of who people are, and what they are like. I like to think I've been friends, for certain values of friendship, but, again, the remove of our interactions is something I find confusing (I can't even talk properly to answering machines or voice mail). I guess this is what penpals were like in the old days, except we talk about things of mutual interest, rather than ourselves & our lives.
This is also pretty much the only socialization I do on the internet. I don't have Twitter or Facebook or My space or tumblr or anything like that. I think the community here has actually overcome my resistance to, and natural suspicion of internet socialization. So, like, yay feelings, or whatever. But that's probably why I am still here, even "at the end of all things."
HI!