BUDDIES on melonland?

[bennizone]

Hello!
I was wondering if there is a internal "logic" or "custom" when it comes to buddies on this forum. I have gotten people requesting to become buddies with me, and I've just accepted the request because, well, I didn't wanna come off as hostile in case it was common practice to befriend(bebuddy?) whoever! That's cute! But I don't really know if that's the case, and I don't know these people, and was considering whether I should clear out my buddies and only be Buddies if I know who the other person is. 

Maybe this is kinda silly to overthink, but no harm in asking, right? 
xoxo Benni

[Twigz0n]

Tbh even though I’ve only had an account here for the past two or three days, I don’t feel like the buddies system would be any different from your average friends/mutuals thing.

Perhaps some people might just like your vibe or the way you convey your thoughts and send a request. Maybe you’ve replied to one of their threads and said something that they thought was meaningful or helpful. Perhaps you’re already both somewhat communicative with each other. But I think ultimately you decide who you’re comfortable with adding as a buddy. Maybe you don’t mind adding random people and that’s okay too!

If you feel worried about ignoring or declining requests you can always just write smth short in your bio that goes like “please don’t feel offended if I don’t accept buddy requests, it’s nothing personal, I just prefer to add people that I know/ am more familiar with”. (Doesn’t have to be worded that way exactly)

This is all just assuming on my part though, maybe there is a secret melonland forums code for the buddies system but I personally doubt it’s that deep lol The site is already very casual as it is

[MediocreMetastasis]

Nobody requested to be my buddy yet  .

Usually on different sites there's different "rules". On Instagram it's whoever I work with in a school/uni class or just someone I know I'll cross paths with multiple times. But never really someone I don't know IRL. I'm more selective on discord where I only friends people who I actually consider friends rather than acquaintances. Or someone I'm working on a project with (game jam).

On this site I would probably just send a buddy request to people who has similar interests to me. The buddy system seems to only show other people who you are buddies with.

[Melooon]

A lot of people send me buddy requests and I don't really know how to handle the situation so I accept them all 

I think you can decide your own system for them; the main use of the buddy system is that it gives you a way to bookmark members that you find interesting or want to follow in some way (maybe you like their art, or want to colab, and want a way to return to their profile easily when you next visit the forum) - there are other ways you could do that of course, its just one option! 

[arcus]

By design, it's used for privacy settings.

Years ago on forums, if you didn't want personal messages or profile comments from strangers, you would restrict them to buddies/friends only. Otherwise, it was pretty normal and expected to get personal messages and profile comments from random people.

This forum also has privacy settings tied to the buddy system under "Settings & Profile > About Me / Profile" and "Settings & Profile > Personal Messaging".