I've got a few mixed feelings about this site. On the one hand it's a useful place to pick up reviews of products I might be planning to buy, it has a vast wealth of writing on almost any subject, some of which is brilliant, some not so much and in theory it should be great.

However, it also has a few members (who I'm not going to name) who can be a bit petty, a bit elitist even. You know the ones.... They complain that there's too much churning going on, yet at the same time they promise to return rate everyone who reads their stuff. It reminds me in some ways of the old vs new money snobbery. Some people think that just because they have won a few crowns or written x amount of reviews or been using the site since it was only them, the guides and a dog named Colin that they have the right to look down their noses on the rest of us....

So why do I keep coming back?

I left the site months ago, yet it's so damn addictive that a spare few minutes here and there at work left me browsing, reading, getting entertained & even getting angry at some points and now I find myself writing another review.

I don't want to while away my hours on dooyoo, there's a whole world out there to enjoy, the sun is shining, there's real people out there to talk to (yes real people, and you can probably read half a dozen dooyoo reviews on what real people are), there's places to visit, books to read, food to try and a million million more experiences to sample in this vast world of hours....

Yet here I sit, browing and browsing til my eyes are red and my thought process is reduced to that of amoeba.

How can something so simple be so addictive?

What happened to real conversation? Asking a friend or neighbour for their opinion? At what point did it become easier for everyone to sit in darkened rooms and pore out their deepest innermost thoughts, their most embarrassing moments, their love of cheap shampoos, their desire to have plastic surgery or to be loved to a complete band of strangers than it did to talk to someone on a bus, in a park, on the phone?

What are we, as a society becoming?

And why, oh why am I bothering to rant like this to nameless, faceless internet readers? If I can't force myself to switch off my pc and head back to the real world who am I to preach to you?

And are you, whoever you are, even reading this still? Have you simply clicked on this review hoping for a return rate or do you really value my opinion of this site? And why would you value my opinion? You don't know me?

I guess, what I'm trying to say is:

My name is Pert Abacus & I'm a dooyooaholic.