I actually kinda thought accurate dox and history were both requirements for new lolcow threads (that is, it's actually in the rules or something).
A dox helps, but isn't absolutely needed. The big thing is a history. A few cows hide their name well enough to not get doxed too early on, but a history is needed. The reason a dox is so critical is it is a passive ween just for existing, and it leads to more information since we have that information to go looking with.
However some cows go full DFE on thread going public, or they are users and see their PG thread and DFE then. This can mean the dox is harder to find post thread creation. So it's best to hold off until you find it.
A full history isn't always needed, just a way to show that they started acting like a cow at Date X, did something notable at Date Y, and are still regularly active as of Date Z. I've seen plenty of new cows spawn from that minimum of information. The real question is if people care about them beyond the first exceptional moment they caught our gaze.
Edit because I forgot to address this earlier, and it is a good thing to actually discuss, as too many people are thread happy about random one off cows:
I don't care so much about history as I care about productivity. Someone who spergs out in public once a month can be fun to follow, but it's hard to keep a thread for a guy like that from being buried down to page 3 by more productive lolcows. So if someone is only occasionally a huge fucking sped, I'm fine with keeping his shit to megathreads more people are likely to visit every day.
This is important to the health of a thread, but getting a thread going is slightly different than maintaining a healthy thread. I do agree with
@Corn Flakes though so far as that once the information is gathered to make a thread on someone happens, it is worth considering if they will be capable of maintaining a healthy thread.
Exceptional acts don't make the cow. Exceptional
habits make the cow. Find if they have a history of exceptional acts, this reveals any habits. At that point you can start gathering information to make a thread. While you do so check how frequently those habits come up and you'll know if you got the productivity. If you got the productivity, make the thread, if they don't, dump it all in a megathread and say "yeah, this person doesn't do enough all that often to justify a thread, so have what I found".
The process of deciding if a potential cow is in fact a cow is something like this (and I will use a personal lolcow, who while not suitable for this thread does help me make the point, who got my attention because they were local and were the coworker of my girlfriend at Starbucks as the example. The name of the lolcow is Royce Rivard):
- Notice an exceptional act. For me this was Royce being a pedo in public and trying to hide behind his autism to justify it, he's still involved in the same bit of drama with his ex who realized he was only interested in her because she was mentally stunted over two years later. He now tries to spin it as her being the abuser.
- Gathered information on them. I already had the dox at the time (it is now out of date and I think they are homeless at this point), but I did do some work to gather social media content. If you're interested you can see their current accounts here (Instagram, Twitter, YouTube Topic for their music, Link Tree).
- Determine habits. They used to hit on clearly underaged minors IRL, no older than maybe 14, (basically a living example of someone who lives by the motto of "if their age isn't on the clock, they are too old for the cock"). Also constant drama with his ex, which gets kinda samey, and he puts out AWFUL music. Oh and comically liberal political opinions. The habits were all there. Happened regularly, and wasn't much of a one off thing. IRL he also would publicly lose his shit on customers at work for not likely Taylor Swift, had TERRIBLE spending habits, actually quit his job to get government covid money, constantly grifting IRL, and a little bit online too. Definitely an exceptional individual with exceptional habits. Even travelled across the border to the US during lock down a few times to see his underaged girlfriend by, according to him, hiding in a trunk. Fucking exceptional.
- Determine frequency. It's a pretty slow, yet steady flow. It's there, but not enough being posted online to be worth a thread in my opinion. I have, however, provided you with the links and reasons I even got so far in the process so you can decide if you disagree with my assessment for yourself. If someone disagrees with my decision enough that they decide to make a thread, PM me and I will help you put together a thread. The big issue though, not much of his exceptional behaviour was posted online. He used to also maintain like eight different twitter accounts apparently, all as hardcore Taylor Swift fan accounts talking about how much he wanted to marry her, but he deleted them before I decided to get the information for them from my girlfriend. During that phase the productivity was there, but since then he's no longer putting enough of it online to be worth a thread in my eyes. You're all welcome to disagree.
- Write the OP and make the thread in PG. I didn't get this far, obviously because I determined productivity was too low, at least when it came to online content. However this is the very last step to a cow getting a thread of their own. In my example Royce didn't qualify, so I didn't bother. However it still shows how important frequency is before getting excited and making a thread.
