What was the Twitter joke. 'If I want an answer to a programming question, I post the question, and then an incorrect response from a different account.' No ones posting to help, but a lot will post to smugly correct the wrong answer.

I'm not entirely sure if smugness is the entire reason for doing it -- I suspect that for many of us (particularly autistics like me) there's a certain amount "But someone's wrong on the internet!" syndrome going on.

Some of us just can't work up the energy to answer a question, but if we see something wrong, it doesn't sit well with us, and we have to correct it.

And yes, sometimes when I see a question I can answer, it gives me the energy to answer it ... but not always ...

old IRC joke

This trick has been around forever, it's actually got a name, "goodhart's law"

Oh your comment is so clever because now I’ve gone to correct you that it’s actually Cunningham's Law.

This is enabled by the Internet and, weirdly enough, by the robustness of our social norms and legal system.

It's possible to make 80% of people mad, 20% of people happy, and benefit from the 20% while the 80% can't do anything to you.