Here's my experience: Some users on the forums have limited knowledge and are unwilling to admit, even to themselves, that there is more knowledge than what they know. It is like a religious belief such that if a user presents something that doesn't fit within that belief, then they attack that user... sometimes for months. It gets brutal.

Here's something else from my weight loss experience that most find difficult to understand or believe: Plateaus are real. I've personally experienced a couple of long plateaus that lasted for several months. The first is the best example... here is what happened:

-I stopped losing weight, despite continuing to eat at a deficit. Sure, I had fluctuations of a few lbs. every time I weighed, but it was always up and down within the same range.
-After 2 months, I changed to an IF plan which actually caused me to be in a huge surplus overall, but at a large deficit every other day. It's the EODD if you want to look into it.
-After 6 weeks of eating at a large surplus and still not seeing any losses still (except fluctuations, but really shouldn't I have gained during that time? No, because that isn't how a plateau works), I went back to a regular daily deficit.
-After another 2 months of no gains or losses, I suddenly started dropping several lbs. in a few days (a "whoosh"). It was about 7 lbs. lost, but I always believe it could have been more if not for eating at a surplus during the IF diet, which was intended to force a loss / whoosh (it didn't).

Ok, both are the same. I hope that my answers/data will further your project in some way!