I asked something last night about calories, and one of the responses I got pointed out that the same question gets asked every week. This is a fair enough comment, and I can certainly agree with the fact that some threads come up time and again, like a glitch in the matrix.

The thing is, if I wanted to say something about Donald Trump or about Brexit (I don’t), I assume the expectation would be that I would do so on the already-running threads. Except that there comes a point when those threads cease being useful, as there is so much ‘static’ it becomes impossible to pick out the thoughtful contributions.

I used to belong to another forum where every time someone asked something, they were directed back to an old thread. That forum is now dead.

I don’t think that STW is in any danger of dying, nor do I think that the Management is even remotely too harsh on posters. But in light of the comment last night, it may be worth considering that the appearance of repeated topics can also contribute to the good health of a forum.

Here endeth the sermon.

blue pill or red pill

Was it the same cat?

Didn’t we do this last week?

http://singletrackworld.com/forum/topic/regular-questions-on-the-forum

SaxonRider – Member

I asked something last night about calories, and one of the responses I got pointed out that the same question gets asked every week. This is a fair enough comment, and I can certainly agree with the fact that some threads come up time and again, like a glitch in the matrix.

The thing is, if I wanted to say something about Donald Trump or about Brexit (I don’t), I assume the expectation would be that I would do so on the already-running threads. Except that there comes a point when those threads cease being useful, as there is so much ‘static’ it becomes impossible to pick out the thoughtful contributions.

I used to belong to another forum where every time someone asked something, they were directed back to an old thread. That forum is now dead.

I don’t think that STW is in any danger of dying, nor do I think that the Management is even remotely too harsh on posters. But in light of the comment last night, it may be worth considering that the appearance of repeated topics can also contribute to the good health of a forum.

Here endeth the sermon.

The flip side of that is that in the absence of sub forums if there was no moderation of new threads the chat forum would become the Brexit/Trump/May/Corbyn forum.

There was a thread posted last week where someone decided to say something about Trump and blatantly said they wanted to start a new thread so that they would get attention they otherwise wouldn’t receive in the giant Trump/rightwing bashing leftist hoedown thread.

This is quite different from asking a specific question about a common subject; cars or stoves or coffee for example.

Didn’t we do this last week?

http://singletrackworld.com/forum/topic/regular-questions-on-the-forum

/closes thread

scotroutes – Member
Didn’t we do this last week?

http://singletrackworld.com/forum/topic/regular-questions-on-the-forum

proper LOL

/loves this place

scotroutes – Member
Didn’t we do this last week?

http://singletrackworld.com/forum/topic/regular-questions-on-the-forum

😯

I can’t believe it.

/embarrassed laughter

Didn’t we do this last week?

http://singletrackworld.com/forum/topic/regular-questions-on-the-forum

Excellent 😀

Why do you even think about this stuff? 😆

I agree to an extent, but it’s a difficult call.

When an event is happening, as with the recent Brexit and Trump shenanigans, or some halfwits encountering an electric fence, everyone and their mother wants to create a thread to discuss the same thing in a slightly different way. Clearly, this is going to quickly swamp the forum. Every time someone famous dies we have to close a dozen duplicate threads as everyone rushes to be the first to break the news (not helped when the first poster gives it a cryptic title, please stop doing that!).

Similarly if someone asks a common question shortly after it’s just been discussed at length* a couple of days previously, if can be preferable to direct them back to the previous thread not just for the sake of avoiding duplication but because there’s potentially a lot of useful info there.

OTOH, I see little point in us being overly militant about threads that have “been done” because someone asked the same question two years ago. I think we’re actually a little looser than some forums in policing this, in other places I’ve seen some right strops thrown at new members who haven’t read the FAQ or what have you.

I suppose the bottom line is that reading every thread isn’t mandatory, but we need to do what we can to reduce clutter and avoid parallel conversations. I think.

(* – “what laptop, must have a screen and a keyboard, for the Internet, email and occasional Office work?”)

On the likes of stackoverflow they populate a little dropdown as you type the title of a new thread (question on SO I guess) which shows posts that already exist with similar titles that you can view. That’d probably be helpful in reducing duplicates in the cases where people have used logical thread titles.

If we have other brexit or trump specific threads (though both topics come up in pretty much every thread already) would you mind not telling the halfwit trolls who seem to spend half their lives in the current ones and we’ll leave them in there typing away to themselves. It’ll be great!

When there are multiple threads can mods leave the one open with the most obvious title, please. “Allo Allo” or “Rene Artois” mean something to me but “au revoir au revoir” will never be found by anyone checking if a thread is already open on the subject before posting.

All that has happened before, will happen again…………………..

^ 🙂
[video]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6bOy3RNyWME[/video]

a twist in the fabric of space? where time becomes a loop.
input translation!

Was it the same cat?

Alive or dead?

When there are multiple threads can mods leave the one open with the most obvious title, please. “Allo Allo” or “Rene Artois” mean something to me but “au revoir au revoir” will never be found by anyone checking if a thread is already open on the subject before posting.

Generally we’ll choose the one with the most replies.

Yup, beat me to it. Perhaps that’s where we’re going wrong.

Can’t the mods just edit the thread titles to something less cryptic? Occasionally? Just the odd time?

We can edit the wording but not the URL itself. It’s a good point though, might start doing that.

Joe Cocker’s dead!!?? 😯

Maybe.

However what’s cryptic to me may not be to others. The au revoir au revoir title was clear to me, even with RIP Mr Celeb in the title people still post RIP Mr Celeb in their one. Fact is people just don’t always look.

blue pill or red pill