Anti-Necrospamming

[Stoic Joker]

This has actually been bugging me for awhile now, as there seems to be two different (seemingly diametrically apposed) schools of thought.

School 1 - Don't keep asking questions that have already been answered, use the search function.

School 2 - Don't resurrect old long dead threads.

So if you have a new spin on an old question you can't add it to the old thread without violating rule 1, and you also can't start a new thread without violating rule 2. Hence there really is no correct answer.

Maybe if the board would add a little tombstone to a post made to a thread that was inactive for (say...) more than 6 months to dramatize the resurrection ... And we lightened up on rule 2 a bit, it could work.

[app103]

School 1 - Don't keep asking questions that have already been answered, use the search function.

-Stoic Joker (January 06, 2011, 04:51 PM)

But, it's ok to do this...I will still answer you, most likely with a link to the old thread with the original answer.

School 2 - Don't resurrect old long dead threads.

-Stoic Joker (January 06, 2011, 04:51 PM)

But it's ok to do this too, as long as you are not resurrecting it for the purposes of spamming and dragging up the old thread because it has the right keywords to go with your SEO spam links.

I was the one that dragged this thread up from the dead, because I had a comment to make in reference to ewemoa's script and the recent server move that came along with a change of forum path that caused it to stop working. That script had been posted in this thread and no other. There was no more appropriate thread to post my comment in than this one.

Ewemoa's script is one of those things that you take for granted after awhile, and aren't even conscious of seeing what it does unless something triggers it, when it's working. Also, when it's not working due to a change in forum path on the server, it slows down page loading a lot. Quite a few people were complaining about slow loading since the move, and I can't help but wonder if some of them are running the script and forgot about it like I did and need to change the path it's supposed to be triggered on.

[Stoic Joker]

I was the one that dragged this thread up from the dead, because I had a comment to make in reference to ewemoa's script and the recent server move that came along with a change of forum path that caused it to stop working. That script had been posted in this thread and no other. There was no more appropriate thread to post my comment in than this one.

-app103 (January 06, 2011, 05:09 PM)

Right, I caught that part, and I agree completely with your reasoning for the post. I'd just been watching to see the "crowd reaction" to it ... Which is what got me started thinking about the rule circle.

As you'd mentioned both 1 & 2 are (supposed to be) Okay. But it doesn't always seem to work out that way (again with the crowd reaction part). So working off Deozzan's post I was pondering aloud a solution to something, as it had been bugging me for a bit.

[app103]

Ewemoa's Nemse script needs updating again.

[Renegade]

The irony here is wondering if we have any newly converted necrophiliacs...

[TaoPhoenix]

The irony here is wondering if we have any newly converted necrophiliacs...

-Renegade (August 31, 2015, 11:43 PM)

Well, also, if you have a new wrinkle to add, I for one get into a bit of "ooh new shiny" and have no idea some older threads exist. So then someone (legit, non-spam) necro's it, and I go "ooh! That's a thing?"

I've done it a couple of times, notably with the Getting Things Done thread because sometimes we speculate and then it becomes a time capsule "how did that work (or not) for you?"

[JavaJones]

Personally I think the whole "necro thread" fear is a bit of barking up the wrong tree. IMO threads *should* be revived *instead* of a new thread *IF* the subject of the new thread is directly relevant to the old one. This keeps continuity and avoids lots of similar but separate threads where discussion gets fragmented, people aren't aware of prior context, etc. I see this happen a *ton* in the forums I manage and it's frustrating. I prefer to see the opposite, old threads being revived preferentially. Yes, you can run into problems on the other end of the spectrum, threads getting monstrous, overwhelming, and no longer on the original topic, but this is not strictly a "don't revive old threads" issue, rather it's a more general and useful "keep threads on topic" issue. If everyone stuck to that much more clear and useful rule, then not only would old and long-lived threads be kept on topic, *all* threads would be! On some of my forums we have 10 page threads that occur over the space of only a week or two, so the long topic issue is not confined to necro thread posting, and sometimes indeed these threads go off topic, so again it's more an issue of keeping on topic IMO.

Just my 2 (or 3 or 4 ) cents.

- Oshyan

[Deozaan]

I mostly don't care anymore, but here's how I explained it nearly 5 years ago the last time this thread was necro-posted to:

Maybe when I wrote the original topic, I was really mad about something (such as what was then a "recent" necro-spammer trend). But now, two years later, that "trend" isn't much of a trend, so the whole conversation is pointless because it no longer reflects the current reality. Or maybe I've had a change of heart since then. Maybe I'm a completely different person now than I was then.

The point is, when someone resurrects a really old thread, and it's been so long that nobody remembers it or perhaps they are a "new" member (within the past two years since the thread was last discussed) and have never seen it before, people start jumping in like it's a fresh conversation because they don't notice the date, when really it's been dead in the water for years.

-Deozaan (January 06, 2011, 03:31 PM)

[JavaJones]

People need to just be aware of the context of the thread they're responding to, *regardless of how old it is*. If people see a thread for the first time and jump to the most recent post and start replying to *that* without reading the full thread, it causes the same problem, no matter how old the thread is.

- Oshyan

[Deozaan]

Wise words.