Comments on: Closing Old Threads

Closing Old Threads

mathowie — Mon, 29 Jul 2002 12:32:03 -0800

New feature: threads on MetaFilter more than a month old are now closed for new comments.

By: rocketman

rocketman — Mon, 29 Jul 2002 12:36:11 -0800

Ah, yes. I was wondering why, when I tried to post to this thread, it said it had been closed.

It works now. Very neat feature. I hope there are no plans to bring this to MetaTalk.

By: MiguelCardoso

MiguelCardoso — Mon, 29 Jul 2002 12:37:28 -0800

Good. If there is any need for a significant follow-up (very rare anyway) I suppose it'll be OK to post it with a link to the previous thread. Thanks too for giving us cult-threaders generous advance notice.

By: eyeballkid

eyeballkid — Mon, 29 Jul 2002 12:37:54 -0800

1142 (MeFi, not MeTa) = (1616 comments)
9622 = (1727 comments)

Interesting. *(whistles Queen tune)*

By: Tin Man

Tin Man — Mon, 29 Jul 2002 12:40:17 -0800

Good call, Matt. Nice work.

Although what most excites me about this thread is that it kicked a certain other MetaTalk thread off the front page.

By: mathowie

mathowie — Mon, 29 Jul 2002 12:40:40 -0800

I forgot to add the feature has been also added to MetaTalk.

While I appreciate the additional sense of community and commradire that the cult threads brought to the site, they are a pointless drain on resources that I've mentioned several times. I'd like to convert all old threads to flat files, instead of database-driven to further save resources from things like search engine bots scouring for new content, and not having to worry about new comments being added makes that a lot easier.

By: yhbc

yhbc — Mon, 29 Jul 2002 12:40:43 -0800

I don't believe it.

Last post.

It really should have been someone else.

By: yhbc

yhbc — Mon, 29 Jul 2002 12:43:36 -0800

Sorry for linking to it, mathowie. I'm just a little - well, I don't know how I feel. The decision to close the old threads, though, was absolutely the right one.

Now, let us all move on. There is, as someone else has said, nothing to see here.

By: ashbury

ashbury — Mon, 29 Jul 2002 12:47:32 -0800

Easy for you to say, yhbc. Now we all have to see what the last post was.

By: ColdChef

ColdChef — Mon, 29 Jul 2002 12:52:33 -0800

Thanks, Matt. You tolerated that kind of childish silliness for longer than was humanly necessary.

MetaFilter: We've upped our standards, now up yours.

By: mr_crash_davis

mr_crash_davis — Mon, 29 Jul 2002 12:55:07 -0800

Forgive me for being ignorant of the process of tracking-back ("back-tracking"? "track-backing"?) but does closing the thread also prevent new trackback links, or is that even possible?

By: mathowie

mathowie — Mon, 29 Jul 2002 12:59:17 -0800

does closing the thread also prevent new trackback links, or is that even possible?

I was just working on that stuff. Yeah, my fear with the trackbacks is abuse on old threads. It would be easy for someone to auto-trackback every old post, in order for them to gain ranking at google for whatever they're trying to sell.

By: Ufez Jones

Ufez Jones — Mon, 29 Jul 2002 12:59:55 -0800

MetaFilter: We've upped our standards, now up yours.

Slaphappy ColdChef comment of the day. thanks again, CC.

By: MiguelCardoso

MiguelCardoso — Mon, 29 Jul 2002 13:00:21 -0800

This thread is over 30 days old, and has been closed for archival purposes.

Doesn't get more dignified than that, either!

By: matteo

matteo — Mon, 29 Jul 2002 13:03:49 -0800

Yeah, good call. The server's got to be real happy

Anyway, some threads could use some early shutdown.
Sorry but we're beyond Fark now, this is Usenet material

By: rcade

rcade — Mon, 29 Jul 2002 13:13:15 -0800

Woo hoo! I think the cult threads were a big reason why this place is becoming a magnet for chatty cathies, so I'm happy to be able to tapdance on their grave.

By: briank

briank — Mon, 29 Jul 2002 13:18:56 -0800

Here's a question -- does this set a de facto "statute of limitations" on double-posting since offenders can no longer be told to go back to the original post if it's 30+ days old?

By: Marquis

Marquis — Mon, 29 Jul 2002 13:20:29 -0800

Yeah - what's the policy now on DPs and follow-ups?

By: monju_bosatsu

monju_bosatsu — Mon, 29 Jul 2002 13:24:38 -0800

Because the purpose of the post is to publicize the link, a double post is still a double post, whether the original has expired or not. The discussion is just additional fun for us.

As for follow-ups, it seems like anyone with a follow-up more than thirty days after the original would probably be posting it to the front page anyway. Maybe posters should just be cautioned to think about whether a follow up is really necessary.

By: mathowie

mathowie — Mon, 29 Jul 2002 13:24:46 -0800

Double posts are still double posts. People can go back and re-read the comments and links contained.

I was under the impression that the point of making note of an identical post from 9 months or 2 years ago wasn't to redirect comments there, but to simply say "this has already been covered."

By: beth

beth — Mon, 29 Jul 2002 13:26:26 -0800

We'll get a repeating set of threads that shows up every thirty days, heh. And then people will complain about it, and Matt will pull his hair out and realize that there's no pleasing you people.

That is, if he's got any left. (I have no idea what you look like, Matt, just trying to be figurative, here).

By: MiguelCardoso

MiguelCardoso — Mon, 29 Jul 2002 13:29:31 -0800

I have no idea what you look like, Matt

Please don't tempt the photoshoppers, Beth.

By: y2karl

y2karl — Mon, 29 Jul 2002 14:18:40 -0800

< margesimpson> Hmm... < /margesimpson>

By: quonsar

quonsar — Mon, 29 Jul 2002 15:08:03 -0800

matt's a good old boy.

By: skallas

skallas — Mon, 29 Jul 2002 16:04:49 -0800

*the SQL server sighs in relief*

By: Neale

Neale — Mon, 29 Jul 2002 16:40:55 -0800

~Damnit, and I was hoping Matt would contact me first so I could push the server load to extremes the night before threads were closed.

Now to post 2000 posts to a thread in one day~

By: jcterminal

jcterminal — Mon, 29 Jul 2002 18:22:58 -0800

nice! gj matth.

By: benjh

benjh — Mon, 29 Jul 2002 18:37:30 -0800

I'm getting an error here, mentions "month ago"... related?

By: stavrosthewonderchicken

stavrosthewonderchicken — Mon, 29 Jul 2002 21:32:49 -0800

~Now to post 2000 posts to a thread in one day~

You'll have to come up with a new schtick, Neale. Icey and I did that last year, and I got banned for it (well, for being an asshole afterwards, anyway).