Introducing... The Anti-Thread Mining Society (ATMS)

[Troutman]

OK guys this is a serious question. :s5 I'm wondering if we should regard thread mining as a harmless joke, or as an annoyance that we should do something about? I have come up with a possible solution but I'd have to ask LunaticSVT whether it's technically feasible.

Basically my proposal is that any thread over, say, 2 years old should be automatically locked. This would prevent irrelevant or even embarrassing old threads returning to waste time and forum resources. I've seen too many Grandpa Henry posts of late!

Just wanting any opinions on this idea (which may or may not be feasible) or any other suggestions. Cheers!

Jack T

[Yagz]

Nope. Who cares is someone adds something to a thread thats old. Maybe the creator of the thread needs to give some updates, etc.

It wouldn't be feasible to lock threads. Thumbs down.

[Aaron_EF8]

why does it seriously matter? It's not like there is an abundance of new threads to read lol

[Troutman]

Fair call Yagz, cheers for the opinion.

But the reason I suggested 2 years rather than, say, a month was because we can be 100% sure the threads are hopelessly out of date. If it thread locking can be automated it would potentially require no maintenance.

Just a thought.

[Troutman]

Originally Posted by Aaron_EF8

why does it seriously matter? It's not like there is an abundance of new threads to read lol

It doesn't 'seriously' matter, just an annoyance that may be easily preventable, so why not.

[Walkinshaw]

Originally Posted by Troutman

Grandpa Henry

whoah, good ole i8 days. *meeeeeeeeeeemories*

[back2thefutura]

don't the forums get cleaned out every now and then anyway?

[davway]

i dont think it is a good idea. if someone wanted to know something they could search and who cares if it is old as long as it helps them get their problem sorted out instead of making a new thread that has already been covered probably numerous times in the past.
thread mining isnt that big a deal anyway....sometimes pretty amusing!

[Troutman]

Originally Posted by back2thefutura

don't the forums get cleaned out every now and then anyway?

No, the only cleaning out is of members who do not participate for a certain amount of time. Even then, their posts remain.

[SileNceR]

the forums view pages are set to prune to 365 days by default, but you can select to view all threads from the beginnning i believe - this is how the miners are finding the reaaallly old threads...honestly dont think its that much of an issue tho - if an old thread gets bought up, and theres no point to it, lock it then... at least that way if someone finds a thread about what they want to ask (and ppl get told to search often enough) then they can continue an existing thread without starting another (making it easier again for someone searching for the same info the next time)