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Forum rule against Necroposting


HumongousNoodle

Question

In order to make the forums more user friendly I'd like to add a rule against necroposting.

 

Explaination on what necroposting is by scratch.mit.edu

First things first: What is a necropost?
A necropost is generally referred to as a reply to an old, abandoned thread that has been considered “dead” for a while. Basically, a thread that no longer serves any purpose is bumped back up to the top of the forums by someone posting in it.

How old should a thread be before it is considered “dead”?
This depends on the thread and the forum it is in. Some things to consider:
-Has the initial question been resolved?
-Is the subject no longer relevant? (For example: a thread suggesting an input box. Since Scratch 1.4 added this functionality, this thread has no real purpose.)
-Is the thread relatively old? If the original poster was asking for help, they're probably not watching it anymore if it's over a month old.

Is it ever okay to necropost?
Yes. If you believe you have something to add to the subject that no one else has mentioned, and the topic is still relevant or unresolved, you can give your input; it may spark new discussion! However, do some searching and make sure the subject hasn't been resolved or continued on somewhere else since then. In addition, some topics, such as Show and Tell threads, are never too old to post in. Since those are there for you to give feedback, rather than hold a discussion, you can always leave a comment for the maker. There's nothing like bringing a great project that has been forgotten back into the limelight.

For more information, see the Scratch Wiki article on bumping/necroposting.

 

 

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3 hours ago, HumongousNoodle said:

In order to make the forums more user friendly I'd like to add a rule against necroposting.

 

Explaination on what necroposting is by scratch.mit.edu

 

  Hide contents

First things first: What is a necropost?
A necropost is generally referred to as a reply to an old, abandoned thread that has been considered “dead” for a while. Basically, a thread that no longer serves any purpose is bumped back up to the top of the forums by someone posting in it.

How old should a thread be before it is considered “dead”?
This depends on the thread and the forum it is in. Some things to consider:
-Has the initial question been resolved?
-Is the subject no longer relevant? (For example: a thread suggesting an input box. Since Scratch 1.4 added this functionality, this thread has no real purpose.)
-Is the thread relatively old? If the original poster was asking for help, they're probably not watching it anymore if it's over a month old.

Is it ever okay to necropost?
Yes. If you believe you have something to add to the subject that no one else has mentioned, and the topic is still relevant or unresolved, you can give your input; it may spark new discussion! However, do some searching and make sure the subject hasn't been resolved or continued on somewhere else since then. In addition, some topics, such as Show and Tell threads, are never too old to post in. Since those are there for you to give feedback, rather than hold a discussion, you can always leave a comment for the maker. There's nothing like bringing a great project that has been forgotten back into the limelight.

For more information, see the Scratch Wiki article on bumping/necroposting.

 

 

 

I think the PokeMMO team does a pretty good job with locking threads, sometimes too good of job before the conversation is concluded.

 

I don't think that's a problem on this particular forum website.

 

As for those that are not locked by the PokeMMO team and are old, I'm sure suggesting to them to lock it if it is no longer relevant, but I don't agree that it should be done simply because it's an old thread.

 

I don't agree with your recommendation here.

Edited by MysticMew
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58 minutes ago, MysticMew said:

As for those that are not locked by the PokeMMO team and are old, I'm sure suggesting to them to lock it if it is no longer relevant, but I don't agree that it should be done simply because it's an old thread.

Once upon a time the mod team used to go through General Discussion and prune out threads that were no longer relevant or where the conversation had clearly ended. I don't believe it went over very well at all, but I don't recall since it's been ages.

 

4 hours ago, HumongousNoodle said:

In order to make the forums more user friendly I'd like to add a rule against necroposting.

Necros aren't anywhere near being an actual problem and I'm more interested in why you would think this is a problem. Going through the sections here's what I see.

 

General Discussion:

Not including the pinned threads, the first 3 pages of threads are all topics from within the past 30 days except for 2. In each case the post that bumped it up was on topic and the topic itself can still be considered relevant.

 

Suggestion Box:

There is no such thing as a Necro here. There are older suggestions that might still be relevant now that could easily be bumped, if someone were to search them up. Even then, if you want to make a case about the threads being bumped with no content, that is a situation where it is better to report it and move on. The current iteration of rules for the section doesn't allow for bumps of that nature, but if the moderation team has made a decision to allow posts to be bumped in that manner it is on them to update the rules accordingly. In any case, necros really don't exist in the section regardless.

 

Trade Corner:

No such thing as necros as active shops will be getting bumped by the maker or players posting to make purchases from that shop.

 

Competition Alley:

This is a very focused section and a lot of discussion takes place here. The threads generally go away in quick order once the discussion is finished. The sub-sections don't really see necros either.

 

Guide Tavern:

This could be cleaned up to remove outdated guides, which I believe is still a work in progress, but generally there are no necros here either.

 

Official Events:

No necros, events that are finished are locked and archived.

 

Introductions:

There really aren't any necros here either.

 

Client Customization:

Cleanup in this section still appears to be a work in progress. Older threads still linger about, but the posts that bump them up are 99% asking why a broken theme doesn't work.

 

Creative Media:

There are a lot of older threads here that are still active with the respective poster.

 

Multimedia:

If you've got something to add to the discussion on an older thread here, may as well post it in that thread.

 

I don't understand where the argument that we need this rule as a means of being "user friendly". If anything the forums are being used exactly how they are intended. Active threads are still on topic, and if something is off topic then it should be reported and you should move on from there. There isn't any sense in piling on to off topic posting.

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It’s not even an annoyance really. It happens maybe once every two months (probably even rarer than that) where a newbie will go waaaay back and post on some really old threads to get their post count up in order to post in the suggestion box.

 

Don’t really think there needs to be a rule about it. If multiple people were consistently spamming old threads, then yeah maybe there might need to be a rule for it, but at that point it may just fall under “spam” anyways.

 

 

edit: Now wait an entire year and then necro this suggestion >:)

Edited by Gilan
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3 hours ago, Gilan said:

It’s not even an annoyance really. It happens maybe once every two months (probably even rarer than that) where a newbie will go waaaay back and post on some really old threads to get their post count up in order to post in the suggestion box.

This is the funny part because there isn't even a post requirement anymore so there isn't any need for someone to get their post count up to post in this section. In either case, necros really aren't a huge problem around here since the majority of topics that are no longer relevant have already been trashed anyway.

 

4 hours ago, Ultrajesus said:

"Johto when?" "Hidden Abilities when?" "Dungeons when?" "Fairy type when?" "Garchomp Dragon Dance when?"

Those seem to come in cycles, there will be periods where there are a bunch of posts asking those questions and then a few months will pass before they get asked again. By that point the old topics are either buried or have been trashed (maybe). Most users don't understand how to use the search functions either so it's one of those things you have to just kind of roll with.

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