Auto-lock Thread / Anti-necro posting

[Polaris]

It's been suggested before in various ways, but I'll post this anyways...

I think threads should be automatically locked after a month of inactivity in them to prevent necro-posting in said threads.

I keep seeing necro posts all over where people reply to a comment from years prior as if the conversation was still going, completely oblivious to the lapsed time or the dramatic shift in dynamics/context of posts from one period (Terraria circa 2012 vs Terraria today, as an example).

If the thread has gone stale for a month, then obviously the people in it have moved in to other things... there's no reason for people to post new comments on dead threads; let the various flame wars, LFG posts, and bad jokes rest in peace.

[BJWyler]

Totally agree. Most of the time the posts that are necroing a thread offer absolute zero in terms of contribution to the discussion anyway, making it completely pointless.

I believe a month, however is too short a time, as some conversations will ebb and flow and not lose significance in that time. I would wait until at least 6 months with no replies before autolocking kicks in.

[Supafly]

Necro'ing a thread isn't always bad. Necro'ing it to hijack, spam and stuff gets them locked. Necro'ing because you've found a solution that is on topic shouldn't be and neither is necro'ing and asking if the issue was ever fixed and asking how it was also shouldn't be a reason to lock them.

I've added to necro'd thread before when someone necro'd it asking if they had a solution and I know what the solution is. No reason to create a new thread when one already exists.

I've necro'd one I made before because after no solution at the time I gave up. But months later found a solution so I necro'd it and provided the solution so that other that searched and found the thread wouldn't be reading useless suggestions and could just read from the edited topic what the solution was.

Just because some users search and find year old threads and then spam rubbish when they necro it shouldn't mean they should all get locked.

[Tolkien Book Fan]

What I would like is for the Steam forums to mark posts that are over 12 months old, so I don't have to remember to check if something is from 2014 before I react to the latest poster.

[RiO]

Originally posted by Tolkien Book Fan:

What I would like is for the Steam forums to mark posts that are over 12 months old, so I don't have to remember to check if something is from 2014 before I react to the latest poster.

^^ This ^^

Adjust the visual style for historic threads or historic post dates, so it's more evident that you're replying in an old thread someone necro-ed earlier that day.

Do that, and necro-ed threads will fall off automatically, because no-one else will bother to continue posting in them unless something was posted that was actually really relevant.

[Tito Shivan]

Originally posted by BJWyler:

Totally agree. Most of the time the posts that are necroing a thread offer absolute zero in terms of contribution to the discussion anyway, making it completely pointless.

It's a self solved issue. If the bumping thread isn't relevant it'll be moderated and the thread will naturally sink again.

The real problem here is moderation being impervous to context and simply locking bumped threads that were too old.

[Polaris]

Originally posted by Tolkien Book Fan:

What I would like is for the Steam forums to mark posts that are over 12 months old, so I don't have to remember to check if something is from 2014 before I react to the latest poster.

Maybe posts that are 6 (or 12) months old have a confirmation to post in addition to your suggested mark? Some people may not see it, but requiring a minor prompt before the comment is to be posted could filter out some of the necro-posting (obviously not the deliberate posting...).

I still think posts should auto-lock after a duration (perhaps a longer duration like 12+ months), but I like your suggestion.

[B l u e b e r r y P o p t a r t]

I made a recent post about necro'ing/locking thread.

Threads should not be auto-locked based on their date, any information can be updated in those threads without making a new one, asking questions in it from people already on the topic that may not see another topic of the same thing.

People that "bad necro" need to be taken care of with warning and bans, the comment deleted (and any that follow it) so it can fall back where it was, instead of letting these people get away with it for what ever reason it is.

[Supafly]

Originally posted by Tito Shivan:

Originally posted by BJWyler:

Totally agree. Most of the time the posts that are necroing a thread offer absolute zero in terms of contribution to the discussion anyway, making it completely pointless.

It's a self solved issue. If the bumping thread isn't relevant it'll be moderated and the thread will naturally sink again.

The real problem here is moderation being impervous to context and simply locking bumped threads that were too old.

Yup, I think the mods should just delete the comment and maybe warn the user about necro'ing with spam/useless comments and leave it open.

[Thermal Lance]

Not all necros are equal

[Hong Kong Phooey]

Originally posted by Thermal Lance:

Not all necros are equal

Why do people hate necro threads so much? I don't give a f if somone from 10 year ago asks for help

[Thermal Lance]

Originally posted by Hong Kong Phooey:

Originally posted by Thermal Lance:

Not all necros are equal

Why do people hate necro threads so much? I don't give a f if somone from 10 year ago asks for help. Is it because they're forced to read B l u e b e r r y P o p t a r t's view on what is or what isn't?

Someone necroing a relevant thread with good informations is fine in my books.

Somebody doing the same with a meme should be banned on sight as far as I am concerned given how annoying that is.

[Hong Kong Phooey]

Originally posted by Thermal Lance:

Originally posted by Hong Kong Phooey:

Why do people hate necro threads so much? I don't give a f if somone from 10 year ago asks for help. Is it because they're forced to read B l u e b e r r y P o p t a r t's view on what is or what isn't?

Someone necroing a relevant thread with good informations is fine in my books.

Somebody doing the same with a meme should be banned on sight as far as I am concerned given how annoying that is.

Too lazy to snip but.....necro meming should be banned. I'm reading that right?

[Thermal Lance]

Originally posted by Hong Kong Phooey:

Originally posted by Thermal Lance:

Someone necroing a relevant thread with good informations is fine in my books.

Somebody doing the same with a meme should be banned on sight as far as I am concerned given how annoying that is.

Too lazy to snip but.....necro meming should be banned. I'm reading that right?

Yes. Especially people that spend 2 hours doing just that. It's ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ annoying when that happens.

[76561198407601200]

Originally posted by Hong Kong Phooey:

Originally posted by Thermal Lance:

Not all necros are equal

Why do people hate necro threads so much? I don't give a f if somone from 10 year ago asks for help

i suppose the "dkjasdkfjsd" posts in a 3 year old thread is asking for help?

[Mailer]

A visual indicator of the original thread creation date wouldn't be bad to have on mobile, at the very least, since I'm pretty sure there is basically no way to know on there. I'm pretty sure it is shown on PC as long as you read the actual hover preview before entering a thread.

Although the last time Valve messed with the formatting on the discussion forum pages something very funky happened, so I'm not sure they have the space to add any more deets in.

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You could also have an auto-unsubscribe feature for threads that have passed a certain lifetime (opt-in, obviously). Could be useful for minimizing grief.