Delete threads after one year

[misscrystal]

There are all these ancient threads popping up now in the forum. Some go back to 2012 and people are answering them as if someone just asked them without looking at the date, trying to help the person who asked. Threads need a one year expiration date.

[fonthaunt]

I doubt auto deletion would be utilized since there are quite a few useful older threads. Right now we try to close them to new responses as time permits, though it’s case by case depending on content. Useless threads are often removed. We have a pretty long to-do list for the forum and old threads aren’t high up just yet.

More than usual have popped up recently due to import processes, but manual “pruning” and increased moderation will help over time. Your suggestion will be considered by the forum development team, though.

[Guest ricksper]

It doesn’t seem like it would be a major project to include the date that the thread was started in the title.

[misscrystal]

good idea!

[artlifeoriginal]

That’s a good idea. I accidentally responded to an old one (a genuine response, not spam) and then felt a little silly. It would be nice if the search could sort by ‘most recent relevant’ but I’m not sure if that can be done with the Custom Search implementation they use for the forum.

That way someone wouldn’t have to manually close old ones either - it probably takes a lot of time to monitor.

As far as the original topic: please don’t delete the old ones. I have found useful information in posts from 2013!

[misscrystal]

I just looked at another one this morning from 2014 where people were trying now to help the OP. Every day I see a few and post that they are from years ago so people won’t keep attempting to respond to a two year old request for help.

edit: just was about to answer another from 2013.

[fitrigwrites4u]

I did not read all the comments here. But perhaps the threads do not have to be deleted. I noticed the admins have made some threads closed (I mean, the threads are still there but people cannot comment anymore), which I think that is great.

[fonthaunt]

@fitrigwrites4u Slowly but sure you’ll see more of that. It is now an active and ongoing process. Some threads are removed if irrelevant or very inaccurate, but useful ones are marked archived/closed/resolved. It cannot be an extremely fast process, there is just no way to do it very fast and still effectively right now. The moderation team is working hard to make the forums a better place and thanks to you and others for the patience and support!

[topaz_muse]

A week and half ago, I was browsing the forums looking for updates to a particular topic and stumbled across a post that I thought was recent but discovered it was from 2012. Closing them to keep new comments from posting would be nice.