Closing old topics

[KnightsOfHonor]

I know there is a small debate on the internet on how to handle older threads or topics. Some places frown upon “necroing” older threads while other places do the opposite and get mad if you start a new topic when an older one already exists. But for this particular forum, following book series decades in the making, that are currently being written, why do we lock older threads and frown at “necroposting”? Like if a new WoB comes out that gives us a little bit more info on Warbreaker, I can’t just go and add it to an old thread about that topic, I have to start a new one and link the old one which inevitably leads to people not actually reading the linked thread and asking / stating repetitive things. It makes sense if a thread has reached a conclusion or just gotten way to big. But to close a thread due to nothing but time when we have to wait years between books...? To me this causes more confusion and clutter than just updating a 2-year-old thread whenever Brandon is back writing on that world instead of having to re-create threads every time he gets back around to a series. I think the culture of the 17th Shard and its moderators are awesome. I have been a lurker here since the beginning (I finally took the plunge and made an account) and this website is one of the best I have followed, but this is one thing that has always confused me and (in my opinion) makes it more difficult to look things up. Other forums do this same thing, but I only have this account so I thought I would ask here. Thank you  

[Chaos]

We used to be pretty lax about necroposting for the reasons you stated, and I like to still think we are much laxer than many other forums. (Remember, Reddit automatically archives things after six months!) We absolutely realize that many topics can have a very long shelf-life. Before our rules revamp last year, we explicitly said that many times posting in old topics can be relevant! Our current rules say: 

Quote

Post Necromancy;

• Refers to reviving an inactive and out of date topic without a legitimate reason. If you wish to continue the discussion please make a new post.
• Legitimate reasons for reviving a post could include;
  • New information has been released that directly relates to the central theory being discussed and creation of a new topic would not substantially differ from continuation of the original post.
  • Continuation of a forum game or roleplay
  • The topic in question is specifically meant to be ongoing (eg. Typo threads)
  • Many old topics have been locked to prevent thread necro’ing--if you believe a thread should be reopened, please contact a moderator.

But let me go into a bit more detail here. Closing older topics is actually a newer thing for 17S! I don't think we did it at all prior to 2020. 

However, there were many times in the past few years where a newer member presumably gets to a topic via Google or something, and one of a few things can happen. They can respond to a very old topic, and these sorts of things can happen:

1. Responding with a generic comment that doesn't really add to the discussion. (Like "I agree!" or things like that.)
2. Responding with a WoB or book content that is much more recent than the original topic. Now, that could be good or bad, but if a topic is from 2016, pre-Oathbringer and the entire premise of the conversation was on Words of Radiance knowledge... like lets say it was a 2016 topic speculating on the Unmade. It's kind of pointless for a member to be, "Well actually, the Unmade are these!" several years later. Yes, everyone in the original discussion would agree, but it's not really helpful. (That's not to say that new stuff couldn't add to discussions, but sometimes discussions have run out their course.)

This did happen more and more frequently as time progressed. There is a small subset of users who got extremely irritated with new members for doing this, even though staff didn't really make a big deal of it. (We did discourage those long-time members from making comments to the new members who made a necropost like these.) So while we definitely realize that theory topics and others can have a really long lifetime, maybe having every topic from the forum's inception in 2010 open for anyone to respond to is not necessarily optimal either. There is something to be said to not having topics open for too long, which I have grown to appreciate in Reddit over the years. Having the same active/popular topics at the top of a forum for months and months isn't necessarily great, as smaller topics can get lost in the midst of it. 

Invision Power Suite, our software, doesn't have an automatic way to lock old topics, so I began doing this manually. I think this is most important to close older Stormlight topics more frequently. So right now, topics are open from about March 2020 and on in Stormlight. On other forums, especially like Elantris and Warbreaker, it's definitely trickier to decide when topics should be closed, but also, if a topic hasn't had responses in multiple years, I don't think it's a huge loss to close it. I have given generally more time to noncosmere, since there is much less discussion on those things.

So where is the line? It's kind of hard to say. I'm happy to discuss it! Also, as the rules state, we are perfectly happy reopening certain topics if needed! 

[KnightsOfHonor]

That makes total sense. I figured there was a reason for it and I just did not know what it was. I think you manually locking topics makes for a better experience for all the users because you can use your discretion (I can't imagine the amount of time that must take) and I think you have struck a good balance. I also appreciate the leniency on the rules. Like I said before, the culture and moderators of the 17th Shard are the best in any online forum I have seen. Thank you!!!