[Logician]

1- I once suggested Date blinks to get attention if viewed message is older than X days hack to be installed here so that such problems will vanish but I guess not everybody finds it handy as I do. I use it in my own board for a long time and it ultimately solved "mistakenly replied" old thread problems.

2- On the other hand I really don't understand why many people are so opposed when a member knowingly replies an old thread? :knockedout: I had had a very old email group before opening my bulletin board and when I installed the board I credited and stressed this very feature of bulletin boards to get my email group members to the forum: A board message is accessible and discussable even after months later, but a email group discussion vanishes after a few days just like a match light.

So joining an old discussion in a bulletin board is something that makes a bulletin board a nice communication tool. It allows new members to blend in, it allows popular discussions stay so, it prevents same questions asked over and over again in different threads as new comers can access and participate the old thread instead of creating their own. So in many ways it is a blessing for a site.

Take our hack request forum: I really hate when everyday a new user joins and posts a thread about "having 2 forums and sharing 1 user database". It has been discussed a lot of times and there is a very nice and informative *old* thread which many people shared good ideas and one can learn much from that thread. If someone has another view, he can post there so it will again be accessible in that particular thread even after months. So I would really rather people "bump" that "old thread" instead of posting another useless thread.

Thus it is surprising to me to see that many people just get irritated when someone adds a comment to an old thread and the commenter usually criticized harsly too. Even if you don't like the idea, well remember that there is no rules against it! :lick: We should all take it easy about this joining old threads issue. :glasses:

(Ps. I assumed bumped thread is not obselete due to its subject and in most cases here in vb.org it is not. Otherwise nobody -including me- likes to see a Window XP question bumping a thread from 1994 about Windows 3.1 hehehe)