The Conservative Cave
Current Events => The DUmpster => Topic started by: franksolich on February 13, 2012, 06:30:00 PM
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One of the rules in the DUmpster is that when two members, usually by accident, post a link to the same campfire on Skins's island, it's all merged into one thread. I've been around here more than four years now, and as moderator, I've always done this with only a few rare exceptions.
It's not anything that happens a whole lot (and no, it's not a problem to merge threads).
Those times I haven't merged threads were editorial judgements on my part, but of course my editorial judgement can be fallible.
However, the last two days, I made the "editorial judgement" to NOT merge a campfire lit by my fellow Nebraskan, the big guy, on Skins's island, and another pair of threads illuminating the same campfire lit by nadin.
My reasonings are complex.....and boring, so no point in explaining it here.
But essentially, do members here prefer that duplicate campfires be merged into one thread, or that they be kept separate, or that editorial decisions by the moderators is good enough, or what?
And by the way, I would NEVER discourage a member from posting something here because it "might" be a duplicate; always better to post it and then find out later it's a duplicate, than to not post it for fear it might be a duplicate and it never gets posted at all. Especially on "shout-outs" from the primitives.
For the record, it takes about two seconds to merge a thread, and so the "time and trouble" aspect of it is NOT an issue.
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I say merged, that way it's all in one place.
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Id leave it up to judgement, but would suggest that the earlier a duplicate thread is identified, the better. Sometimes, if a pair of duplicate threads persist for a while, they diverge into unique conversations. Merging the threads at that time would do more harm than good.
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I voted "merge." I don't have a huge opinion, but it's only fair to the person who found the OP first, I think.
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I voted to merge. OTOH each DUmmie is infinitely more important than the next so perhaps keeping them separate would be better? :fuelfire:
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I'd leave it up to judgement, but would suggest that the earlier a duplicate thread is identified, the better. Sometimes, if a pair of duplicate threads persist for a while, they diverge into unique conversations. Merging the threads at that time would do more harm than good.
That's my concern, because sometimes it might be hours before two threads are merged (the moderators aren't here 24/7/365), and by that time, the discussion on each of them has gone off in different directions.
And if that's happened, the thread can be rather inexplicable, as when something's merged, the comments too are merged in chronological order, mixing up the two discussions.
That HAS happened at least a couple of times this past week.
But on the other hand, the character and quite-different literary talents of the member posting the topic evoke different sorts of comments; for example, a thread started by Tucker inspires one sort of wit from members, while a duplicate thread started by Carl inspires another sort of wit from members. The "personality" of the original posting member DOES play a part in all that happens afterwards.
(This is not a "bad" thing or a "good" thing; it's only a thing.)
I myself have no opinion on the matter; my sole interest is merely to help keep the audience of the DUmpster--excepting the lurking primitives--happy.
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I voted to merge. OTOH each DUmmie is infinitely more important than the next so perhaps keeping them separate would be better? :fuelfire:
One of the more-humorous experiences I've had as moderator are those after I've merged two threads, and I get a personal message from the second original poster, whose thread has been suborned into the older duplicate thread, asking, near-panic-stricken, "What did I do wrong? Why did my thread disappear?"
After which it's explained the second thread didn't disappear (although it did become harder to find).
For the record, no one's thread has EVER been deleted from the DUmpster--we're not Skins's island, after all--it's only ever been merged or moved to a more-appropriate forum.
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I voted "merge." I don't have a huge opinion, but it's only fair to the person who found the OP first, I think.
Regarding the duplicate threads concerning Chief Bawling Bull, which happened on Sunday, it was an "editorial judgement" thing on my part to not merge them, for the utterly selfish reason that I wished to rattle the big guy's cage, giving him twice the exposure of his buffoonery; a personal thing.
That wasn't professional of me, using my "powers" as a moderator to cater to a personal whim, but on the other hand, this was only the second time in four years I've done such a thing. We all sin once in a while.
And the current duplicate live threads concerning nadin, one by Ogre and the other by GOBUCKS, well, one can already see where they've each provoked different sorts of reactions, different sorts of discussion. They've only been up an hour or so, but merging them now would be like blending apples with tomatoes.
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I say merge, just so we can keep the crazy all in one place. :-)
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Merge.
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Merge. It's confusing. "Hey, where'd my post go?" Plus, you get one thread that stays active while the other sinks.
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Merge, with dual acknowledgement.
Helps keep the clutter down.
Easier to ridicule the primatives that way.
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Merged.
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I voted merge, but Miskie makes a good point. If each thread had say, 10 replies or so, it's two different conversations. So, editorial judgment comes into play.
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Okay, it looks as if the consensus is to continue on as we always have, merging threads, with a little wiggle-room left for moderator judgement, so that's what we'll do.
This thread had the unintended consequence of assuring some that just because they don't see something, that doesn't mean it was deleted.
This has been a great concern for many, concern expressed in personal messages.
As already said, if one doesn't see a post he made, that generally means it was merged or moved to a more-appropriate forum, nothing more. It wasn't deleted; it's still around.
I imagine there's been six or half a dozen things deleted on conservativecave the past four years, but probably those posters were informed by personal message that it violated a rule, or something.
So if one's post evaporates, look elsewhere for it; it's still here.....somewhere.
And if one can't find it, inquire of a moderator; we're always happy to be of assistance.
By the way, even though it's only a minor microscopic problem, there is another way posts evaporate.
Say one is looking for posts by the late Tangerine LaBamba. One knows she is [was] a member here, and one recollects some of the jewels, the gems, she posted here. But when clicking on her profile to "show all comments by this member," one comes up empty.
note to chris_: ignore what follows because it's not that important, it's only a small thing, you got more important things to do, your platter's already full, and you do a good job anyway; this is not a complaint
Some may remember that one Saturday morning--I think it was last summer--when members woke up, grabbed a cup of coffee, and logged on to conservativecave.....to find that overnight, chris_ had taken over the whole site. Every single member was chris_, every single comment was made by chris_.
This happened because chris_ was trying to correct a tiny mistake, and w-a-a-a-a-y over-corrected.
chris_ eventually got it all sorted back out the way it was supposed to be, but it entailed him dealing with the accounts of each individual member to correct it. We have a lot of members here, and a lot of comments, and so he took care of the active members first, and then some of the more-prominent once-active members.
Members who only ever made a few comments--one or two or three--and then never returned, he didn't bother with, because it wasn't important. Or members known to be no longer in this time and place (such as the late Tangerine LaBamba); it's just too much time and trouble.
However, the posts of these no-longer-active members still exist; they're still here, in their entirety.
If one wants to find a gem or jewel posted by the late Tangerine LaBamba, for example, all one has to do is go to chris_'s profile and punch on "show all comments by this member."
What one's looking for, it's in there.....somewhere.