How’s that one rank amongst all-time viewed & posted threads? I’m pretty sure I haven’t seen a thread in the Cafe Society forum with more posts or views.
Any clue?
The LotR thread is longer.
What gets me is that over half the 2K+ posts are from the same 7 or so people. Why it isn’t closed already is surprising.
Here.
As of this writing, the Diablo2 thread is up to 2,015 replies and 19,108 views. The LotR thread has a few more replies (2,041 and locked) but has by far the most views of any thread ever (402,835 at this time), followed by The horror of blimps with nearly 162,000 views. The most replied-to thread (the “a” thread in MPSIMS, now locked) has 5,337 replies but a comparatively meager 29,963 views.
Sorry to be nitpicky, but there were more than just a handful of people involved in the LotR thread. A total of 711 members contributed to it, and it took the most prolific 69 to make up half of the posts. While the top 10 did take up about 20% of the posts, that’s no different from many of the other distributions in real life (i.e., the 80/20 rule).
Oops, I just realized that NoClueBoy was probably talking about the Diablo thread, not LotR. In that regard, he is correct – that thread has 96 participants, and 50% of the posts are made by only 5 members.
Because if it gets closed, another one will immediately start. It’s also continually receiving new information, so rather than degenerating into a cliquey conversation it’s a thread that anyone can jump into at any time.
So start new threads, then.
The reason given for the Great UncleBeer Purge of Long Threads is that long threads do indeed hamper board performance.
I’m not picking on yours only, btw. There are several long unclosed threads currently running. Band width is bandwidth. And if only a handful of people are contributing over half the posts, then it’s clique-ish. Period.
I really don’t have any problems with long threads or cliques myself. Hell, I’ve had a few of my own, including some which I volunteered to have closed. But there seems to be a double standard, or at least a neglecting to monitor threads, at work here. Was is it all an UncleBeer moodfest? Or is there a policy (unspoken or not) about ultra-long threads?
Thanks for the info, Earthling! That’s all I wanted to know, so feel free to lock this thread as the OP has been answered.
I think the problems with long threads were specific to the old version of the software.
If that is indeed the case, then I am probably not alone in wanting to hear some acknowledgement from Admin about it.
I realise that boards evolve, and different standards apply to different circumstances. Still, some sort of official answer would be appreciated. While I am not advocating chat threads or fluff threads like some of us had, other long threads, like the Diablo2 one, or the Star Trek threads, or very creative story threads, or extremely entertaing hijacked threads, might benefit from being allowed to exist.
I’m not sure what’s better…one Diablo2 thread with 2000+ (and none of us planned to make it this long either), or 20 different types of Diablo2 threads with 100 posts apiece? I think the latter would drive fellow SDMB’ers crazy seeing 20 different threads that has some reference to Diablo2. Most of these threads would probably end up ongoing as well…can you picture this?
Ex:
- Best Diablo2 Tank
- Best Group to Baal Run in Diablo2
- Best Version of Diablo2…1.08 v. 1.09 v. 1.10?
- How to Find Anni Charms in Diablo2
- MF gear in Diablo2
- Player v. Player Mode in Diablo2
- How can I soup up my Summonmancer in Diablo2?
- Should I make a Tank Barb or a Singing Barb in Diablo2?
- Who has the highest damage Fireball in Diablo2?
- What unique rares are we missing in Diablo2?
- What’s the best mercenary for a Lightning Sorc in Diablo2?
- What’s the best runes to trade for runewords in Diablo2?
- Who has the lowest frames per second attack speed in Diablo2?
- Paladin auras…what’s the best combination to use in Diablo2?
- Where’s the best place to find the whole range of uniques in Diablo2?
- Is the Valkyre skill over or underrated in Diablo2?
- Best consistent drops from bosses in Diablo2.
- Best strategy for Hellforge runes in Diablo2.
- Best setup for elemental damage in Diablo2?
- Potionless character compositions in Diablo2.
- Yadda
- Yadda
- Yadda
.
.
.
All of these first 20 topics have actually been discussed at some length in the thread. IMHO, I think the fellow SDMB’ers would rather see only one Diablo2 thread instead of 20+ Diablo2 sub-threads.
Labeling us as a clique is a little harsh, we more than welcome anyone who posts on this board and meet up with them online. I feel a better connectedness with the SDMB’ers who double as Diablo2 players…and it’s certainly more than just 7. It’s like a nightly Dopefest at times.
The chat thread on Diablo2 is nice, but not an ideal place to convey ideas, complex strategies, and listing stats. That is why we do it here on SDMB. It does keep the post count down to 2000, instead of 4000, 6000, maybe even 8000 posts. Anyway, I think the one current thread is the best way to handle this IF the bandwidth doesn’t suffer as much as the SDMB’ers who would suffer staring multiple D2 threads…
hey, you guys won me over. Even specific Qs by gamers can be found with the new vB’s “search this thread” tool. Now, if we can we keep this ATMB thread from garnering too much attention… (yeah, I’ll stop posting too)
I feel for you guys. I fear that calling attention to the thread may have numbered its days. I hope not, but still.
Think, Yeticus. It’d drive us crazy trying to keep track of all the threads we should be posting in.
Look, I have closed the thread in question based on pressure from Powers Above.
I am investigating the question of whether long threads do, indeed, still hamper performance. I will get back to y’all.
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IF there is no such hampering, and a half dozen folks want to discuss their game, I don’t see any particular reason not to let them, but I will submit that question to the Moderators for arriving at consensus. Subject to that decision, I could then re-open that thread or leave it closed.
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IF there is some performance degenration on account of large threads, then we’ll leave it closed.
I do think that having a dozen threads on how to play a particular game would be excessive, especially if we’re talking half a dozen people participating. Set up a chat room or email list.
Can they start a new thread to continue the discussions? Like the Ask the Gay Guy threads? Just restart when they get too big, right?
Because, even tho there may be only a few posting, I would wager that a whole lot of gamers are reading it.
To the gamers: Sorry guys. I hope it wasn’t my posts that broke the camel.
I recall suggesting this myself a thousand posts or so back, as it seemed the thread was getting unwieldy. However, the problems did seem to go away with the new software.
Send all Camel-Replacement Reimbursement claims to NoClueBoy via priority mail.
C K Dexter Haven i can’t blame you for any of this, but since you are apparently our conduit to the Powers Above i would beseech you to pass on the following responses.
There are definitely more than 6 people participating. However, there are a few of us who tend to post more often, while some of the newer or more casual players do not post as much.
This just won’t work, for several reasons. First, we often discuss different aspects of the game, which is better-suited to a message board setup than an e-mail setup (since one can quickly scan through the history to be sure about what point is being replied to). Bottom line is, e-mail lists suck for discussions. period.
A chatroom only works if all the members are online at approximately the same time, which is often not the case with us, especially considering that we have a variety of time zones represented.
And most importantly, neither of these options lend themselves to new players jumping in and joining the group. We have had well over 5 or 6 new people start posting in the thread, as well as joining us to play on battle.net, simply because they saw the thread. With a private forum such as a chatroom or e-mail list, this would not be possible, and greatly detracts from the diversity our little group experiences. The fact is, this thread is the ideal means to not only keep our discussions out of everyone’s hair, but also encourage new members to jump in and interact.
We’ve done our part to try to be inoffensive to the rest of the Cafe Society readers by concentrating our efforts in one thread, both for their sakes and our own sanity. Of course we don’t want to slow the board down, but i think i can speak for all of us in saying that we’d rather see one long thread than multiple small ones, as long as it doesn’t adversely affect the servers.
I don’t think that it’s fair to tell us to “take it elsewhere,” since this is legitimate Cafe Society material. It is no different than the various small groups of posters who start a new thread for each episode of whatever television program is their current addiction, or those who make fifty different threads on the same movie. If anything, i would be willing to bet that the majority of Cafe Society readers find it more annoying to have to wade through 15 threads on the same topic than to politely ingore one.
As i said before, of course we will abide by whatever rules the Powers Above wish to enforce, but I’m sure we all want to have a logical and reasonable solution for all parties involved, and i doubt that any of those presented short of re-opening the thread will best accomplish that.
He’s got a point there.
A new multi-topic thread would work. Just link back to the old one. We do this for ENT episodes and it works well. The old ep threads fade after a time (except for one very odd one ((which I suspect will be locked if it ever gets posted to again)) ) and no one seems too bothered. Neither the fans nor the non fans.
I’d vote for a policy of locking threads when they hit some set break-point number of posts, with the understanding that the discussion is allowed to continue in a new thread, whose first post links to the closed thread. The post closing the old thread links to the new thread.
How would that work? You say. It’s done all the time in Fathom’s “Jokes and Games” forum. When a particular game (like word association, say) hits a certain length, the forum mod closes it with a note linking to the new continuation thread, which is started under the same title and one higher number.
As I type this, I’ve got the “Jokes and Games” forum list open in another window. “Haiku Hijack” is on Part 9; “The Corrupt Wish Game” is only on Part 2 (I gotta find time to play more); “Word Association” has hit Part 48; and there’s another game that’s achieved Part 51.
Now, I know that Fathom’s forums move a lot slower than the SDMB’s, so it’s easier to do that at FFF. Still, it seems like a simple solution to any bandwidth problems presented by freight-train threads. It’s rare that such threads happen, anyway, so if the bar for opening a new chapter were set high enough, it shouldn’t be an onerous addition to the mods’ duties.
On preview, I see that NoClueBoy is thinking along the same lines.
Hey, NCB, how you doin’? 
I’m doin’ fine, baby! 
Now all we need is Angua or maybe lel to jump in this thread too and I guarantee it’ll get locked down in twenty minutes! [wink, wink]
As an aside, I wonder how many new members we gained from that LoTR thread. From what I remember, a lot of people heard about it, and logged on to contribute. How many stayed around?