# A locked thread mystery **URL:** \ **Category:** About This Message Board\ **Created:** [June 29, 2001, 5:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-locked-thread-mystery/70633 "2001-06-29T17:17:59Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 16\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Fenris](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/fenris/32/498_2.png) [@Fenris](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fenris)\ **Post date:** [June 29, 2001, 5:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-locked-thread-mystery/70633/1 "2001-06-29T17:17:59Z")
Over in GQ, there’s a [locked](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?threadid=76153) thread with zero views (Titled “How do I cut my lawn to look like a baseball field”). Normally when a thread is locked, you can still read it. In this case, it returns a “Invalid thread specified. If you followed a valid link, please notify the webmaster” message. It’s absolutely no big deal, but I was curious. Fenris ---
**Author:** ![dantheman](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dantheman/32/9421_2.png) [@dantheman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dantheman)\ **Post date:** [June 29, 2001, 5:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-locked-thread-mystery/70633/2 "2001-06-29T17:31:45Z")
I’m not sure why you can’t view it at all, but I suspect it was closed because it’s a duplicate post (same question, different forums). ---
**Author:** ![Ukulele\_Ike](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/df788c/32.png) [@Ukulele\_Ike](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ukulele_Ike)\ **Post date:** [June 29, 2001, 5:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-locked-thread-mystery/70633/3 "2001-06-29T17:53:41Z")
It was actually a nasty slam against **Chronos,** one of the GQ moderators. Y’see, he always wanted to enter the orthodontia profession, but personal circumstances have required him to take employment mowing the grass at his local ball park. The OP was so mean-spirited that **TubaDiva** closed it off completely, in order to spare his feelings. ---
**Author:** ![TubaDiva](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tubadiva/32/507_2.png) [@TubaDiva](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TubaDiva)\ **Post date:** [June 29, 2001, 6:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-locked-thread-mystery/70633/4 "2001-06-29T18:23:19Z")
And I would be it’s gone now . . . so it truly will be a mystery. your humble TubaDiva Administrator The bigger mystery is why post it twice? ---
**Author:** ![dantheman](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dantheman/32/9421_2.png) [@dantheman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dantheman)\ **Post date:** [June 29, 2001, 6:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-locked-thread-mystery/70633/5 "2001-06-29T18:47:56Z")
Actually, IIRC it was posted THREE times. But I could have been just sleepy… Seriously, I thought I saw it worded the same in two forums and slightly differently in a third. Course, they coulda been deleted, right? 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [June 29, 2001, 8:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-locked-thread-mystery/70633/6 "2001-06-29T20:51:55Z")
Most likely scenario: Thread gets multi-posted, multiple moderators are on-line at the time and see it. One moderator fixes it by closing the extra threads. Then, you load the forum list, and see it as closed. Then, the other moderator, who had already loaded the thread and hence didn’t see that it was closed, deleted it. Then, you try to open the thread, but it’s already gone. Flaws with this scenario: I know that I wasn’t one of the moderators in question, and I can’t imagine why any of the non-GQ mods would bother with a minutium like a dual-posted thread. Also, no matter what the scenario, the first mod would have to have jumped through some interesting hoops to close a thread without viewing it. Or did you mean zero replies, not views? ---
**Author:** ![Fenris](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/fenris/32/498_2.png) [@Fenris](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fenris)\ **Post date:** [June 29, 2001, 9:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-locked-thread-mystery/70633/7 "2001-06-29T21:33:09Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Chronos \* > \*\*Also, no matter what the scenario, the first mod would have to have jumped through some interesting hoops to close a thread without viewing it. Or did you mean zero replies, not views? \*\* Nope , Zero views, which is why it caught my eye. ---
**Author:** ![Fenris](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/fenris/32/498_2.png) [@Fenris](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fenris)\ **Post date:** [June 29, 2001, 9:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-locked-thread-mystery/70633/8 "2001-06-29T21:35:26Z")
Hmmm…now that I look again, I wonder if I _was_ looking at the reply column? (I’ve only had about 6 hours of sleep in the last 72, so I’m a bit punchy) ---
**Author:** ![dantheman](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dantheman/32/9421_2.png) [@dantheman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dantheman)\ **Post date:** [June 29, 2001, 10:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-locked-thread-mystery/70633/9 "2001-06-29T22:53:39Z")
For a view to register, you have to actually open the thread, right? So if you were looking at a list of threads with new posts and saw the same one posted in different forums, you (if you were a moderator) could simply close one down before anyone got to view it, even yourself. And that’s prolly what happened. Mod saw the threads, closed one before it was viewed. 🙂 Any other questions? I’m gonna go have some dinner now… ---
**Author:** ![Lynn\_Bodoni](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/e47c2d/32.png) [@Lynn\_Bodoni](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lynn_Bodoni)\ **Post date:** [June 30, 2001, 4:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-locked-thread-mystery/70633/10 "2001-06-30T04:21:15Z")
As far as I know (and I am NOT a tech), I have to view a thread to close it, or to delete it. Lynn Administrator ---
**Author:** ![Redboss](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/8baadc/32.png) [@Redboss](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Redboss)\ **Post date:** [June 30, 2001, 6:42am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-locked-thread-mystery/70633/11 "2001-06-30T06:42:51Z")
Have you tried this? The murderer unscrewed and removed the door handle and used a blow-pipe to send a dart with a poison tip right at the victim’s throat. he then replaced the - Oh, a locked **thread** mystery? Sorry, can’t help. Agatha Redboss ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [June 30, 2001, 6:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-locked-thread-mystery/70633/12 "2001-06-30T18:00:37Z")
Well, it is _possible_ to close a thread without viewing it, but by far the easiest (and therefore most common) way to do it is to open up the thread and click the little link that says “Open/close thread”. ---
**Author:** ![manhattan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/manhattan/32/7_2.png) [@manhattan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/manhattan)\ **Post date:** [June 30, 2001, 6:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-locked-thread-mystery/70633/13 "2001-06-30T18:10:33Z")
A quick experiment here shows that opening a thread using the right click and the “open thread in new window” option does not increase the view count. I came upon the multi-posts yesterday, and killed them like the bastard children that they were. You must have happened upon them in mid-kill. ---
**Author:** ![dantheman](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dantheman/32/9421_2.png) [@dantheman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dantheman)\ **Post date:** [June 30, 2001, 6:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-locked-thread-mystery/70633/14 "2001-06-30T18:25:19Z")
Was I right that there were three, or was my mind being a brat to me? ---
**Author:** ![wring](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/838e76/32.png) [@wring](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/wring)\ **Post date:** [June 30, 2001, 6:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-locked-thread-mystery/70633/15 "2001-06-30T18:30:27Z")
**dan,** I remember 3 grass cutting ones (IIRC 2 were in GQ and the third was elsewhere?) it was a day for multiple posts - some one did a double thread in the pit and I also saw **five** copies of a single thread in GQ (olives?) they weren’t there for long, what with our quick-draw mods packin’. ---
**Author:** ![dantheman](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dantheman/32/9421_2.png) [@dantheman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dantheman)\ **Post date:** [June 30, 2001, 6:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-locked-thread-mystery/70633/16 "2001-06-30T18:36:58Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by wring \* > \*\ ***dan,** I remember 3 grass cutting ones (IIRC 2 were in GQ and the third was elsewhere?) it was a day for multiple posts - some one did a double thread in the pit and I also saw **five** copies of a single thread in GQ (olives?) they weren’t there for long, what with our quick-draw mods packin’. > \*\* Aha! **A** -ha! \