Well fuck the newbies. That’ll learn 'em not to know every Doper cultural idiosyncracy before they show up here in foreignland!
Of course, that’s why they revive zombies in the first place.
No, it’s the jokes. They want to see the stupid zombie jokes.
But as has been [del]whined about[/del] pointed out several times lately, it is an ineffective warning because it comes at the end of the thread, after you have read through the entire thread.
And really, if you read through the thread and have something useful to say, what does it matter that the thread is old? Sure, the person you are responding to might not be around, but the conversation is still readable, the ideas are still viable.
Because even though (generic) you thinks you’ve got something useful to say, chances are you actually don’t because no-one likely cares about that topic anymore and has no further interest in discussing it.
Obviously updates for the outcomes or breaking news on the topic don’t count, before anyone tries to bring them up.
In GQ zombies occasionally will take on new life, but the great majority sink back to oblivion after only a few new posts (which are usually mainly zombie jokes). If it was an interesting topic in the first place, most of the important points have already been made.
A couple zombies I’ve read recently were about people asking about their specific situation. And the situation was time-specific too. So I guess if someone was in that exact same situation right now, it could be useful to them. But the odds are probably against it.
Fits under evaluation of “useful”. Should the person consider the timeliness in their response? Sure. Should the person not reply simply because the thread is old? No. Should the person revive a long-dead thread to post “me too”? No.
There’s a locked zombie thread in the Pit right now and at the bottom of the OP http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=873592&postcount=1 **tomndebb **has an edit saying “this is a zombie thread from ten years ago.”
I saw it right after I read through the OP and I was glad to see it because I knew right there what was going on.
Would it be possible for a mod to post a similar edit in the OP of a zombie thread if someone reports it as a zombie? That way people who are bad at noticing post dates (guilty!) know as soon as they read the first post and can decide whether or nor they want to read the rest and/or join in the zombie joke-o-rama.
We don’t add stuff to posts. Apparently, if we do so, we change our legal status, and become liable for anything that is in a post, even if we haven’t edited it.
It’s certainly possible, mods add comments to OPs all the time (like in CC putting the link).
Whether mods wish to take on that as a standard responsibility is the question. Given that they are currently putting a comment at the end of the thread, would it be better to put it at beginning? Do both?
They could add a [zombie] to the title to make it easier yet. Then posters could get in the habit of just reporting the thread for the title change.
How many times do I have to tell you to stop being smarter than me, What Exit?
That’s an excellent and simple idea. It wouldn’t chase away newbies and would let prissy folks like me recognize zombie threads.
I would suggest a better word than “zombie”, except I don’t have a better word. “Old” or “dead” have the same flaw of just provoking more questions from the uninformed. Can you imagine the number of threads getting opened in ATMB that ask, “What does zombie mean in a thread title?”
But it’s a reasonable solution if we’re going to keep them open.
[Old thread] as an addition to the title would be good enough. Even n00bs will understand what it means, and won’t ask about it, unlike [Zombie].
“Sophia Peletier”-zombie from the “Walking Dead” TV series.
Cute.
So this is now a zombie thread on zombie threads zombified by a zombie. :eek:
Yeah. But let’s just close this mess and be done with it.