Something just occured to me, why is it ok to celebrate birthdays here, but not post count milestones?
I have no objection to the policy, I am just curious as to what the difference is. And if this question has already been answered, please accept my apologies for repeating it.
I wasn’t aware that folks still celebrated birthdays here, but then, I don’t brave the wilds of MPSIMS often.
A hunch, though: Celebrating post count milestones casts a high post count as something to be desired in and of itself, which would encourage post count padding (something which the mods wish to avoid). But there’s no way a person can actively try to achieve a birthday quicker. You’ll have the same frequency of birthdays, no matter how much or what you post.
Your hunch makes sense to me.
If the mods/admin don’t want to support post padding, why don’t they just removie the viewable post count amount?
That has been debated quite a bit, Duderdude, and it has yet to be settled.
My take on the OT was that since birthdays are actually something that gets celebrated outside of the boards (it’s scary out there, don’t forget your towel), there can be a “party,” much as we would celebrate getting a new job, or getting married, etc. Post counts don’t mean anything on the outside (and, some would argue, in here), so they don’t get the special status.
Everyday I impress my co-workers with my post count. “Up to 2200!” I’ll say. “Gosh!” they’ll say, clearly wowed. “We don’t know how you find time to do any work!”
I throw a post-count party for myself at every 500 posts. I invite friends, hire a clown, have punch, pie. It’s really quite the to-do.
Intrestingly, I only celebrate my birthday in MPSIMS.
I was going to say the same exact thing, but then I realized that would be quite a silly thing for me to say.
You hire a clown? Dude, I was just kidding about that.
I hire a clown and punch him. Then I eat the pie.
For someone that has loudly stated numerous times that you don’t pay attention to post counts and that they don’t mean anything to you, your posting of that thread in the first place and your pursuance of why it was not allowed after it was closed is very curious.
No, see, the thing is… I don’t even have 500 posts. Ergo, such a statement on my part would be silly. Get it now?
That’s all. Nothing else.
Come play with us! We’re very gentle and never bite unless asked first.
Are you referring to me?
If so, you are wrong. I have on many occasions said that post count does mean something. It means that there’s a chance that member has learnt the civility and ettiquete of posting here. A person with a post count of 5000 is far less likely to misbehave and far more likely to be trustworthy and know the boards than a person with a post count of 5.
But I am not getting into that debate. I am simply letting you know that you got me wrong.
I’d imagine the birthday threads would not be prohibited by the rule that prohibits game threads and post count parties for the following reason: the rule is to prevent the forum from filling up with long multi page threads that only a few members continue posting to. IME, birthday threads get a lot of people who only post once, and they rarely exceed 2 pages. If for some reason they started turning into long drawn out affairs involving only a few posters, then I suppose the Mods might see fit to forbid them too.
Another difference is the birthday threads only occur once a month, so there’s usually only one active at a time when any are active at all.
Hopefully we can get an official ruling on this one, oh Mods? 
Spoken like a true sub-one-kay-er. 