Is disabling post counts something that’s an option for the Administrators? As in not displaying them, or maybe not even keeping track of them.
Yep. They can be configured to not show.
I sometimes think that would be a good idea.
Take a look at Fathom. Opal’s turned off the post counts there. You can still see them by looking at a user’s profile (that’s a picture of a face in profile with a question mark next to it).
Fathom also uses vBulletin, despite the rather different appearance of that site.
You can’t disable keeping track of them (without modifying the software), but as other posters have said, you can disable displaying them.
Okay thanks. Then I have another question. Then is there a reason you display them, or did you just leave it as the default?
Just in a spirit of honest inquiry, what would actually be a good reason for wanting to disable post counts?
I was just thinking that’s one less thing the server would have to worry about. I also think they don’t serve much of a purpose, but I could be wrong. That’s why I asked if there was a reason we keep them.
I find them very convenient.
Under 8,000: Feckless Newbie.
Over 9,000: Pathetic Nerd.
And I’m sure that Arnold would agree with me.
You mean I’m still a newbie!!?? :eek:
Oh, but wait, that make you a nerd! snort
I’d like to see post counts grow exponentially. Maybe post count = posts^2 I’d be over 17.6 million.
He’s practically perfect in every way Q.E.D. Look again.
Well, if you feel the desire to treat newbies different than you treat nerds, do we need both post counts and registration dates? Wouldn’t that be redundant?
Eliminate post parties and post padding, for one.
From what I’ve seen, some people use the post counter as a kind of social status indicator.
That might turn out to be a wash – for one, I tend to access profiles more often on boards where post counts are disabled simply in order to see what post counts are. (It doesn’t do much, but I’m just nosy, I suppose.)
I could imagine that on a larger scale, this could lead to the server having more strain on it.
It wouldn’t have to be if post counts were not listed in the profile, either.
Man, I’m all about incoherent sentences in this thread. What I meant to say was:
If post counts were not in users’ profiles, then we wouldn’t have people accessing profiles just to get post counts.
I imagine (though I don’t know for sure) that at the beginning they were left as default. If we got rid of them now, I can guarantee that there would be a bunch of people complaining because they like seeing post counts.
Also, I personally find it helpful in the course of my duties to see the post counts under the poster’s name in a thread.
Only temporarily, my dear chap, only temporarily.
Okay, well I dislike seeing post counts. However, I don’t think you should decide which features to keep around just based on what people like or dislike, so I’m not complaining.
One question, though, and I think it will be my last. Is it possible to set it so that Moderators can see post counts, but everyone else can’t?
Nearly any feature you want is possible, however, to do this in vBulletin would require software modification, I’m almost positive.
Sorry, I meant, is it possible without software modification.