Overly-Cornfielding Messages?

Hello administration and other gentlebeings.

In this thread, all replies were shuffled off to the cornfield. Surely not every reply was made by a sock.

I’ll warrant in the grand scheme of things, it’s not the most important thread on the forum.

Same with Is there a bottom line to all these “Sovereign citizen” cases?

Not sure why the whole thing got taken out, had 288 replies, and I remember many of them being quite interesting, I may have even participated in that thread myself.

Actually came to ATMB to see what was up with that.

Though the example in the OP of this thread is even odder, as the OP of that thread is a member in good standing.

What’s annoying is that if you click on the link, You Cannot Gargle Sand Socks link at the bottom of the closed link, k9, all you get is Oops! That page doesn’t exist or is private.

Why do the powers that be provide a link that basically says, “Neener, neener. You can’t see it!!”

That was a screw-up and not a plan. I’ll work on fixing it.

The tools involved are testy to say the least and I had 40+ posts to disappear and the direct replies.

Sorry all.

Started by a troll and woken by probably the sock of the troll. That one is gone as it mainly attracts trolls and their socks.

OK, I think the thread is restored minus the sock posts and a few “neverminds” from Whack-a-Mole I left in the cornfield.

Between the OP and the first reply by sohvan, do you see anything?


Again, sorry about that. I was having problems last night. Another thread got trashed also but that one I caught and fixed last night.


That is a feature that is basically a bug (to me). After I move the posts to the cornfield, I then have to go back and delete those annoying links also. Hopefully I didn’t miss any others.

I can attest to what a difficult process this is to do in Discourse. There are a lot of steps, and they don’t come naturally.

The first time I encountered a prolific sock/troll when no other mod was around, I didn’t know how to handle the whole process. The best I could manage in the moment was to get rid of the troll and then hide the posts until more experienced mods became available to help. I felt terrible about it, as those hidden, horrible posts could still be read with only a click.

Fortunately, @What_Exit and @engineer_comp_geek were on the job a couple hours later and were able to cornfield the posts. @What_Exit has since outlined the process for us all – but even with step-by-step instructions, it is very easy to overlook a step, such as deleting the links, when you’re chasing down dozens of posts.

It’s also easy to make a mistake, and while most can be fixed, it takes time. I think we all appreciate it when someone brings a mistake to our attention, but bear with us as we work to correct them. Also please keep in mind that problems often arise at inconvenient times: We’re just on our way out the door to prearranged events, or time to put the kids to bed, or it’s the dinner hour, or, or, or. It’s nice when participants don’t attribute a malevolent hidden purpose to our actions or lack of same.

I hope you can be patient with us as newer mods get it all figured out. And I hope the older mods aren’t browbeaten into quitting. As the newest mod, I can tell you that this “job” is harder than it looks.

I wasn’t complaining about the cornfielding, per se, but rather the traces left behind,

The ears are always sweeter in the invisible field.

I’m sorry, I should have been more clear. I don’t think anyone posting in this thread was complaining or browbeating. Those comments were intended in a more general way.

Thanks mods, clearly this isn’t easy to do and you’re obviously doing your best to make it right.

Negative. At no point in this thread do I see anything between the OP and sohvan, and there’s no reference to gravel anywhere in the thread either.

My hat’s off to you.