# Sig was there on one post, then gone on another!

**URL:** <https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sig-was-there-on-one-post-then-gone-on-another/245887>\
**Category:** About This Message Board\
**Created:** [May 19, 2004, 2:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sig-was-there-on-one-post-then-gone-on-another/245887 "2004-05-19T02:00:52Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 6\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![Incubus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/c68b51/32.png) [@Incubus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Incubus)\
**Post date:** [May 19, 2004, 2:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sig-was-there-on-one-post-then-gone-on-another/245887/1 "2004-05-19T02:00:52Z")

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This has me rather puzzled 😕

When I posted my ‘test post’, it had my signature. But when I posted a reply to that post, the reply did NOT have my signature. What gives? Under options, I turned ‘show signatures’ on, and I have a signature, so it seems wierd it would show up in one post but not the other. 😕

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**Author:** ![Berkut](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/a88e57/32.png) [@Berkut](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Berkut)\
**Post date:** [May 19, 2004, 2:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sig-was-there-on-one-post-then-gone-on-another/245887/2 "2004-05-19T02:18:30Z")

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Are you checking the “Show your signature” box when you post? It recently defaults to off.

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**Author:** ![Lobsang](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lobsang/32/4067_2.png) [@Lobsang](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lobsang)\
**Post date:** [May 19, 2004, 2:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sig-was-there-on-one-post-then-gone-on-another/245887/3 "2004-05-19T02:20:02Z")

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The Show signatures option means to show you other people’s signatures whenever they have ‘show your signature’ switched on for that post.  
‘Show your signature’ has recently been set to default to off for the whole board.

But I don’t know why your sig was there for the OP (maybe the switch from default on to default off happened between your two posts)

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**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:** [May 19, 2004, 1:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sig-was-there-on-one-post-then-gone-on-another/245887/4 "2004-05-19T13:56:24Z")

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Lobsang’s explanation is probably the story here.

Please see the announcement above for more details of the situation.

your humble TubaDiva  
Administrator

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**Author:** ![Antigen](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/848f3c/32.png) [@Antigen](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Antigen)\
**Post date:** [May 19, 2004, 3:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sig-was-there-on-one-post-then-gone-on-another/245887/5 "2004-05-19T15:07:44Z")

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I’ve noticed that if I preview my post after having checked my show sig box, and then post my message, my sig disappears. It seems the box is magically unchecking itself when I hit preview. That’s normal?

Why don’t we have individual defaults for this option, like we do for thread display, and all the other things on the “options” page?

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**Author:** ![Troy\_McClure\_SF](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/troy_mcclure_sf/32/4150_2.png) [@Troy\_McClure\_SF](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Troy_McClure_SF)\
**Post date:** [May 19, 2004, 3:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sig-was-there-on-one-post-then-gone-on-another/245887/6 "2004-05-19T15:24:01Z")

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> [@Antigen](#):
>
> It seems the box is magically unchecking itself when I hit preview. That’s normal?

I beleive that’s always been the case, aside from the past month or two. I believe that the Powers That Be want sigs used little as possible\*, so they make sure that if you want it to show, you gotta earn it.

The general guideline is to use your sig once per page per thread, max. I beleive that comes straight from the staff.

\*- It’s one more thing the database has to fetch upon a page load, and 99% of the time, they add nothing useful to the discussion, therefore they’re a bit of a needless drain on resources.