I’m aware of some recent policy changes that allow Zombie threads to be re-animated after a long peaceful slumber.
Unfortunately, I find it particularly annoying that I read a thread only to realize its several years old and may not be particularly useful. The posts may be out of date, the users are no longer active, the links included are dead, etc.
I know the date of the posting is listed, but its so unobtrusive that I don’t notice it. Can we perhaps have some sort of easily recognizable feature that makes zombie threads more noticeable as such? Change the font color or something on threads that are more than a year old perhaps?
I don’t believe that there is a standard way to do that in vBulletin. There may be a plug in that allows it but the management here, if history is any guide, won’t add anything to the standard version.
In that thread you say that there’s no way to do that. Again, I point out that post icons are a STANDARD PART OF VBULLETIN. This requires no hack and minimal effort effort from the admin team. Uploading custom icons (like the brain with a chunk taken out) is also a STANDARD PART OF VBULLETIN.
Is a five second Google search really too much to ask?
But seriously, If it can logistically happen, it doesn’t answer the question, “Is there a litmus for Zombie threads?”, That is to say, the ‘zombieness’ of one thread or topic might not equate across the board of other would be zombies.
I meant that I don’t think that there is a way for this to automatically happen once a thread is old enough. If thread icons were enabled, moderators would have to manually add them as the zombies appeared. They could also edit the thread titles. Most of those threads would probably have replies by the time a mod found out a out them.
It’s seems like kind of a pain in the ass to me but, of course, YMMV.
In the past when others have said that it can’t be done, I am sure that they meant automatically. Even without icons, they could but “ZOMBIE” in front of the thread title and not even bother with icons.
Of course not. I’m suggesting that if a zombie thread is resurrected that a moderator goes in and adds a [ZOMBIE] tag to the front of the title. Considering the fact that only a handful of zombie threads are resurrected every week, this wouldn’t be a burden at all.
On the other hand, if only a handful are resurrected every week, it’s really not a big problem. At best, a tiny, inconsquential annoyance. So why bother doing it?
You underestimate the number of zombie threads that are resurrected every week. There have been a lot more since threads have been searchable by Google.
Speaking as a moderator, I don’t think it’s really worth the trouble to do anything like this manually as standard operating practice. Having to read or having mistakenly replied to a zombie thread is a minor inconvenience at worst. Frequently posters will note it’s a zombie thread. If I notice one, I may also post in the thread to indicate it’s old. But I’m not going to go combing through the forum looking for them.
My recommendation, if you are seriously inconvenienced by reading zombie threads, is to make it a practice to check the date of the first post. Problem solved!
