I just got something I at least thought was weird under ‘Display Options’. It said I could sort the list from ‘the beginning’ (as opposed to ‘two days’, ‘one week’, ‘two weeks’ etc.)
When exactly is the ‘beginning’? The beginning of the column by Cecil Adams? The beginning of time itself? The beginning of the message board? If so, on the last one, when exactly did the message board begin? I have been on it for about 20 years now. And when I joined up, it was already going for some time, it seemed.
Please answer this profound question. I must not be the only one who wonders:).
The beginning of this message board. The first forums were ATMB, Comments on Cecil’s Columns and General Questions. Using the display options to display posts “From the Beginning” and “In ascending order” shows the first post in ATMB is March 11, 1999, CCC as April 5, 1999, and the first one in GQ as June 1, 1999.
As with the creation of the world, I believe there was a gradual process of separating the light from the darkness, and new forums were added one by one.
My mistake. I should have sorted threads by “Thread start time” rather than “Last post time.”
Comments. March 10, 1999.
General Questions. Strangely, the sort by start time give October 3, 1999, as the first, although other threads were started as early as June 1, 1999. Something screwy there in the sort.
ATMB. March 13, 1999. Again, the sort option doesn’t work properly for thread start time.
Going back to the very first page of The BBQ Pit listings, I notice a post on 02-24-2009, but then underneath that is a post dated 07-30-1999, continuing down to the bottom to a post dated 03-27-1999.
As I said, the sort function seems to be screwy. In many cases when a new forum was started threads that had been started earlier in other forums were moved there.
I’m not sure of the date, but the Pit was the fifth forum started, or at least its forum number is 5.
Comments is 1, ATMB is 2, General Questions is 3, and MPSIMS is 4. The Pit is 5. There appears to be no forum 6. Great Debates is 7.
I believe what was once “Forum 6” was Straight Dope Chicago, which was pruned off the board when the site was worked on in 2017.
For those that don’t know what I’m talking about, we once had some columns aimed towards local (Chicago area) content, with a message board forum to match. The idea really never got traction and was ultimately abandoned and when the site was changed it was all just dropped.
Wait, where is this option? In my User CP I have something called “Edit Options.” When I click on that, I get “Thread Display Options.” In there I have four choices, including “Thread Display Mode” and “Default Thread Age Cut Off.” I can eventually get to “Show All Threads,” but there’s nothing like “From the Beginning.”
Nor does the oft-maligned search function have that term. The closest I can find is “Any Date.”
It’s not in User CP, it’s on each forum page. At the bottom there is a blue line with “Display options.” You can select options for “Sorted by,” “Sort order,” and “From the.”
Thanks Colibri. I found it, but it doesn’t seem to work well for me. When I try searching for my own OP’s, It shows me as the thread starter in fewer than 100 in GQ and hardly any in ATMB. And I still can’t find my very first post, which would have been shortly after I first signed up (if not the same day.)
Of course, I understand that everything before The Winter of Our Missed Content is sort of hit or miss, but I’m pretty sure I’ve started more than a few hundred threads over 20 years.
I don’t know what to tell you. I find you have started 333 threads (the first 1/16/2000), of which 54 were in GQ and 11 in ATMB. The earliest post I can find by you is 8/6/99. The problem there, as you can see by checking the earliest threads, is that the names have become disassociated from the posts in the database and appear blank. Therefore you won’t find your earliest posts.
That tells me that over 20 years and 25,000+ posts, only 1.3% of them represented an actual, original question or thought that I contributed to this Board. :eek: And I’m sure many of them were topics that had been discussed before and I was simply rehashing. :smack:
Hey, I start very few threads myself. I’ve only started 20 threads in GQ in almost 19 years. (Of course, that’s because I already know most of the answers.;)) But the number of threads you start doesn’t have much to do with how much you contribute to the board. I’m sure I’ve started many fewer threads than you. (I can’t tell the number of “real” threads without searching every forum, since several moderating actions generate new threads in invisible forums.)
