# Thread locked icon: did I see it happen "live"? **URL:** \ **Category:** About This Message Board\ **Created:** [February 17, 2005, 11:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/thread-locked-icon-did-i-see-it-happen-live/290616 "2005-02-17T23:46:43Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 5\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Mr.Blue\_Sky](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/d26b3c/32.png) [@Mr.Blue\_Sky](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mr.Blue_Sky)\ **Post date:** [February 17, 2005, 11:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/thread-locked-icon-did-i-see-it-happen-live/290616/1 "2005-02-17T23:46:43Z")
Earlier today, I was in MPSIMS. There’s a post count thread by Lobsang that Cajun Man locked down. I swear I saw the lock icon suddenly appear over the thread icon. Did I really see this, or am I crazy? ---
**Author:** ![vetbridge](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/v/b5e925/32.png) [@vetbridge](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/vetbridge)\ **Post date:** [February 18, 2005, 12:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/thread-locked-icon-did-i-see-it-happen-live/290616/2 "2005-02-18T00:06:20Z")
> [@Mr. Blue Sky](#): > > Did I really see this, or am I crazy? Why would you assume the two possibilities to be mutually exclusive? 😃 ---
**Author:** ![Mr.Blue\_Sky](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/d26b3c/32.png) [@Mr.Blue\_Sky](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mr.Blue_Sky)\ **Post date:** [February 18, 2005, 12:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/thread-locked-icon-did-i-see-it-happen-live/290616/3 "2005-02-18T00:11:55Z")
> [@vetbridge](#): > > Why would you assume the two possibilities to be mutually exclusive? 😃 Okay, crazi- **ER**. ---
**Author:** ![Cervaise](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cervaise/32/16693_2.png) [@Cervaise](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cervaise)\ **Post date:** [February 18, 2005, 1:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/thread-locked-icon-did-i-see-it-happen-live/290616/4 "2005-02-18T01:03:31Z")
I don’t think this happens live. Rather, I’d hypothesize a sort of illusion: If you hadn’t had a locked-thread icon recently, it would have to be loaded from the site instead of pulled from your local cache. So all the regular icons appeared, and a second later the locked icon appeared after having been downloaded. If you saw it only out of the corner of your eye, your brain may have misinterpreted its appearance as a switch. Just taking a guess about what might have happened. ---
**Author:** ![Sutremaine](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/e495f1/32.png) [@Sutremaine](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sutremaine)\ **Post date:** [March 13, 2005, 8:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/thread-locked-icon-did-i-see-it-happen-live/290616/5 "2005-03-13T20:26:14Z")
I don’t think you can have things appear live on this message board. It’s just an ordinary web page, and you only get updates when you refresh the page or click a new link.