I was scrolling through GQ this a.m., and ran across this thread. Someone resurrected it after 7 years.
Have you ever resurrected a zombie? If so, would you discuss what caused you to do so?
I guess different people use message boards in any number of different ways. But I’m trying to figure out what would lead me to conduct a search that resulted in a years’ old topic, and then if I did, why I would reply in a manner as though I were simply continuing the conversation.
Note: I’m not talking about an anniversary of a past event, or a new development in something discussed before.
Yeah, a lot of zombies are resurrected by someone searching something on Google like Stewart sandwiches, find the thread and quickly register to comment.
Ahh - hadn’t thought of that. :smack: Sure enough, the resurrecter in the thread I linked joined just this month. Go forth in the comfort that you dispelled a tiny portion of my ignorance this morning!
I would guess that better than 95% of zombie resurrectors are newbies who came across the thread while Googling and didn’t notice (or didn’t care) it was old. Occasionally zombies will also be resurrected by spammers. We usually remove the post and any reports so the zombie floats back down to the depths where it was sleeping, but sometimes it gets enough posts before we get to it that we leave it open.
I think that new posters who join because of one thread, aren’t familiar with the SDMB and miss that it’s an old thread. I think at this point we just have to get over zombies and realize that it’s helping to bring new members to the board, some of whom stick around.
The drive by zombies is why I prefer another message board I go to (that uses the same software). There they have a note on any thread more than a year old that you have to click a button acknowledging that you understand this thread is years old and what you have to say is worth reviving it. It won’t prevent zombie threads outright but it does at least cause one to ‘think’ about it before they repost it. Very rarely does that board have zombie threads.
I think there is some kind of tip for new Dopers, that instead of starting a new topic, they should first search to see if there’s already a thread for it.
I’ve resurrected a few zombies here and there, almost always in Cafe Society or The Game Room, because I had a single comment about a recipe or TV show or movie or video game that really didn’t warrant a fresh thread, but I still felt the need to share.
I don’t think I ever have, but the situation I might do it is this: I start to post something, then it occurs to me that there might be an old thread on the subject, so I search for it, find it, and think I have something interesting to add to it. Since we are discouraged from duplicate threads, this seems reasonable.
That said, I wish there was a notice that a thread was a zombie.
I used to lurk on a board that encouraged zombie threads. The moderators would bump them to give newbies a chance to share their stories. New SDMB posters who resurrect threads won’t necessarily realize they’re doing something out of the ordinary.
I get the impression that many resurrectors aren’t even clear on the concept of a message board. (Which, let’s face it, is becoming an obsolete form of Internet discourse.) They just Google, see some comments about their topic of interest, and think, “Ooh, I can make a comment, too.” Few if any ever return.
