Or perhaps we should just start Digging For Victory, saving old cooking fat and rubber bands, and collecting saucepans, park railings and iPods to be melted down and made into a new server. That, coupled with issuing War On Ignorance Bonds, should see us through to VE {Victory For Edification} Day.
Sounds like my users wanting to keep email for years. You have to delete stuff sometime. 
Why don’t you just delete that line from your “features list” next time you delete a block of old threads? Then it won’t be an issue any more.
You guys have a long “Ministry Of Information”-style history of disappearing threads you don’t like anyway. Maybe you can find an intern at the Reader who can do a search for all the threads where “new features” and “better performance” and all that stuff is promised. Then *they *can all get disappeared too. Maybe that will make the SDMB’s Pay Up And Shut Up “customer service” easier to swallow.
I’ll defend this.
We do not delete threads just because we don’t like them. Threads are deleted because they are from socks, returning guests, or spammers.
Unfortunately, sometimes that means pretty good threads get taken away, but we believe that it will discourage such actions if the actors know that their works will simply go away.
I will concur that I certainly felt that “Ability to search the massive SDMB message database” implied that the massive SDMB message database was a permanent fixture and not going anywhere any time soon. I was a little bummed when Jerry started deleting old messages, but figured (based mostly on TubaDiva’s post quoted earlier in this thread) that they would be put back eventually when we had space again.
Now it seems that they may never get put back, which makes the “massive SDMB message database” somewhat less massive, no? It’s just a little disappointing.
And for my last point, I certainly do not mean this in any way to come across as rude or obnoxious. Maybe there’s just some aspect of database administration I’m ignorant of. But how can you know that you’re purchasing a new server within two weeks and yet not have even an approximate guess as to when we might be up and running on it? Are we talking a few weeks here? A few months? A year or more? Never?
Incidentally, I would suggest that in light of these new revelations re the possible permanent disappearance of old threads, somebody with some server space to burn might want to archive some of the “classics”, e.g. the VVC thread, offsite.
The intentions are well founded but the execution would not be a good idea as posts on the SDMB are copyrighted to the original poster and the Chicago Reader. Users may reproduce their own posts outside the SDMB but not the work of others without express written permission from the Reader.
Sorry.
I think there’s a misunderstanding here. Let me be very clear and very explicit. The Moderators and Administrators are just staff, we are not the decision-makers. We try to pass on information when we can, but we’re not the ones making the decisions or having any say in the matter. At the moment, Jerry and the tech gods are very busy with multiple projects, and the highest priority in terms of the SDMB is getting the new server is in place.
But yelling at the Moderators and Administrators of the SDMB – well, you might as well yell at your pet or some stranger walking by on the street. Kind of like yelling at the traffic cop because you’re unhappy that the governor didn’t live up to his campaign promises.
Damn you Dex, why the heck did Bush get us involved in a land war in Asia!?
Then (as various people have said before) you shouldn’t exactly be making predictions about future events if you don’t have the information, should you?
I think there would be a lot less yelling if people didn’t feel cheated. I think people wouldn’t feel cheated if they weren’t led to believe certain things which don’t come to pass. I think people wouldn’t be led to believe certain things that don’t come to pass if other people wouldn’t masquerade as having information they really don’t have or making calls they really can’t make.
Great. So, old threads are being deleted, we can’t do anything about it, and we can’t even archive them for ourselves because the Chicago Reader, which is the entity responsible for deleting them in the first place, won’t let us. They don’t want to keep the threads and they won’t let us keep them, either.
Thanks a lot. Yes, I’m very sorry, too.
This post is probably a lot angrier than it should be, but frankly I do feel cheated. I’ve supported this message board as best I could over the years. I’ve directed friends here, I’ve bought all the damn books multiple times, I bought the T-shirt, I bought the mug, I signed up when we went pay and even convinced my husband to sign up even though his total posting history is something like 3. It’s because I felt like this board was really worth contributing to, both as a poster and also financially. And now archives that I think most of us naturally assumed would be permanently available are being deleted wholesale without even an apology, or even the acknowledgement that people are justified in feeling a little upset. In fact, the attitude we’re getting is, “You have no right to complain because we never promised anything, so shut up and stop whining.”
I think that being upset over the permanent disappearance of archived threads is a legit complaint and I really don’t appreciate being treated like a small whining child because of it.
Well, sometimes you get information given to you by people in places of authority, people that have control over how things go, and you make decisions based on what they told you.
And then situations change and plans change accordingly. And then what do you do?
You stop sharing any information that might be passed on to you, that’s what you do, especially if you can in no way affect the outcome.
So I don’t know. I can’t even speculate.
On 'tother hand, we also get yelled at when we DON’T pass on information. People complain about something, and the Moderators are unable to respond and so don’t, and READER management doesn’t read that thread and so they don’t see it or don’t choose to respond, and the anger just builds because you think you’re not being heard. Stuck between Scylla and Charybdis, we are.
When we are given information, happy news or unhappy, we do our best to pass it on. Then the situation changes, and we’re left holding the proverbial. We heard good things; we thought they were coming to pass (and they may still but not at the moment), and we wanted to share that. Would you prefer we not tell you anything until after the fact?
Sorry if you feel you are ill-treated, it’s hard to convey tone in threads. Further complaint of that sort, however, belongs in the Pit, please. Now, please re-read what Jerry said above. He did NOT say one way or another that threads were going to permanently disappeared, he said he would do his best, but that there were no guarantees.
Once again, he’s warning you in advance of what MIGHT happen. Would you prefer he not tell you until whatever decision is made is already done?
I just wanted to pop back into this thread to say that I, for one, agree with An Arky’s post in the related Pit thread that basically said that the moderators and administrators are doing the best they can with what they’ve got.
Personally, I feel that (upon reading the explanations in this thread), you guys rock. You provide a great service to us all, and I’m sorry for putting the burden on your shoulders in the OP.
The Chicago Reader is to blame for this continuing debacle.
Then pass on the complaint to Reader management and kick them up the backside for a response. One of you guys popping in to at least say that the proper people have been informed of the complaint would also be far less frustrating to the members than no official response at all.
No. You’re stuck between the charming, smart and in no way mentally subnormal inhabitants of a message board and management that couldn’t spot a successful business plan if it anally raped them.
Just be a little bit smarter about doing so and don’t put yourselves in the firing line should things not happen. Make clear that it’s Reader management promising the wonderous bullcrap that ain’t gonna happen and not you personally. And, seriously, don’t promise, hint or suggest a damn thing around subscription time because it makes it look like you’ve pulled a bait & switch. Folk ain’t gonna be thinking “That bloody Reader conned me”, they’re gonna be thinking that you have.
Being an Admin or Mod is shit at the best of times, but you guys don’t even have the benefit of owning the damn board you run. The Reader doesn’t really give that much of a shit about the board, the subscribers or you folk doing the day to day running of the place. Why put yourselves in the position of having to take shit because of the Reader’s failings?
Here’s an idea: Publish the contact information for the person at the Reader who is ultimately responsible for the board. Direct complaints to them. They get paid more than a modest stipend to do their jobs, let them start to earn it.
I get the copywrite and ownership issue. Might the Reader not be able to insure that at least the board itself can protect the classics, say those that are mentioned in the periodic classic threads, have some nominating process from the members or by some mechanism such threads over six months old that get X number of views? Given that some of those classic rants, meltdowns and general funny stuff are great stuff, it seems to me that those threads are a corporate asset that it would make sense to protect.
For bad news, or potential bad news, tell us as soon as you know and apologize on behalf of the management. Everyone understands that shit happens, or at least they should. For good news, tell us when it happens. Don’t, for goodness sake, tell us something great is going to happen but not tell us what it is and then not mention it again. Especially don’t insult the customers who express doubt.
We have a Pit thread going that is civil by Pit standards and it is so far being ignored by the Admins.
It only came up because someone asked the question. It was answered well and honestly but it should have, in my opinion, been announced when it was first realized so that people could have had a few days to copy some of their favorites for safekeeping.
You mean like what happened when someone did a search for a thread, discovered it missing, and then was told later that threads are being deleted?
As Kal so memorably posted:
‘No. You’re stuck between the charming, smart and in no way mentally subnormal inhabitants of a message board and management that couldn’t spot a successful business plan if it anally raped them.’
I’m confident you moderators and admins are jolly decent chaps.
But you must expect us paying subscribers to be peeved when things don’t improve.
Is there no way you can alert the Reader to the fact it has a real opportunity to create goodwill amongst a sizeable Internet community?
I apologize for losing my temper in this thread yesterday. I am really upset about the loss of old threads, more than I probably should be for something that’s just a message board, but I do realize that the mods have nothing to do with that decision. I am still fairly irate with the people who are responsible for that decision, but since they apparently don’t read and/or care much about the boards, it’s less than useless to post about it here.
I think that nominating and archiving specific threads that are deemed to be of lasting value would be a nice gesture. Not as nice as actually being able to search all of the old threads, but still, a nice gesture.