Is there a way for the mods to enable a feature to mark zombie threads as such? I’m thinking like a small “z” icon where the open/closed envelope icon is now.
I thought we would all appreciate a heads up about zombie threads before we click on them.
Search for “zombie” in the title of threads in this forum and you will see that this topic has been covered many, many times.
It looks like a vBulletin template could be modified to flag zombie threads:
https://www.vbulletin.com/forum/archive/index.php/t-79943.html
Our IT guy prefers we stick pretty close to vanilla vBulletin without much alteration to the system. That’s not an option in our current version of vBulletin.
The first thing in the post is the date. The very first thing.
That doesn’t mean most people check the date. The last thing I think about when I see a thread I want to read is “I wonder if this is a zombie thread”. Only after reading the thread and hitting the post that tells the world it’s a zombie thread do I usually realize it. Occasionally I recognize it’s a zombie thread before reading it, but more often than not, I don’t and simply plunge into it.
With that said, it’s not the biggest problem in the world, and if the thread topic interested me enough to click on it to read, I usually don’t mind reading zombie threads. But it would be nice if there were some quick visual clue, (like a locked thread with the padlock), that would tip me off immediately that the thread is a zombie, I would appreciate it.
Maybe instead of a padlock, a nice big “Z” on zombie threads would be nice.
Give it the mark of Zorro! :dubious:
Hm, weird I searched for the term zombie and I just got actual zombie threads. As discussed in the other thread, this only requires a tiny bit if effort by the IT guy, and it’s over. There is no reason whatsoever actual human mods should spend time on this issue. It’s an extremely simple one liner of code that accomplishes the zombie marking.
It doesn’t seem like a script to determine “what is a zombie thread?” would necessarily be terribly accurate. It’s possible for two threads, started the same day, to receive a new reply the same day months later, but with one being a zombie (“how can I use three pounds of hamburger, a cucumber, and a jar of peanut butter, need to know quick”), and the other one not (“Joanie Loves Doofus Season 36 thread”). Both threads are old, both are getting new replies, but one was inactive for months while the other has been getting several posts a week the entire time its been around.
So, comparing first and last post dates is out, what about comparing the two most recent posts dates? Nope, because what happens after someone zombies a thread? Someone else comes in and replies to the zombification, suddenly the dates between the two most recent threads is virtually nil.
What about going through the thread and just looking for any large gap between two posts, and if it’s large enough, mark as zombie? First, you just killed the hamsters. Second, what if Joanie Loves Doofus has a gap midway through the season. Suddenly when the 2nd half starts now it’s a zombie? I think not.
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If you’re referring to the post by John Mace, he said “Search for “zombie” in the title of threads in this forum.”
This would have been the result:
http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/search.php?searchid=7076912
Since Great Debates used to be a forum that absolutely prohibited zombies, after the rule was relaxed, I began putting an edit note in the first post of the thread and the post that revivified the zombie. It is a bit of a hassle, but it seems to be working.
Making the appeal that “it would not take much work to change” will not result in a change and will simply irritate everyone who has been through this.
Regardless how little effort anyone believes any particular change would require, please understand the following:
IT at Creative Loafing is stretched very thin, maintaining the financials, the publishing, and the other internal systems of Creative Loafing. The SDMB is a sideline that they are willing to support only as long as it does not interfere with their primary responsibilty.
Any change to the vB software is a potential glitch. If they need to take time away from their primary responsibilities to deal with a typo in a patch or to discover that some undocumented aspect of vB did not like their “enhancement,” they are wasting time that they need to spend on their primary duties.
They will not do it.
As it is, periodic burps in the system drag them away from their primary tasks more often than they or we would like to see, so asking them to take more time away for a cosmetic enhancement will simply not be received well.
More like this.
I expected that to link to at least a four year old thread.
I like zombies. I mean the threads. I like dusting them off and seeing what people were like way back in 2004.
As far as I can see, most resurrections are by new posters. They may not be aware of the conditions attached to bringing zombies back to life, so, however you flag it, it may not make a difference.
I like zombies to. And I also like the guilt trip I receive when I realise I have been had.
The idea is to mark threads as zombies after they’ve been resurrected (as that’s when a thread becomes a zombie) so other readers can identify a thread as a zombie, not to mark all old threads as zombies.
Not necessary, as inevitably a plethora of posters leaps forward to make brain-eating jokes that alert everyone to the zombie status of a thread. 
Can we get a zombie stickey?
I don’t mean I want you to resurrect a sticky from 5 years ago - I was thinking more in the lines of:
a zombie is a…
people are making brain eating jokes because…
we have more since google…
you can’t see some poster’s names bacause…
we used to ban them, but now…
we can’t tag them because…
we’ve discussed the issue here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, etc.
That’s a good idea. I’ll hoist it up the mod flagpole and see who salutes.
Arr! Happy Talk Like a Pirate Day!
I imagine so. Try throwing honey at it.
Oh. Not as much fun, but potentially more useful. Good thought.
-D/a
It was a great suggestions, Darth Panda, and my reward for taking it to the mod loop was getting volunteered to draft it. Doing that, then passing it around for comments and revisions, will take a couple of days, so don’t hold your breath, but we’re working on it.