I am baffled, at times, over the pointless locking of threads on all forums of this message board.

There is of course times when the feature should be used, but I think it is being over-used and reasons given for the locking (if any) are often more ridiculous than the post itself.

And I am not making this point because one of my own posts was recently locked, but it has highlighted the issue.

I am not asking for changes over moderation methods, I am stating my opinion.

It is true. Take the fish topic for example. In that case, there was not even a reason given, just locked.

I really don't understand it myself. When I lock a topic, I give a reason, and it's usually a good one.. as for the fish topic.. let me find it and see if it should've been locked...

It would be ironic if this topic was locked...

I haven't been around too long, so I haven't seen many locked topics, and all the ones I've seen had pretty good reasons... maybe a few shouldn't have been locked though.

*most* of the lockings are good logical choices though seem more like a vendetta than a descision...

I've only Locked 4 topics while I've been a MOD and I thought that it was the right desision. As for the fish, I was baffled.

Yeah that would be very ironic.

I'm sorry I locked your topic, Tom. It's just, there WAS already a thread that discussed that very topic, I merely locked it in an attempt to redirect any continuing conversation to the other topic.

So was the topic unlocked then?

That's because most of the locking is done by me, paper

I do quite a bit of locking in Hoenn Discussion as well as Kanto Revisited, but those I lock either has a similar topic, or else the question in the topic has already been answered. Also, I will entertain anyone's request to re-open certain threads, provided the reasons given are adequate. I don't really see any pointless locking anywhere in the forum.

I find that when a question thread is left unlocked, five or six people seem to think that posting an answer to the question that has already been answered two hours ago is an excellent idea, even when they have nothing more to add than "Yea, X is right, just let me explain what X said in different words..." This generates a fair bit of spam, and also tends to be discouraging to the person asking the question- six people jumping up and saying "oh everyone knows that", especially if the asker is new, can be discouraging. It seems a bit harsh to lock two or three questions a day, but it's usually for the best, and moderators tend to be quite open about what they're doing so if someone wants further discussion they can usually ask for it to be reopened.

I personally don't know why the fish topic was locked, I thought it was quite good. Recent locked topics have included the birthday one where we decided to sticky one topic and close all the others to avoid several posts of the same nature. The Michael Jackson one wasn't a good start. I would have been happy had it started on the verdict, rather on people's opinions of him, as the thread was going to turn into a discussion about pedofiles, which I didn't want on these forums. Questions on Trainer Cards have already been answered several times, and that's why that was locked. hey whats up and watup were locked as there is already an introduce yourself thread stickied. TK had his reasons for locking the Nintendo topic, but I would have done the same...we're not out to directly compete with the hoardes of followers of other sites, we're quite happy to stick with ourselves and befriend anybody who happens to drop by. I'm not sure who locked the Elements topic, but I didn't really get the point of it either. It would be like starting a topic on "whats your favourite colour".

If there are any ever topics which are locked for no apparanet reason, please do speak up, and mods, please just put a little why clause at the end of locked threads.

Thanks,

Amphy

That's unfair, I didn't lock the fish one!

Oops... Sorry. It was a misunderstanding

Edited my post.

When some questions are answered, I do think that a cuple could generate a mini discussion. I don't think they should be locked unless no one posts within a few days. Then there are large topics such as School, which I think should be stickied. Then we could have temporary stickies on some topics such as Proboards versus phpbb, or What's Your Personality. Sticky them just long enough for everybody to get their say, then unsticky them, and when no one posts, leave them alone.

Sneaky_Sneasels birthday topic was closed? That was kind of funny seeing the different "presents" everyone got.


And Necromancy. The thing that gave e a bad reputation as a n00b. Sometimes it can't be helped. What if in the birthday topic no one posts for a good year. But then suddenly we have a rush of new members. Shouldn't they be able to mention their birthday's too?

I don't always agree the Moderators, but sometimes they have their reasons not all can see. Therefore they act. Those acts can be for better or worse.

And that is precisely why we welcome people's feedback. Think a mod is doing something wrong? PM the mod, and make your request politely. Most of the time we'll comply. Mods aren't saints; we make mistakes too. So be sure to remind us when we do make mistakes

And this is what is so great at Psypoke forums. We consider it a democracy which is great. To be able to discuss with a Mod various things, is a privledge not many forum Administrators give.

Well, I have to take the blame for the fish topic. Here's what happened. Master Chief was reviving a good number of old topics in this forum. After over two months, he revived the fish one with a silly joke. I was moving kind of quick which caused me to miss the legitimate question Tom had posted on the bottom, so the topic got locked. If I had seen Tom's post, the topic wouldn't have been locked.

However, most of the topics around here that are locked seemed to be locked for a good reason. Some topics just need to be locked. Occasionally, I might lock a topic without leaving a note, if I think it is obvious enough that everyone will understand why it was locked, but I guess it wouldn't hurt to leave a note along with every locked topic.



I don't know if you were being sarcastic or not, but there was a what's your favorite color topic.

A little bit ago, I did lock some topics without posting in them, I thought it'd be obvious on why they were locked (Most had members like WPM, Truestar, etc. posting a link to a topic similar to it).

Most were answered questions and some had duplicates.

I'll try to take the extra time to post in them now, to prevent confusion, even though it takes a couple of minutes to post for me (Dial-Up).

Though getting 10+ posts from Locking topics doesn't seem right to me (No offense to other mods). We aren't contributing anything to the topics, but it still counts as posts.

EDIT: Forgot Color Tag

I assume most people that have been given moderator status are mature enough not to care about a number next to their name. I have been at PsyPoke for over five years and anyone else that has been here a while shouldn't be bothered either.

There is nothing worse than a forum of locked topics all over. Perhaps talking to the people that revive old topics/repeat things, would reduce the need to lock posts.

Necromancy isn't that bad. If it is done right it can be very useful.

What would be a good way to start a Mike Jack. thread?

yep...quite right rayquaza

First of all, we do remind those repeat "offenders" to stop reviving topics and such. Secondly, I assure you that most people, even those non-moderators, do not regard post count highly. Even I myself don't really care about post count, despite my "personal feud" with Sneaky_Sneasel over who should be the highest poster here

indeed snowball...wise words.!!!!!!!!!!!