What's wrong with bumping a thread?

[TheBigK]

I remember the days when I was introduced to the world of forums - and ever since then the moderators of the forums I've been a part of have frowned upon me for bumping an old discussion.

Can someone quickly tell me what's wrong with bumping an old discussion? What if I need to add something to the discussion without creating an entirely new discussion on the same topic?

 

[Digital Doctor]

I prefer people to find old threads and post there first.
IMO.

 

[Optic]

This varies from community to community, I reckon most communities don't mind people bumping old discussion topics if they have something new to add to the discussion, which has the potential to revive the discussion thread again. Otherwise the alternative is usually a duplicate topic.

On the other hand bumping a thread just for for the sake of pushing it back to the top of the thread list with no content like "bump" is usually frowned upon..

 

[FredC]

"bump"

is usually frowned upon..

This...

 

[TheBigK]

On the other hand bumping a thread just for for the sake of pushing it back to the top of the thread list with no content like "bump" is usually frowned upon..

Agreed.

However, if someone's doing it 'for a reason' (like getting support), it should be allowed, IMHO.

 

[SEOmers]

Agreed.

However, if someone's doing it 'for a reason' (like getting support), it should be allowed, IMHO.

Yes and No.

A bug for one person is rarely the exact same issue for another. When people bump old posts it does nothing more than make matters worse, for most.

 

[Sador]

It depends. Over the years, people tend to change their mind about things, have new experiences, things that were said in the past might no longer be true in the present, etc. Hence why some feel it's better to create a new topic over bumping an old one. Other than that it's just preference, I guess.

 

[LPH]

Information in an old thread may be outdated, therefore, bumping the thread can cause confusion. If the board is a support forum then it is definitely a bad idea because the issues may look the same and turn out to be different versions, different problems, etc.

 

[Jeffin]

Reading through the replies here, I think it depends on the topic and the forum. On my site, I am totally fine with people replying to old threads because of the type of topics we have.

 

[TPerry]

That's why, IMHO, a feature that allows a thread to be automatically closed after X number of days would be beneficial.

 

[Paul B]

That would be a simple enough add-on.

(If I had the time I would create it.)

 

[TPerry]

That would be a simple enough add-on.

(If I had the time I would create it.)

Figured it would be... but it would be nice if it was rolled in. I know a couple of other scripts have that ability folded into them.

 

[Sador]

That's why, IMHO, a feature that allows a thread to be automatically closed after X number of days would be beneficial.

Wouldn't that end in discussions suddenly being cut off? Or do you mean x days without replies?

 

[New Joe]

I use this and works well:

https://xenforo.com/community/threads/old-thread-warning.88317/#post-863478

 

[TPerry]

Wouldn't that end in discussions suddenly being cut off? Or do you mean x days without replies?

No, because if the reply was just a "I agree" then it would re-open it for another x number of days. For most "problem reports", new versions resolve those issues or as said above, the data is outdated due to newer versions.