Thanks, everyone, for your comments and suggestions. It's a balancing act between keeping useful information visible and making sure that less useful information isn't dredged up. :) I'm passing all of your comments on for consideration and we'll let you know of any developments. In the meantime, please be sure to continue letting us know about any problem posts that crop up in these discussions.
Claire
I've seen on other forums where they put a lock on a thread (symbol shows up), whereby the thread cannot be added to.
What I like to do when I see someone addressing someone on an old thread is to send the person being addressed a heads up via private message so if they are still an active member at all, they can come and respond if they so choose.
lagree butterfly..I find it strange that anyone would go back as far as 7 years to find some nasty controversial thread .very often they are trolls .
Hi,
I agree, the old posts coming up again is really annoying! Nearly all of the threads on the first page of both the BC 3& 4 and the BC Expert Forum are old ones. And that leads to people adding to them, often apparently with no idea that many of them are several years old.
In one of these forums, a doctor answered a number of the old threads, sometimes asking people for more info regarding their cases, and encouarging in their journeys through treatment (already long finished). It's a shame so much of her valuable time and knowledge was spent on old threads, rather than used to answer new questions from people in current need.
I do think it's important for the old threads to be available in the archives so that searches can lead people to some of the excellent older answers, but I can't believe, with all the technology available, there isn't SOME WAY for Medhelp to close the older threads, perhaps those that have had no activity for a year, to any further posts. That way new posters would have to start new threads, and would be more likely to get quick responses, plus the old threads wouln't clutter the "front page" of the forums..
good ho...its good be be in the know not hear it from others ...lol maybe post on side bar would be good .. ..thanks .
Hi Margy -
We've had that for awhile now, and I'm sorry you didn't know. You raise a good point, though, and I'll discuss it with our developers to see if we can find a way to notify members of these more subtle changes.
If you have any suggestions, let me know! We are open to any and all ideas!
Thanks!
Emily
Have just been informed in a members journal that now there is a symbol for old posts ...would have been nice if the rest of us members could have been informed ..I have just heard .....
Hi there -
Yes, that's an unfortunate side effect of leaving them up. I'm sorry that happened.
Em
Been a lot of problems lately , on the childrens forums ..one troll went round many forums dragging up the old salacious posts...it was removed from all the forums immediately ..One was from 7 years ago .
Hi, margy,
In general, even old posts may have something educational to offer folks who are using a search engine to research an issue, so we feel it's important to leave them visible. Unfortunately, we don't have archiving capabilities that allow us to leave the posts visible while closing them to new comments, but in many cases, it's okay to suggest that a member start a new topic for their question. By all means, please feel free to report anything that falls into this category, or anything inappropriate that gets dredged up. We'll take a look and we'll take action whenever necessary.
Claire
most of us dont like the old questions being dragged up , some are many yeards old, or controversial , it happens all the time on the child forums..sometimes I find I am answering a five year old thread and the child has grown up LOL
We do encourage starting a new post so you can always report the posts that you see that are posting on old threads and we can contact the member to explain the process :D