It's been posted before...

Originally posted by tinker9917
There's been lots of times I wouldn't have known about a certain subject if the new thread had not been posted. Also, if a thread was done a year ago or three years ago or whatever, a current discussion and new info is alot better than posting to a thread that is long dead.

That's the part that I don't understand: If we're here to discuss things, what's the point in posting to 3-year-old threads? What kind of fun is that? It's stupid on the face of it, to expect people who are excited about a particular subject to go post on the 35th page of some ancient thread.

So to all you wannabe mods: STFU....

I get the impression some of those people spend a lot of time searching for previous threads on a given topic.

Search for a similar thread using keywords, then, if something is found, post something to the effect of "AHA! This has been posted before!".

I think it's a form of trolling. If they really think it makes any difference, there's an alert button on each thread. Let the mods decide if a new thread is unnecessary.

On second thought, maybe those people have used the alert before and want to avoid catching flack from the mods for being a PITA.

reply to post by Ex_CT2


Yup. wanna be authority figures have always bothered me... 'Dog' the bounty hunter annoys the hell out of me, he's only gonna get his family hurt one day by crossing the wrong people.

Dog: We don't need another hero.

Originally posted by amongus
I think there should be a minimum number of years that one should be a member before telling the community of ATS how to act.

I usually respect your posts man.But this one is out of line.Just saying.

reply to post by Raivan31

"how am I supposed to know that the subject exists in the first place in order to use ATS's search function to find it?"

That simply makes no sense. If you are taking the time to write a thread, you obviously have some subject to discuss. There is simply no excuse for not searching the site before creating your thread.

To the average user, this site is a free depository of information exchange, they can talk, make friends, create long threads full of content, all for free. YAY. HORRAH.

In fact, every single post on here, including the one I'm typing, takes up space on a server, somewhere. And because ATS isn't some mickey mouse operation, you can bet that data center storage is also mirrored and backed up constantly.

This is, my friend, extremely expensive. As well, this site is a heavy generator of traffic, which is also expensive.

Beyond that, having redundant threads makes the site harder to navigate, and ends up splitting what could be a meaningful discussion, across several threads that usually don't link up.

From a cost stand point alone, it makes sense to ensure the site is neatly trimmed without any fat. From a flow perspective, it also makes sense.

That said, the search function isn't always perfect, sometimes you get no results because you didn't find the magic combination of search terms.

That is not an excuse for not bothering to search. Need an example?

Search Trayvon Martin. Search Earthquake. Count the endless string of duplicate threads, posted sometimes very close, which is acceptable as they wouldn't have shown in a search, others posted hours apart. NO EXCUSES.

Follow the rules, the rules say search then post, make every post count. Be thankful they allow this much space to be used as a useless rant section.

reply to post by Raivan31


Actually TVTexan was not joking.

It has been posted before.

previously posted rant about this topic

vvv

I have seen these before i never encountered it in any of my thread(i dont start much thread anyway).

I have 2 attitude toward these;

1) If the info is recent, meaning it happened today or yesterday, There is NO NEED for 2nd thread.

2) If the info is posted 6 months ago and new information has arrived, then it is OK TO POST another thread.

Main reason for making a new thread on an older topic is because

1)those members that discussed might not even be on anymore.
2) new information is added
3) what the new generation and the new minds have to say about it.
4) and clearly, if its an old thread revived, it doesn't last long, because people just realize its an old thread and not much activity on it.

I agree. There have been topics I was interested in in the past, and I went to search them on ATS, and it's great if you want to read some old posts, but if you have anything to say on the subject, it will not be read because no one is visiting that page anymore.

Many in the ATS community will complain when silly or outlandish threads are created, and I sometimes get annoyed with these as well, but think about it for a moment. If each conspiracy or whatever type story can only be posted once and never again, then the only things left to post will be these outlandish type of threads, because the real stuff has been posted before. If this is what ATS wants, then I'm afraid it's time to close up shop. ATS can present it's old threads as articles to be published on the web. There's nothing more to say. There's nothing more to post.

reply to post by phishyblankwaters


Half of your argument is on behalf of ATS, yet you do not appear to be a moderator or site owner or anything. Let's just leave it to the mods. If they have a problem with a thread, they will close it.

But I agree with you in regards to same day/week repeat threads such as Treyvon Martin. I am speaking about threads which are old and pretty much dead.

I don't mind pointing people in the right direction of an existing thread if the topics quite new'ish. In the rush to be first with a revelation there's bound to be a bit of a crush.

If the topic is donkeys old though I don't see the point of waving an existing thread in their faces. Either the original thread creator will come along in his own time and mention it or a mod will or a disgruntled poor blighter will come along moaning they created the topic previously and it got ignored. Such is the way of things.

But like other's have noted, what's the point in direction them to a thread that's huge, where every point has previously been hammered across and then left to gather dust.

I think it's a symptom of the self entitlement derived from the social influence of pervasive Convenience that gets most people's panties in a wad.

Everyone is the me me me me me little princess these days because they are the most important person in their universe and their opinion is so obviously because of this importance, important, such they can't be bothered to search or contribute to an already established conversation. No, they have to start their very own topic so they can get the attention they rightfully deserve.
They must be heard. they must pop up in the new topics section. They must get real time engagement, debate, validation, and recognition for their so very very important contribution.

This is, of course, exaggerated to some extent, but, it's to illustrate a social disease pervasive throughout modern technical society, driven by convenience which enables people to subscribe to this psychology of self entitlement.

Everyone wants and expects, and even demands immediate attention and gratification of their wants with as little effort as possible without any of the social responsibility that comes from any consideration for the greater state of society or one's position in it.
It's equivalent to littering, because, someone else will clean it up.
It's equivalent to saying "How was I suppose to know I shouldn't litter because i saw a piece of trash on the street the other day so I thought it might be okay."

If any of anyone, on a conspiracy site no less, would take the time to understand this social programming of convenience breeding this attitude of self entitlement that's so pervasive as a control mechanism with the masses, you'd take the time to stop, think, search, REsearch, consider, think again, and then post, if only out of protest against the mechanism of convenience that's being broadcast and programmed across all media vectors.

As JFK said - paraphrasing - we choose to do these things because they are hard.
Do the difficult thing. Avoid the easy path. Resist convenience.

Nothing worth having should be easy. Anything easy, or convenient should be automatically suspect.
Ever wonder why so many things are getting so much more convenient and easy year by year, gadget by gadget? You're being programmed, dumbed down, fattened, and made lazy for a reason.
Look around.

Well, I don't often bother to point out a similar thread, and if I do, I would say that it has been discussed before, and add links as a 'point of information' and for no other reason. You can often find further information this way, and it's silly to just ignore posted links, furthermore, it's only moderators who decide whether to allow concurrent, similar posts to continue, or close any later ones. and in any case you can still read them from the menu.

Anyone who posts, "It's been posted before" and nothing else, is entitled to be ignored.

Ever read something or come across something and you suddenly wish you had somebody to talk about it with? Well I often have that happen. I had it happen earlier. I wanted to come to ATS to talk about it. ATS is a forum community, not a chat community. So that means communication is more measured and not as free as chatting might be. But I guess I'm more of a chat-oriented person sometimes. I think this is why people make duplicate posts. I think that labeling this self-entitlement is a bit overdone when people are just looking for somebody to talk with about something.

This idea that everything has to be tight is very suffocating. ATS shouldn't go down that road. There's a reason that empirical studies are tight and measured. It's to ensure their integrity and professionalism. But to compare ATS to a lab like Los Alamos or to the Library of Congress is extreme somewhat, don't you think? And it's hard to restrict abstract thought or to contain it neatly. When we journey down those dark roads between rational thought and irrational thought, who says one thought has value over another? This isn't 1+1=2, is it? I think it needs a free flowing atmosphere.

Am I mistaken? Does ATS intend on restricting traffic on those dark roads? That's a formidable challenge. Imagine trying to flag down a car that's in superposition. Or a car that you can't see. One way to go about it is to stop all traffic and call in the experts to ensure that the invisible cars are checked. This way you have the best chances of spotting everyone, but even then it's hit and miss.

It that happens, these conversations won't appear on ATS anymore. They'll be in coffee shops, bars, parks, streets, chat servers, and so on, where people don't feel you breathing down their back. And you can tell yourself that ATS is better for it, but even empirical things have limits, did you know.

Originally posted by ideasarebulletproof
Yeah I got one of these. I posted a thread about a new app by Mozilla that would allow people to see who is tracking them, I called it nifty.

Then a smart guy replied with this:


"It sounded nifty the first time I read about it...
www.abovetopsecret.com...

And even the second time I read about it...
www.abovetopsecret.com... "

I just thought, 'OK, thanks for letting me know. No need to be a dick.'

It is quite obnoxious, and even more so because they think they are clever and have a big "E-Penis" which is quite pathetic in itself. lol

This is a good example. These kind of topics die, so if you weren't here to witness those threads you would be without the nifty app because you would not know to be searching for it.

reply to post by ashtonhz8907


Thing is, you don't have to know about something to be able to find it if it's already been posted.
SEARCH is just one option.

Click FORUMS of at the top of the page, choose a forum, scroll down the list of interesting titles, or, click next and scroll down that list of interesting titles, or, click a random number and scroll down that list of interesting titles.

There's tons of fascinating subjects and conversations to discover this way. SEARCH is only one way to find things. To say 'I didn't know' is ignorance, since that very lack of knowing is the definition of ignorance.
The process of denying that ignorance would thus involve the tools supplied by this board by either using the SEARCH feature, or, clicking an interesting FORUM then browsing topics.

reply to post by Raivan31


I used to be pretty sharp on the Internet and quite speedy with posting new topics - somehow I was ahead of the curve - maybe I still am, but not today - so I started a Tumblr account Darkbake Reports (which is empty right now) in case I want to write about something that has already been covered...