Honestly, if we cut Bitches and Natter, I'd leave the board. Not that the Stompies should make a decision based on me, but this isn't just a board where people talk about some cool show -- it's evolved into a community.

We had to create Natter *because* the board become more of a community than just a talk-about-Buffy place.

Bitches has become its own subcommunity, in the same way that Atlantic Canadians has.

Numberslutting was a waste of valuable board space.

Yes. This. For God's sake, it drives me batshit to see people taking up 8 posts in a row to try to get to some number.

I do have to say that at this point killing natter and bitches will basically kill the Buffistas.

Cutting out Natter and Bitches would be like cutting off someone's head to treat a brain tumor. Those two threads are the heart of this board. Remove them, and we might as well close up shop.

Yes. This. I don't think it's just me. I think people would be really upset.

If it's that bad, why don't we just go back to PeoplesForum?

Before we have 20 more posts defending Natter and Bitches, I think from my reading of both lightbulb and this thread, the conclusion was already reached that Natter and Bitches are us. We came for the Buffy - stayed for the Natter, sort of feeling overcame most of the posters.

I don't think anyone is still seriously proposing that they be eliminated.

Kat's latest propsed cuts are here.

And because I'm all about me, my latest suggested cuts are here

thread, the conclusion was already reached that Natter and Bitches are us. We came for the Buffy - stayed for the Natter, sort of feeling overcame most of the posters.

I don't think anyone is still seriously proposing that they be eliminated.

Really? Because I just finished Lightbulbs, and I got the feeling that there are people still seriously proposing it, and who would, in fact, do it today if they could escape Death By Bitches.

Cindy, the refresh time is counted in seconds, not minutes.

That's not it.

Right now I'm worried that all this discussion of extreme measures is contributing to a panicky tone.

Code changes have been made. More will be made when fresher eyes than mine have looked at it.

And who knows? A dedicated server may very well be possible, and solve the problem.

I know some of the operations HR couldn't run on their box can run on my lame 512MB PC at home -- a lame dedicated server indeed.

I think we were a strain on Peoplesforum, too.

Though they are huge, I don't think cutting out Natter or Bitches is right. They are where the community happens for the most part.

If we're going to take drastic measures, why not get rid of all the quotable threads? Couldn't the quotes just go in the main threads?

Other madcap suggestions:

COMM, as much as I love it, is just reposting from elsewhere -- if we seriously need to cut down on threads, that's a prime candidate for chopping.

Could the F2F thread be closed until there's planning for the official F2F. Smaller individual F2F could be planned via email on even in Natter.

Close Minearverse until Wonderfalls actually premieres.

Oh, and one more thing, on the Briney, the admins have made the thread lengths pretty small (2,000 for light traffic threads and 5,000 for larger threads) to save on hits to the server. Would that help us any?

the admins have made the thread lengths pretty small (2,000 for light traffic threads and 5,000 for larger threads) to save on hits to the server. Would that help us any?

Nope, not if we keep closed threads in the database.

Nope, not if we keep closed threads in the database.

What if we don't? What if we have 5,000 post threads, and archive them a week after they close?

What if we don't archive at all?

I think archiving closed threads promptly (say, after 1 week) makes a LOT of sense, whatever that's worth.