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

What if we have 5,000 post threads, and archive them a week after they close?

That would make a difference.

But I'd recommend heartily against changing everything all at once. We'd never know what made a difference, and what was just panic.

We're blessed with the ability to talk with our web hosts. Let's take advantage of this, and tweak, and do this strategically..

From what Kristen is saying, it sounds like the problem is serious. So IMO, it's perfectly legit to discuss our options so, at the least, we'd be ready to go right away if we have to. And, while I may misunderstand the sitch, we need to at least discuss serious measures. And our dreams of having the exact board we want is up against the technical limits.

A lot of the ideas are good and necessary (I've disabled my auto-refresh). But how much good will they do? Enough? It sounds like even the experts don't know. Maybe it isn't knowable until we actually put things into effect.

So I'd suggest that if it proves necessary, and other measures have failed, as a last resort, we ditch Natter, Bitches, and Un-American, to be replaced by a completely new thread, to make it clear that no one thread is swallowing up the others. Call it Cocktail Party, or something like that.

I don't think it's been proved necessary yet, and I hope it will never be necessary. But I'll toss it onto the table as a compromise measure.

(Edit to note that this xposts everything since Teppy's post #4449, and to re-emphasize that I'm not suggesting we do this now. And much as I enjoy COMM, I'd be willing to live without it.)

But I feel like, They Can Pry Bitches From My Cold, Dead Hands,

Yes.

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.

And hell, yes.

This could be a great way of cutting down board use, though, because if Bitches goes or is merged with Natter, I'll be out of here, and I think this could be true of a good few other people. So that could solve things. I'd regret the hell out of it, myself, because I love the place to pieces, but I guess there's always LJ.

(And forgive me, I forget who asked, but, yes, there is a difference between Bitches and Natter. There's an overlap of people and themes and suchlike, but it's two different environments with different atmospheres.)

See, that's why I feel discussing the worst case scenarios (well, near worst) isn't doing as much benefit as it might.

For every "let's ditch Bitches/Natter" or "lets do odd days only", even if said lightly, a hackle somewhere twitches up, a bit, and it gets tenser.

Not usefully tenser, either.

Anyway, enough of what might look like topic nannying.

Possible changes are being tested right now. New people are looking at the code. Changes have been implemented.

And I will lead a fundraising charge myself, to prevent Natter/Bitches being closed. But Allyson and Sean will have to take forks to the neck as a fundraising event.

But I'd recommend heartily against changing everything all at once. We'd never know what made a difference, and what was just panic.

Agreed. One of the first rules of problem solving is to try not to change too many variables at once. The best way is to change one variable at a time and see how that goes. For example, we have yet to see whether removing the random quotes has made a difference, and if so, how big a difference. We think it will, but we have no proof yet, and whatever the result of that change is will effect the things we have to look at for further changes.

But do you think it would be worthwhile, right now, to put a post in Press asking people to (a) turn off auto-refresh and (b) cut down on the number of one-line/content-free posts they make? Unless we just want to get rid of auto-refresh completely -- I mean, really, people can't hit the refresh button when they're ready to see if there are new posts? IJS.

Edit: My point being that both of those things are relatively painless, and one of them would make the board a better place anyway, IMO.

Question: Are we sure "O minutes refresh" works the way it's supposed. I've always been leery of it. I know it is supposed to mean it won't refresh. I've never been confident that it would work, so instead, I set mine to 30 minutes, because I don't stay on message center anyhow, even if I have two windows open to b.org.

And I will lead a fundraising charge myself, to prevent Natter/Bitches being closed. But Allyson and Sean will have to take forks to the neck as a fundraising event.

And hell yeah. I bet we could all frigging retire.

put a post in Press asking people to (a) turn off auto-refresh

If we think it's a good idea to turn off auto-refresh, then it should be turned off in the coding. It's a simple change to make.

Question: Are we sure "O minutes refresh" works the way it's supposed.

Yes.