No disagreement. The only issue is that a new poster may not be aware that the person they think they're helping may have resolved their issue long ago &/or may not have visited the forum in a very long time & won't see their reply.
And this often (not always) is at least partly because the person doesn't read ALL of the replies, something that is not restricted to new folks. There are often replies that are duplicates or ignore several things in an earlier post in the same thread, just because they didn't read it all.
What, a long running thread on Tire PressureWay back when, our longest-running thread was on the subject of TP. For years the subject would either be replied to or started fresh, and folks would say "oh no, not again"
Granted, it's not a big deal, but there's not much point in asking a question of the OP or giving direct advice to the OP on a problem that is 2-3 years old. However, general comments or advice on the problem type may still be useful to others who are researching a similar problem. So, yeah, there's nothing wrong in replying to an ancient thread, but the content of the reply should take the age into consideration. And most of us don't realize that the information is dated until we have already replied.
The first to reply to such a message are always the FNGs. That is because they can see every message in the forum by default, unlike the rest of us who only see newer messages.
This is true, but if you happen to be the FNG and click on a thread it will take you to the first page of said thread. At that point you're on Page #1, and if you don't notice that there are 37 pages of replies and look to see what the original post date is then there is no help for you.
Spammers don't care
Very true, but I think we're mostly referring to actual newbies replying to a 5-year-old post.Spammers don't care
Sure, but the 37th and last page can still be ten years old. Such as these 41 pages from 2010.
You'd think but often it's a spammer who gets in. Others reply then spammer removed so you might not notice.Very true, but I think we're mostly referring to actual newbies replying to a 5-year-old post.
He passed away a few years ago Don.
I almost didn't ask because I was afraid to get such a reply.
Ned passed away in 2016. See this thread:
If you're new and you never clicked on a subject before, it will take you to Page #1. That's when I try to remember to look at that date on that first page, and if it's 8 years old and there are 37 more pages following it I'm just going to skip it because it isn't relevant anymore and I certainly don't have time to read every single multi-page post on the entire forum.
Just curious if you occasionally click on Mark Forum Read (below the red menu line)?
I think the last time I marked any forum read was when I first got here. When I join a forum I will cherry pick for a while if there is a feature like "today's posts" so I can get a flavor of what's going on. Then I mark the whole forum read.
