Reply To: The Random Post Thread (Game Potential)
Angelastic: That thread is explicitly for what this thread has turned into. There’s a bit of ambiguity, I see now, in the wording of “open thread” — to “open” or “reopen” a thread, as a verb, means to start it (or restart it); threads that have been opened (i.e. started) may certainly be closed in Vanilla (well, I can do it, at least). The name “open thread”, however, is Internet argot (pretty common in my experience, at least) for “thread that doesn’t have to be about any subject in particular.”
(There was a time, believe it or not, when most of the non-JoCo-related content in the forums could be more or less limited to one thread…)
Specifically, the backstory is that that mass extinction of threads was caused by the Great Backup Disaster of Aught-Seven, which wiped out about a month of forum data. (The blog posts and comments were restored, eventually, but the forum data proved too hard to retrieve.) Every thread opened during that time, including the original Open Thread, was, hmm, extinguished. Hence the first question in the thread was, which threads that have disappeared should be reopened (i.e. started again)?
As I’ve said before, I find the actual general discussion that’s started in this thread much more rewarding than the thread’s original stated purpose of “random unconnected posts” — that’s why I haven’t bothered to shepherd everyone back to the Open Thread, which I may as well close since its functions are being served by this thread.
ETA: Although the idea of a “closed Open Thread” still amuses me, I’ve decided to “sink” it, which means that new posts in that thread won’t bump it to the front page.