Questions about the forum mechanisms + suggestions for topics titles

[GazetaBitcoin]

Hello,

During the time spent here I encountered a few aspects for which I need a little help in order to understand them, as it follows:
- what is "nuking an account"? I saw many time this expression but I couldn't find any answer;
- how does work "Total time logged in"? I presume that when opening a topic page (thread, for example), after the page is displayed, the time counter counts the time for a certain amount of seconds. Practically, if you remain on that page (and you don't press Alt+Tab), the time counter won't count a long amount of time, although the same page is displayed. I believe the time counter counts only a few seconds (30 for example), then, in order to have a bigger logged in time, it is needed to navigate to another forum page. II wonder what is the time counted (in seconds or in minutes) after opening a forum page;
- what is "autoban"? For this term I also couldn't find a clarification yet;
- why is the custom in Meta section to close the topics? I understand the intention to reduce the spam, but, however, I didn't observe this custom in local sections, for example, nor in other sections. If the only intention is to reduce the spam, why isn't this custom applied also in other sections?;
- is it possible to unfollow a thread where you posted a reply? If yes, how?

Besides the questions, I'd like to add two suggestions for the topics titles:
- maybe it would be helpful to have more characters available for the topics titles, as sometimes is hard to fit in the actual space with what you want to write as a title, especially when a complex name is needed. In this case, most likely, the topic title would be a vague one, as is this topic's title. If there would be more characters available in the title, maybe this would help several cases of complex titles.
- a second suggestion regards the way a topic title should look like. I know there are topics on this matters (eg. theymos' thread or tranthidung's thread). However, besides the guidelines from those two threads, I would suggest to use a common sense practice, which I'm calling "the 3Ws rule".

The 3Ws rule means the following: construct the title having in mind to precisely describe what, who (if needed) and (if needed) where. Example: "Selling 1 BTC in Amsterdam". "Selling" is the answer for "what", "I" is the answer for "who" (the "I" is implied in the topic title) and "in Amsterdam" is the answer for "where".

Thank you.

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[rosezionjohn]

- what is "nuking an account"? I saw many time this expression but I couldn't find any answer;

It's like banned account with all of the users posts deleted by forum admin or mod. Nuked only applies to newbie accounts

- how does work "Total time logged in"? -snip-

How about simply the accumulation of time you are online and the counter starts upon logging in?

- what is "autoban"? For this term I also couldn't find a clarification yet;

It only means a user is permanently banned by moderators. Do not be confused by the "auto".

- why is the custom in Meta section to close the topics? I understand the intention to reduce the spam, but, however, I didn't observe this custom in local sections, for example, nor in other sections. If the only intention is to reduce the spam, why isn't this custom applied also in other sections?;

- is it possible to unfollow a thread where you posted a reply? If yes, how?

By default, you are not getting any notification from the replies you made.

[OmegaStarScream]

Since the user above managed to answer most of the questions:

2. The counter actually increases by 15 minutes and then you automatically become inactive until you refresh the page. So If you just visit a thread, go inactive for a few minutes, then refresh the page, you will see that your total time logged in increased by 15mn.

4. I don't get it either. If you mean the ability to close topics, then that's something you could do in the other sections as well.

5. You should start using the Watchlist instead of "Show new replies to your posts", which can be easily edited: https://bitcointalk.org/watchlist.php

[DdmrDdmr]

what is "nuking an account"?

Answered above. In addition, nuked accounts get all their posts deleted, so they effectively become Brand New in the process.

- how does work "Total time logged in

It represents the amount of time the profile has been logged in. It does not seem like a very relevant factor to consider, and there is quite a blur as to the exact calculation procedure. Presumably it should count the time the session is active, although some accounts seem to have boosted that number artificially, perhaps by loggin-in multiple bot accounts 24/7 (some of those figure in the forum stats as those most time online.

- what is "autoban"?

You will find the autoban term used in the Modlog, representing banned users by mods.

So... this user claims to have been given a reason:

I only changed the message on autobans. ("Autoban" = lingo indicating a type of ban. They're usually not actually automatic.) <…>

- why is the custom in Meta section to close the topics?

People do not really make a habit of locking topics to prevent additional spam trailing posts. Perhaps Meta does that a bit more due to the fact that the people that roam there more aware of this, but even so. I doubt that a generalized habit of locking topics would really lead to less spam. Probably to more topics being opened.

-is it possible to unfollow a thread where you posted a reply? If yes, how?

Yes. You need to Edit your watchlist.

- maybe it would be helpful to have more characters available for the topics titles, as sometimes is hard to fit in the actual space with what you want to write as a title <…>

I doubt that it will happen. I find that happening to me, more so if the OP is in Spanish than in English. Rephrasing it a bit normally does de thick, performing some synthesizing.

[SFR10]

- maybe it would be helpful to have more characters available for the topics titles, as sometimes is hard to fit in the actual space with what you want to write as a title, especially when a complex name is needed.

Having more characters in the subject field of a thread might break the table ^{[to an extent]} or end up with an unpleasant look (threads displayed as two/three lines while viewed from each board ^{[depending on your screen resolution]}).

• DdmrDdmr's suggestion, usually works but you can also use an ellipsis (... ^{[triple dots]}) instead.

[GazetaBitcoin]

Thank you all for the detailed explanations.

I finally understood now the counter for total time logged in - 15 minutes Thx OmegaStarScream! I was sure the session is detected a active only a few minutes, I just didn't know how many. I use to keep myself connected 24/7, but I never saw after 1 day of being online to have the counter raised also with 1 day. So you should navigate from a page to another at maximum 15 minutes in order to keep that counter ticking. I know it's an irrelevant information, but it was a big curiosity of mine

Everything clear about the autoban and unfollowing threads where I posted using the Watchlist. Thx rosezionjohn, DdmrDdmr!

About nuking I understood from DdmrDdmr that the users become Brand New as they have their posts deleted. However, I didn't understand why rosezionjohn said that nuking applies only to Newbies. A Full Member / Hero account can't (technically) be nuked and by having all its posts deleted, to turn the respective account into a Brand New one? This measure (nuking) applies only to Newbies? And if yes, why?

About the custom to close the topics, indeed, when I said "custom", I meant the... how to say... the "habit" from Meta to have the topics closed, not the ability itself to close them. I know this is possible in other section as well, technically speaking. And I agree with Ddmr - closing topics may lead to opening new ones, so the I'm not sure if this "procedure" helps avoiding spam, if that was the idea behind this habit. I guess we have to stick with the respective custom in Meta, as many have this idea in mind - to close the topics after the questions are answered After all, where you go somewhere, you have to follow the customs from the respective place.

Finally, about the length of topics titles, thank you Ddmr and SFR10 for the suggestions. I think I'll follow your advice, although I personally prefer to have a crystal clear topic title, thus everyone to understand what it is about straight from reading the title. But in cases like current topic, where several subjects are discussed, this is really impossible. I'll try to do my best in the future for such cases, and, in the end, I will write "[...]" if I just run out of characters.

Thank you all once again, I appreciate!

[SFR10]

A Full Member / Hero account can't (technically) be nuked and by having all its posts deleted, to turn the respective account into a Brand New one?

No, everything should be done manually for higher ranks.

- Some ranks used to be immortal against demotion but that's no longer the case:

IIRC only Newbie, Hero, and Legendary members don't get demoted normally. Maybe I'll fix it at some point, but it's not really a big deal.

e.g. The following account is no longer a "Hero Member":

I also saw a user: mkr with 15 posts and Hero Member (Archive: http://archive.is/ijaTy)

Profile Link : https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?action=profile;u=216331 (Still Hero)

This measure (nuking) applies only to Newbies? And if yes, why?

Correct. It is meant for fighting against spambots:

Nuke removes all of a users posts/threads and bans them (spambots).

[DdmrDdmr]

<…> About nuking I understood from DdmrDdmr that the users become Brand New as they have their posts deleted. However, I didn't understand why rosezionjohn said that nuking applies only to Newbies. A Full Member / Hero account can't (technically) be nuked and by having all its posts deleted, to turn the respective account into a Brand New one? This measure (nuking) applies only to Newbies? And if yes, why? <…>

As far as I’m aware, nuking indeed applies only to Newbie accounts. I don’t know the reasons, but it may have to do with Jr. Member rank being reached before with simply 30 Activity (no Merit requirement initially), and that most nuked accounts were so due to garbage posts. Technically though, one can demote his own account by deleting posts, since post deletion may reduce the Activity counter, and this his own rank. Some people do that when cleansing their posting history for one reason or another.

I keep track of 314 merited (earned) accounts that have been de-ranked due to this practice (likely many more unmerited accounts too, but I do not keep track of those):
https://public.tableau.com/shared/3ZMNHR9J4?:display_count=y&:origin=viz_share_link

The cases that stand out more are those of a Legendary demoted to Member (there’s another one de-ranked to Full Member, and yet another one to Sr. Member), and even a Hero to Band New (what a waste)…

[GazetaBitcoin]

I understood now also about the nuking! Thank you both!

However, there is something unusual about the Watchlist, as far as I can see... I'll detail below:
1. I started with the question how to unfollow topics where you previously posted. Why? Because I use "Show replies to your posts" and I observed that there are listed all the topics where you previously posted, in case new replies were posted in the respective threads. It seemed that if I write inside a topic, I'm automatically subscribed to any new replies created in the respective topic, fact reflected by showing that topic again and again under "Show new replies to your posts". And I didn't want to see some of the updated topics where I previously posted something. For example, I posted once in the "Freebitco.in win a Lamborghini Huracan" topic, asking how I can delete my account. I found out this thing is impossible, but since then, so many replies appear in that thread and I keep seeing it in the "Show Replies to your posts" link (which I used to use prior you mentioned me the Watchlist). I'm not interested in seeing again and again that new replies appeared in that topic, as the only reason I wrote inside it was to find out if I can delete my account from their site.

2. Afterwards, you mentioned the Watchlist, and initially I thought there appear also all the topics where I previously posted. I thought it works the same way as "Show new replies to your posts". Thus, when I clicked on Watchlist, I expected to see there all the topics where I posted at least once, fact which automatically subscribed me to them (take into consideration that, as I never used Watchlist before, I also never added a topic to my Watchlist). However, I don't see in the Watchlist all the topics where I previously posted, but only some of them. For example, the Freebitco.in topic doesn't appear in Watchlist, although it appears (when new replies are made) in the "Show new replies to your posts".

3. From 1. and 2. I suspect that either the respective two forum features work differently, or one of them is buggy (I think the Watchlist). Why do I think that Watchlist is buggy? Because I never used it until yesterday, but, however, there were several topics listed under my Watchlist. Nobody added them there; they appeared there at my first usage of Watchlist. So a possible bug is that Watchlist adds in a curious manner some topics, without user's action. Another one would be, in case Watch list is supposed to work exactly as "Show new replies to your posts", that it actually doesn't work the same way. Because in the "Show new replies to your posts" appear all the topics where you previously posted, in case others wrote new replies, but in Watchlist don't appear all the topics where you posted.

4. Of course, there is another possibility as well, meaning that I didn't understand yet how the Watchlist actually works (and there are heavy chances to be this way).

But even so, if 4. is the correct answer, then I still don't know to unfollow a thread where you previously posted, to be more precise how to make that the respective topic won't be listed anymore under "Show new replies to your posts" (in case other users wrote inside those topics).

Also, why do I see some topics in the Watchlist if I never used it before?

Any idea about this behavior of the respective two forum features?

[DdmrDdmr]

<...>

The watchlist I believe was added after the notification feature, and have common terrain. I’m really not too fluent with tuning them, as I barely use anything other than the default behaviour on them myself. Nevertheless, take a look at the following:

increase your potential with the Watchlist and Notification Feature!   
Watchlist (origins)

If the topic you are trying to remove is not on the watchlist, then it is probably on the Notification configuration tab (https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?action=profile;sa=notification). You can click on an entry to unsubscribe.

[bitmover]

4. Of course, there is another possibility as well, meaning that I didn't understand yet how the Watchlist actually works (and there are heavy chances to be this way).

As you said you are using watchlist only since yesterday , you clearly didn't understand it.

But even so, if 4. is the correct answer, then I still don't know to unfollow a thread where you previously posted, to be more precise how to make that the respective topic won't be listed anymore under "Show new replies to your posts" (in case other users wrote inside those topics).

Also, why do I see some topics in the Watchlist if I never used it before?

Any idea about this behavior of the respective two forum features?

Based on my experience, you should ignore Show New Replies completely. This is bugged IMO and completely abandoned. Every topic you ever posted will keep showing there, and this makes absolutely no sense imo.

Watchlist in the other hand is not bugged. Everything I am going to say now is based on my experience using the watchlist daily for nearly 2 years.
Watchlist works much more like a feed, as far as I could understand it. You can add boards and topics (if they are not in the boards you are watching) to your watchlist. Also, any topic you write will automatically goes to your watchlist (I am almost sure about this, but not 100%).

However, every topic that goes to your watchlist is going to be removed soon from there. When you click a topic in your watchlist it disappears from there, until someone posts again.

Additionally, watchlist is a list of "hot topics".Only topics which had a recent activity are gong to show up there. You won't be seeing topics which the last reply was 3 months ago (like the Show New Replies). The oldest reply in my watchlist is from 15/12, which is yesterday.

I think watchlist is an amazing tool if you use it properly, this is how I keep myself informed of all important (imo) discussions in the forum.

[SFR10]

I still don't know to unfollow a thread where you previously posted, to be more precise how to make that the respective topic won't be listed anymore under "Show new replies to your posts" (in case other users wrote inside those topics).

There's a workaround but it ignores topics by their respective boards:

• Go to Profile > Ignore Boards Preferences ^{[under Modify Profile]} > Tick the appropriate board/s > Click Change profile button > You no longer see threads that you've posted in from those boards on "Show new replies to your posts.".

Take note of the following:

Be advised that by ignoring a board it will be completely inaccessible to you

[Upgrade00]

...

This would work, but I doubt the OP would want to ignore a board which they just recently posted in. AFAIK, there is no other option for removing a topic you posted in from your "show new replies to your posts" list.
I sometimes follow up threads directly through my replies list linking directly to the thread (I just assume new replies would have been added after a while).
Piggy's notification bot is also a convenient way to keep up with threads.

[DdmrDdmr]

<…> Piggy's notification bot is also a convenient way to keep up with threads.

More than threads per se, Piggy’s notification bot is meant to notify you whenever you are mentioned on any post in the forum. Unfortunately, the bot seems to have stopped working over the past four days, and there is no news on the matter.

Some people are in the process of developing or enhancing their other alternative solutions. As far as I’m aware there is:

-   Going back to the forum’s search engine, parametrizing the search  (i.e. username and variations + last 2 days + sort by most recent topic first -> + refresh every now and then manually). This is what I'm doing for now.

-    [WORKING] LoyceV's alternative for Piggy's @mention notification bot

-    [TelegramBot] Merit watcher and Mention Bot

[GazetaBitcoin]

Thank you bitmover, SFR10, Upgrade00 and DdmrDdmr.

Indeed, as Upgrade00 already said, I don't want to ignore boards completely. Just some topics where I posted previously, which keep appearing in the "Show unread posts since last visit" link. Apparently, there is no such option though, so I have to stick with this or to use only Watchlist.

As a issue of note, I saw two buttons at each topic - "Watch" / "Unwatch". I selected to unwatch the Lamborghini Huracan thread and I see it didn't appear anymore on the "Show replies to your posts" link. I'll try to do the same with another topic which I don't want to appear in that link anymore and I'll let you know.

Maybe I just found a workaround?

[LoyceV]

However, I don't see in the Watchlist all the topics where I previously posted, but only some of them.

This is really all there is to it:

I don't understand why anyone would not use the watchlist. You can configure the watchlist to be exactly the same as "show new replies to your posts" by configuring your posts to be auto-watched and adding your posted-in topics to your watchlist. After this is done, you can unwatch topics that you don't want to see.

Since I found this post from theymos, I stopped using "Show new replies to your posts.".

[o_e_l_e_o]

Since I found this post from theymos, I stopped using "Show new replies to your posts.".

Yeah, this is the best way to do it. I've pretty much never used "Show new replies to your posts", as it very rapidly turned in to a mess, even within a few weeks of signing up to the forum. Pretty much any thread on boards such as Bitcoin Discussion will turn in to a spam megathread given enough time, and I definitely don't want to be alerted to every piece of one line nonsense for the rest of time.

Just set it up to automatically add all posted-in threads to your watchlist, and then unwatch the ones you don't want to follow anymore.

[GazetaBitcoin]

Thanks for sharing your opinions as well, o_e_l_e_o and LoyceV! I'm going to give a try to Watchlist.
However, if the workaround mentioned above works, I think I'll stick with "Show replies to your posts", because I'm used to it. But we'll see

[GazetaBitcoin]

I am revamping this old thread of mine as I just find out, by pure chance, an official answer, from Staff, to one of my questions.

- why is the custom in Meta section to close the topics? I understand the intention to reduce the spam, but, however, I didn't observe this custom in local sections, for example, nor in other sections. If the only intention is to reduce the spam, why isn't this custom applied also in other sections?

I've been making an active effort to lock threads in meta once they have reached a conclusion. If anyone has any reason why the thread should be unlocked, you are welcome to request that it be unlocked, and I'll happily do so. But Meta is one of those sections that spammers feel that they can hide their spam, and be outraged when their posts are deleted under the guise of "this is supposed to be a special section about the forum!".