Why does MacRumors create dupe threads?

[tobefirst]

Can someone clue me into the reason why there is a need for a new thread for front page stories that talk about things that the community is already talking about?

2 scenarios:
1. Forum member beats the editors to a story and starts a thread. Then the editors post the story, effectively creating two threads on the same subject, which I haven't seen merged very often.

2. There was this thread from the iPhone blog which, again, created it's own thread. The blog post was about the forum thread!

I totally understand wanting to put the last one on the blog, but why not just link to the existing thread? Why couldn't the MacRumors posts just fall inline (chronologically) into the discussion?

Is this a conscious thing (of having a separate thread for the post), or is it just that it isn't being combined, or what's the deal?

 

[arn]

2 scenarios:
1. Forum member beats the editors to a story and starts a thread. Then the editors post the story, effectively creating two threads on the same subject, which I haven't seen merged very often.

2. There was this thread from the iPhone blog which, again, created it's own thread. The blog post was about the forum thread!

#2 was a mistake. It was supposed to link into the existing thread. (has since been fixed).

#1. We merge threads when notified. Threads are often merged together when there are duplicates.

So, bottom line, there shouldn't be duplicate threads, ideally.

arn

 

[tobefirst]

Thanks for your reply, arn. I didn't know if it was a policy thing or what. I'll report the threads from now on so that they can be combined.

 

[WildCowboy]

I frequently merge existing threads into newly-posted news threads, but I don't spot all of the duplicates. So yes, please report them.

If you look at the index pages for the news discussion forums, you'll see a number of threads started by people other than MacRumors. The vast majority of these are because existing threads were merged in.

 

[Doctor Q]

Occasionally, an existing thread isn't appropriate to serve as the discussion for a front page news story, so we may post cross-reference links and/or close the other thread. The goal is to do whatever will best facilitate the discussion.

Merging is still the first choice of action, and it lets the post originator get proper "credit" for starting the thread.