Merging vs Closing, ... Options

[orgasm]

Um... I noticed a lot of threads are getting closed and the mod just posts a link, implying that the topic's already been made sometime in the past.

But if they already made the effort to find the older topic, wouldn't it make more sense to just MERGE the two topics instead of closing everything?

IDK... just something I noticed...

[Simba]

Well, usually if the new topic doesn't really get that many replies or there aren't that many posts in the older topic, we close the new one. But if there's already discussion in the new topic or the original topic already has a lot of posts or is really old, we leave the new one open.

[*Zatanna*]

As AC has pointed out, whether or not we close or merge topics is subjective. If there are a number of topics that pertain to the same subject, such as all the Harry Potter topics that get created periodically, most likely the new ones will get closed. If someone makes a new topic that has already been created and has some good responses ("there's a thread already like this" types of replies are not what we'd consider good responses) most likely that will get merged.

If a thread you create is closed because one similar has already been created, just PM the mod and ask for it to be re-opened and then merged. It's more than likely that a mod will be more than willing to do so. It is also much simpler to re-open a closed thread then merge it than to merge a thread and then have to close it.

[smoke]

I only merge if the new one is 2-3 pages long. Otherwise it's pretty much pointless.

[*mipadi*]

Of course, an exception would be if the topic in question is more than a year old, and the newest reply is also from that time.

So what happens then? Just leave the newer one open?