What's the Dump?

[The Glyphstone]

Sorry if this is a taboo subject...

I saw a thread in Friendly Banter which, from its title, was definitely off board-rules - it was locked and moved to "The Dump", a board I had never heard of and was forbidden to access. I know threads can be deleted outright, so if this was too much to be simply locked, but not enough for outright deletion, then, what's the Dump? Secret mod-training forum? Repository of locked threads for mods to laugh at? ???

[Rawhide]

On a message board I ran, we used a similar forum as a repository of rubbish threads. The mods could then discuss and decide their fate (ie. deletion, warning, ban, etc. etc.).

[The Prince of Cats]

In one place I mod, we have 'The Gallery'...

Mind you, it was a visible (if locked) board where we put all of the worst offenders. Flames, excess bitching, text-slang... (yes, we would ban people for using txtspk or l337)

I think most boards have one, just somewhere to put the worst threads.

[Samiam303]

I was wondering the same thing... Anyway, whatever it is, it's pretty funny... ;)

[RawBearNYC]

It's a moderator only forum for parking threads we need to look at but the moderator who put it there thought it should be out of the public eye.

[WampaX]

It's a moderator only forum for parking threads we need to look at but the moderator who put it there thought it should be out of the public eye.

Or the boards are haunted and, from time to time, the departed souls of the banned rise from their text files and drag another not-so-innocent thread into the firewall pit we call The Dump.

Take your pick.

[Samiam303]

It's a moderator only forum for parking threads we need to look at but the moderator who put it there thought it should be out of the public eye.
But what's the point in not just deleting them if they can't be viewed by non-mods? I guess it's for stuff that may prompt further action by mods?

[WampaX]

But what's the point in not just deleting them if they can't be viewed by non-mods? I guess it's for stuff that may prompt further action by mods?

It gives us a sealed off environment to "work over" the thread without further outside interference.

[RawBearNYC]

we can also opt to move questionable threads back.

[The Prince of Cats]

If, I am reading this right, thy are doing something I do sometimes. Once a thread is moved to the hidden forum, it can be editted and cleaned up before moving it back to where it started.

Deleting a thread is one thing but sometimes they are quite good threads that just went bad because someone started adding personal attacks into otherwise sensible posts.

E.g. Overnight (because all the mods are in the same timezone in this example) a troll and a foreign poster get into a long argument in a thread while other people are also posting sensible replies and just ignoring (or remarking in passing on) the two trouble-makers.
In the morning, the mods need to go through the thread and remove the offending posts. They decide it will only take ten minutes but they still want it off the board while they fix it.

Another example would be separating the offending posts by edits to the database until you have one thread of stupidity to go into the Gallery of Idiots (examples of what not to do) and the original thread goes back to where it belongs.