Necroposting

[Kirethorn]

I know discretion should be used to determine if a thread is too old to be helpful to anyone anymore, even if your info blows everyone elses out of the water; but what is the general guide on how long a thead has to lie dormant before you shouldn't post in it?

[Derian]

There really isn't.

If you have a question that can be posted in a thread that already exists and wasn't answered somewhere else, by all means, post in the dead thread.

If someone asked a question and the thread hasn't had any posts for a month or more, you don't need to bump the thread to answer the question; they've probably already figured it out or forgotten about it.

Also, if you're (not the OP specifically, this applies to everyone) going to post in a months dead thread to say something that's been said a million times in that thread or to say "wow cool" or some other such nonsense, a pox upon your house.

[Droma]

What Derian said

If you find you want to put your $0.02 in go for it

[Big King Jimmy]

If someone asks a question, and the thread dies, (I'd say even after 2 weeks) it might be better to PM the original poster and ask if he ever got an answer, and if he hasn't offer one.

The way I look at this is like this: threads are conversations. If you're sitting around with your friends you might ask them all a question, but no one has an answer. Now time passes, everyone is kind of milling about, having their own conversations, you wouldn't get everyone's attention (which is what posting in a thread does) and say "Hey, I think I have an answer!" you'd just walk up to him and say "hey, did you get an answer?" just like a pm.

Thinking about things like this, in terms of "how would I handle this in conversation?" usually helps me not zombie posts.