What is this ‘You might also like’ clutter?

Example 3 of my day:

Adult children, rent and cooking

Thread from August. A new poster has just come along and asked her own brand new question and restarted the whole thread. From August.

Maybe it's a MN rouse to help members get stuff done. I have never been so productive since all this 'you might also like'/invitation to reanimate zombie threads 'upgrade' was installed and made the site so irritating.

Oohhh goody it's that time of year again
it's Justine mansplaining to us all how we are all too stupid to understand why we don't understand why the latest crock of shit HQ have come up isn't the BEST THING EVER
comes round quicker and quicker
already had it for the new format earlier this year and here we are again
maybe we could have themed pyjamas and justine eve boxes themed specially for it

Yes, that was kind of the point I was making, hence the 'confused' emoji.

There are already many plant apps for that. And thousands of books. And posting a photo of your plant in the hope that one of the experienced gardeners and houseplant experts on MN can identify it for you. In any case, there are over 300,000 species of plants, and countless hybrids and varieties. And almost all of the time, the plant looks different depending on the time of year. You could look at all the 'Plant ID' threads ever created and never find the one thing you want.

i don't think the way to deal with this is to deliberately sabotage the boards. Why create even more harm and frustration to MNers than has already been dished out.

Frustrating as it is, and this has been the most ill-conceived new feature ever launched on here, not least of all the lack of recognition that it just doesn't work no matter how much they try to tinker round the edges with it, there's no need to be spiteful.

I also get this thread as a recommendation (again not relevant and a zombie from March) but also potentially upsetting given the nature of the topic

www.mumsnet.com/talk/conception/4502547-No-line-progression-in-48hrs-worrying

On this thread
www.mumsnet.com/talk/am_i_being_unreasonable/4681576-that-theyve-been-gone-over-an-hour
Where a mother is worried that her husband and young kids have not returned from a walk...

This thread is suggested
www.mumsnet.com/talk/coronavirus/4458919-Faintest-of-lines-just-after-the-30-minute-mark
From January. About covid testing.
Totally irrelevant and unhelpful

To be fair, it's the weekend.

I wouldn't expect any of the decision making staff to be at work and prioritising this on a Saturday or Sunday.

The message is loud and clear, but I will summarise for MNHQ

users do not like this feature
users do not want this feature
if the feature is meant to assist new users, everyone else wants to be able to opt out of it
the positioning of the feature onscreen is intrusive and annoying

the reasons for this are:
the crude algorithm renders the feature useless
the feature consistently brings up zombie threads
the prominence of the feature is highly annoying as most people don’t want to use it

And of course, the question that has been asked so many times, but remains unanswered:

if the feature is so good and is wanted by so many, then why does it not appear on Site Stuff?

The thread title is 'Plant ID', which happens to be a really common thread title in the gardening topic, as you might expect.

I can't even begin to imagine how a random (new) user to MN would stumble across the site with such a generic thread title, let alone why they would stick around long enough to click other random threads with the same title and different plants.

Yet apparently this is exactly why the new feature was implemented...

Perhaps the idea is you can wander round your garden logged into MN identifying various different plants, if you don't already know what they are?

There's a thread in the Gardening topic at the moment from somebody posting a photo and asking for help in identifying what the unusual plant is.
The thread title is 'Plant ID', which happens to be a really common thread title in the gardening topic, as you might expect.

The suggested threads at the bottom read:

Plant ID
Plant id
Plant id help
Plant ID

I mean - what are the chances that any of those are going to be even remotely approaching anything that resembles it?

Answer - 0% . I checked.

Isn't it just.

I'm honestly getting so fed up with having a few minutes to spare and spending it inevitably clicking on out of date threads. I can't even just use the threads I'm on feature properly to check on updates to recent threads as anything that's been resurrected now pings to the top.

It’s very tempting @LookItsMeAgain …

I've a suggestion - Why don't the existing posters, the long term posters, search the boards for the most idiotic and unrelatable posts and resurrect them? Go back years if you can, and to hell with the Zombie nature of the threads, just bounce them back up to trending?

As MN don't appear to give a shit about what happens on their board, why the hell should we?

If the problem is the lack of new content being produced, and how advertisers are measuring that, then why not have a look at why that is? Why not ask us why fewer posters are starting new threads that prove to be popular / have longevity / have the qualities needed? Why not ask about security worries, the blatant tabloid steals, and the 'feel' of the new platform?

Why pretend that linking to 9 year old Maisie's screaming fit in March is any kind of business solution?

Swaddled swede?

something to put in the manger for the nativity I suppose 🥴

You say that @ArcaneWireless but I was reading a thread about improving swede and one of the suggested threads was one about swaddling. Super useful

don’t give a shit what we think or want though do you @mnhq @justinemumsnet - you couldn’t have made that any more obvious really. How long will it be before we see another begging “keeping the lights on” post because your regular users have all fucked off

I have pressed the ‘suggestions’ a few times now in error when scrolling down to post. And once on purpose thinking it was the newer thread.

I can maybe see the joy of it if you are looking for what to do with potato, an egg and a swede or suggestions for a handbag or winter coat but…

If you are going to keep it, please don’t put it between the thread and the posting box.

HQ, there is right now a very distressed post from a parent-carer at the end of their rope, looking for support.

Not only are they now even more upset and ashamed because someone has requested a trigger warning on their thread, but at the foot of their thread this parent now has a list running of suggested linked threads:

Am I bad parent?
Am I terrible?
Am I a bad mum?

This is an awful thing for a distressed parent to have to see on their thread! It's distressing enough to see being done to her, it must be infinitely worse for her.

So, is the idea to piss off the existing user base, in hopes that passing traffic makes a few misguided clicks on threads from 2014 and it looks as if the site is more active, to please advertisers? That's what I've gleaned, so far.

It seems ridiculous that regular users could predict how this function might cause problems (and distress) but MNHQ and the techies couldn't.

And as someone upthread pointed out, the % of zombies in active will vary for every user depending how we use active convos and how many boards we have hidden from active. Regulars are probably more likely to have more boards hidden from active, and hidden boards are more likely to be either specific interest or tumbleweedy boards which are proportionately less likely to generate many zombies, so if you count all of those in the zombies in active % figures then it will show lower than if it was done by how we actually use active.

As someone, like many, who's been here a lot of years and produced useful content, it does feel like a kick in the teeth to be ignored in favour of welcoming newbies. And it's patronising to newcomers who really don't need special treatment, if the content is good they'll want to join. And pissing off your content producers seems a bit short-sighted.

It’s still making me laugh. I’m on a thread about I’m a Celeb and it’s suggesting a similar thread is one about who will win Wimbledon.