@tikimom you are reading my mind. We have posted this issue for weeks now. It really hit me today though when I thought to look up a school I have posted about in the past. There were a bunch of new threads I totally did not know about. The email notifications before of activity in sub forums was extremely useful. Those who have moved on, those with the expertise, well we have lost their input with this new CC haven’t we? I feel so sad. After this application cycle I really doubt that I will be visiting CC if these issues are not fixed. So sad. What the heck are they thinking? I wish I could say that their intentions are to fix those problems but they have not piped up to indicate that at all at this point so I have lost hope.
So many disappointing changes to the boards - I now spend less time, it’s not as friendly. I found this for the first time and just want to say it’s a ridiculous policy. We were on page 14 of a thread - many people weighing in with answers and advice in addition to the wonderfully helpful freshman who posted “ask me” and now it’s been closed by an over-achieving moderator. It is really necessary to police a free flowing conversation like -this? Ridiculous. Just ridiculous. And very “big brotherish.” You will drive people away by continuing such policies.
December 2013
MODERATOR’S NOTE
Please note that “Ask Me” threads are not permitted on College Confidential, because they deter people from creating threads that get responses from multiple posters, or getting other points of view.
The original poster of such threads is, of course, more than welcome to respond to any questions that are asked on the open boards.
Just logged out again when I clicked on back button. On my laptop.
@MaterMia, the moderators revised the policy about a month ago… Instead of closing “Ask Me…” threads, we now rename them “Questions about ____” and add a note that anyone is free to ask or answer questions. It seems to be working well.
What is the name of the thread you are referring to? I can try to re-open it.
One reason we instituted the policy initially was that quite often, an OP would start such a thread with the best of intentions, and then disappear, leaving people hanging. We are not trying to be big brothers - we want the forum to work as best it can. In the future, feel free to PM me or one of the other moderators if you have a complaint or issue.
Thanks!
Okay, this is a weird one. Please bear with me!
I was just Googling (as I frequently do and which is the way I originally discovered CC several years ago) the terms “colleges like haverford,” and the oddest post ended up in in the College Confidential search results (which were at the top of all the results, BTW):
It’s called The Real Truth About Haverford College and it would appear that it was created by CC’s very own Dave Berry. Now I’m pretty sure Dave Berry is a PSU alumnus (although I suppose it’s possible he transferred from HC), and I sort of remember this post from a while back and, as I recall, it was written by some disgruntled student or graduate. I also find it hard to believe that someone in Dave Berry’s profession would do such a hatchet job on any college, let alone one of Haverford’s reputation.
Here’s the post as it appears when I access it via my Google results:
Here’s the link: <a href=“http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/haverford-college/123228-the-real-truth-about-haverford.html”>http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/haverford-college/123228-the-real-truth-about-haverford.html</a>
Reading through the thread, I think it may have originally been posted by someone named “HCisbad” based on one of the responses made.
I went back to see if I could find the original post from within the thread’s archive, to see if I could determine who actually authored it, but it isn’t there:
<a href=“Haverford College - College Confidential Forums”>http://talk.qa.collegeconfidential.com/haverford-college/p32/</a>
Given that the very popular humor writer Dave BARRY is a Haverford alum, I’ve got to wonder if somebody has hacked CC to make it appear that one of that college’s most famous alumni actually believes Haverford is some bastion of political correctness and racism.
Or the similarity in names could just be a cruel coincidence resulting from a huge website upgrade gone bad.
Either way, I have to wonder how many OTHER threads on CC are now compromised!
I will contact Dave Berry to see what he says. That’s bizarre! It says an “Unknown User” edited the post back in April, 2006. We used to be able to look at the unedited version of posts, but now we can’t.
^^^^Thanks!
Wow, that is really weird, LTL. I was not a member back in 2005/06, so I’m wondering if the edit window was really that long back then …
December 2005 edited April 2006
^ Dave Berry has elevated status around here, currently listed as “CC Admissions Expert”, which likely gives him the ability to edit posts long after the normal edit window closed.
I highly doubt he was the author of the original topic. Most likely, he edited it at some point, and somewhere in the last 8 years something got messed up in the database so that the owner is now wrong.
The wayback machine only goes back to 2007 for the Haverford College forum, so we may never know. Given its age, I wouldn’t worry too much that it is a widespread problem. At least, not a new problem.
IMO of course.
I just got logged out BTW. Running on a desktop in Firefox, Windows 8.1.
That hasn’t happened in a while… is there an expiration on the login? I know other sites like Yahoo and Google make you re-login every so often.
Not sure what exactly you mean by the “wayback machine,” but I’m able to access 36 pages on the Haverford forum, dating back to October 2004 (or so it says–who really knows for certain???). See here: <a href=“Haverford College - College Confidential Forums”>http://talk.qa.collegeconfidential.com/haverford-college/p36/</a>
Honestly, my main concern is that it was GOOGLE that took me there and, no doubt, will take others there as well.
Frankly, I was pretty stunned to see “Dave Berry” trashing such a respected school; it took me a minute to realize it was a post I’d read in the past and hadn’t originated with the real Dave.
Most people aren’t going to realize that, however; they’re just going to take it at face value. If I were a Haverford administrator, I would not be amused!
@notrichenough, I will pass along your report to the administrators.
The Wayback Machine is an archive of large parts of the whole internet.They basically take snapshots of everything every once in a while and store them so you can look them up later.
While you can see threads in the HC forum that go back to 2004, you are seeing what they look like today, not what they might have looked like originally. Unfortunately the archive didn’t go back far enough. So I can’t tell whether that post has been incorrect for years, or if it happened during the recent change to the new forum software.
^^^Got it–thanks for the explanation!
FWIW, I don’t think the post has been that way for years–I’m quite certain I read it with its original author’s name attached within the past two years. I bet you’re right, however, that Dave probably edited the original post at some point and the latest conversion installed him as its originator.
Can you tell if there’s still a CC account for someone named HCisbad? I wonder if the latest upgrade removed any posters who haven’t been active in a certain number of years. That could suggest other looming problem posts.
All this just goes to show that machines will never be able to completely replace real people! 
I don’t know how to search directly. I tried entering that name as the recipient for a PM, and got “No results”. So I’m guessing that user name doesn’t exist any more.
Some will remember the original Wayback Machine is from Peabody’s Improbable History- Mr Peabody and Sherman.
^^^Shame on me for forgetting that. Sadly, I’m old enough to have forgotten that I used to remember that reference.
@mainelonghorn thank you for the response.<br>
It is this thread: <a href=“http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/north-carolina-state-university/1440237-ask-a-current-freshman-at-nc-state-anything-p14.html”>http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/north-carolina-state-university/1440237-ask-a-current-freshman-at-nc-state-anything-p14.html</a>
Probably too late - it was closed in December, and the original poster probably won’t return. Best thread with best info on that school’s page - 21K views, 201 views abruptly closed in the middle of great conversations by a variety of posters.
I just find it ironic the reason for closing it was that “ask Me” discouraged others to post and answer yet that is exactly what was happening and a silly rule shuts off the conversation. Kind of defeats the purpose of the “rule” - and yes, I realize you have changed it now. Thanks again.
Okay, I am a glutton for punishment…but here goes one last time:
Hey CC–in the past few days you have had at least 5-6 different posters ask about whether there are plans to make updates so that one can see if there are new posts in the sub-forums without having to click on each sub-forum. Since this is a request that has been asked several times–can someone please address whether or not this will ever be changed? If you are not going to change it, please just say so. The silence on this particular request (especially when you jump all over log-off issues) is really peculiar.
^ 2 weeks. No update.
It also seems as though the damage control team has checked out.