is this it?

Is this the post you are looking for?  http://model-railroad-hobbyist.com/node/30997

I don't speak for MRH, but here are my observations:

Sometimes Users will remove posts in their own personal blog, but otherwise content is never intentionally removed from the forums. Sometime threads are locked but the content stays available. Spam posts and duplicate comments are often removed by an admin.

To find threads you have participated in, look at the recent posts list from the right side of the screen, and then choose the "my recent posts" tab at the top of the list. You may have to look through a few pages to find it.

Cheers!

@Bill - URL for missing blog chain

When I click on that link, it takes me to the MRH home page. I've tried three different browsers but no luck. Are you able to view any of the posts in that chain?

When I go to my posts, this is what I see:

The missing blog entries should be right below this chain.

Any ideas?

ok, I see the issue...

I have some administrative privileges on this forum so that I can assist people with various tasks like posting images and videos.

The owner of that post has marked the post as "private" so it is no longer visible to general users on the forum, but my lite admin privs still allow me to see it.

Since it is a blog post, the post owner is within his rights to limit access to it, so there is nothing I can do from here. I'd suggest contacting Joe Fugate or the OP directly if you have further questions about the status of this post.

@Bill - Got it!

Thanks for the info! That clears it up.

It's interesting that if the author of a post changes it from public to private, it also locks up any and all replies that are tied to the original submission. I have installed and still maintain a variety of different "blog" software packages for friends of mine so now I'm going to have to check to see if that functionality is in them as well.

I guess that I'll have to keep my own archives of discussion chains from now on so if I want to refer back to them in the future, they'll still be there.

Thanks again!

One of the Problems with MRH Forums

You never know when a thread will just disappear ... taking EVERYONE's contributions with it.  Sometimes it is MRH staff, sometimes it is the "owner", sometimes it just disappears.  

Could the redirect contain a useful message?

Seems to me that simply redirecting a link to a deleted or private thread back to the main posting index can cause confusion for readers.

Is there some way to have redirects go to a page or pop up a dialog that says something like "This thread has been deleted by < xxx> " or "This thread has been changed to a private thread by the OP"?

Craig

???

Can I remove my comments from a "hidden" thread?  If the OP can "hide" it, I would like the ability to delete any contributions I made to it ...

Blog posts versus forum posts

This was true quite a while back when we had some problems with the SPAM module, but those problems have been solved. We do not routinely unpublish threads -- lock them maybe, but they remain visible.

This said, we do allow some extra privileges with blog posts, which the referenced thread is. A blog is "owned" by the creator and he/she should have a bit more say in what happens to such threads. A blog thread can be marked private, which makes it unpublished to the public, but leaves it visible to the owner.

If you think about it, a blog is a personal journal, and people should be allowed to have more say about their personal journal threads. If you comment on them and the owner makes it private, then oh well -- it was on THEIR blog.

Forum threads, on the other hand, are owned by no one, so they have no ability to mark the thread as private. So your comment about the "problem with the MRH forums" about threads routinely disappearing is inaccurate.

We almost never unpublish forum threads. We may spam a few flame war comments, but that's a few times a year. Blogs are a bit more special in that the OP can make it private if they wish -- that's rare too, but as this case shows, it can happen once in a while and we permit it because it's a blog thread not a forum thread.

Blogs ...

Would it be possible to make "blogs" more "distinctive" to the viewer than "threads" ... a different background or some such?  They look too much like threads, and if they are "owned" by another, I'd rather not provide input ...

Use the Recent Posts by type

Not easily with this version of our website software. The easiest way to see just forum threads is to use the Recent posts by type menu option just below Recent posts, then select Topics to get just the forum threads. Other options are Blogs (obviously), eZine, which are the comment threads for magazine articles in each issue of MRH and Polls, which are the occassional infrequent polls someone will post. Polls are like forum threads, nobody owns them.

OK

That actually works.  Thank you for pointing it out.

John

I'll just say, John, that never looking at the blogs will cause you to miss some great content.  It seems a bit of an over-reaction to stop viewing or posting to the hundreds of blogs on here for the 2 that I can recall in 9 years that have been deleted by their author.  The benefits far outweigh the downside, in my opinion.  

Dave

You are probably correct, but I feel somewhat "cheated" when I take time to read and reply to something only to have it hidden later because it was "personal".  I don't want to mess with other people's "stuff".  I'll just stick with the "open" content.

OP's move to privacy wipes out other posters' comments

There should be some way to allow the person who submits a post, be it as a blog or discussion entry, to change that post from public to private without erasing the intellectual property of the people who added comments to the original work. I understand that MRH views blogs as belonging to the original poster, and that this person kind of "owns" the topic, but shouldn't that "right" also apply to the people who respond to the original item? It would be nice if the follow-on folks would still be able to reach their submissions, even if their posts were disconnected from the original text.

This is sort of a philosophical discussion because if MRH's current blogging/discussion software doesn't have that functionality, I'm sure we'll all do just fine as is, however it may drive more folks to use the discussion groups rather than the blogs since one never knows when a thread may disappear. This is unfortunate because the blogs get front page space and discussion topics are only found after drilling down through several layers.

That said, if this is all that we have to argue about lately, it's small potatoes. MRH - keep up the good work!

No different than Blogger

This is no different than any blogging site such as Blogger. If the blog owner decides to nix a post on Blogger and folks commented, then all those comments will go bye-bye too. That's the way it works when you own the thread -- you own the visibility of the comments, too.

In that sense, MRH is pretty much working how other blogging sites work -- the blog owner owns the publishing rights on the main post and all attached comments.

'discussion topics are only

'discussion topics are only found after drilling down through several layers.'

I think you are making it harder on yourself than need be...I just click recent posts. I can see right there was is a magazine thread, a discussion thread and a blog.

 "If the blog owner decides

Why does MRH have any interest in making it possible for guys to delete comments made for the group? It seems to be against our goal of learning and sharing? If a blogger doesn't like the way a blog is going why not just tell them to post that it is being locked but content still available for interested parties? ......DaveB 

Wish list

I do understand that most blogging software operates that way that's been described for MRH, but I was just thinking that it would be nice IF I was still able to get to the comments that I attached to someone else's thread, even if they changed it from public to private. I haven't tested all of the various platforms with which I've worked over the past years, but it seems that the ones I've been able to fiddle with so far do operate the same way as this one.

My point about blog entries getting higher billing over discussion topics on the MRH website is only because the recent blog entries are listed in one of the blocks on the right side. To see what's going on in the discussion world requires more mouse clicks. Maybe another block for "Recent Discussion Topics" could be included in the right column as well one of these days.

MRH is pretty much working how other blogging sites work.

Not exactly ...

1. I do not visit "blogging" sites, as I have very little interest in them.

2. I do visit forum sites as I have an interest in sharing information,

3. MRH's "blogs" are mixed in with the forums and even look the same from a casual glance ... this creates confusion on what is open/public domain shared by everyone and what is personal and can be hidden at any time.

4. It would be nice if MRH Forums were a complete separate entity from the blogs.  Yes the filter sort of works ... but more of a "work around" than a real solution to the problem.

There are two things going on

There are two things going on here. One we have a standard forum where someone puts out a topic and everyone is invited to comment on it.  That is open and will not be deleted.  

The second thing we have here is the ability to create a personal blog.  Like pretty much all blogs if the "owner" wants to do something with said blog he can because it belongs to him. On a lot of Blogs the owner can delete a post they don't like, lock someone from posting, block someone from sewing, lock everyone from posting or block everyone from seeing or just delete the whole blog.  This kind of thing is pretty "standard" for blogs.  If anything the blogs here seam to be very limited in what the "owner" can do with "there" blog.

When posting on a forum topic you are basically  writing on the side of a public billboard.  When posting to someone's blog you are writing in there personal journal and as such the owner can do whatever they want.  If you don't like that don't post in someone else's blog.

The real problem is that we here on the forum fail to understand the difference and frankly we need to learn the difference.  This group has HORRIBLE etiquette.  We regularly take a topic and run off with it ignoring the original topic when we should create a new topic and we regularly treat a blog like a regular post.  This is frankly the users problem not a problem with the group software or how Joe has this set up.  So perhaps we need to get better about what we do.  

And as far as I can tell/ remember it is pretty easy to tell a blog from a topic as it says what it is on the main screen where you first select the post you want to read.

-Doug M

"The real problem is ..."

No.  The REAL problem is that forum posts and blog posts LOOK the same here.  People treat "blogs" as if they were forums because it isn't easy to tell the difference and they are all mixed in together.

 "The REAL problem is that

Yeah, if one clicks on recent posts a lot on the list that comes up are blogs. If MRH wants to include blogs they should be in a separate area where one has to actively go find them, and people should not use blogs where topics would be more appropriate.......DaveB 

Topic or Blog or ..

If posting to a Topic vs a blog is a concern the sort and read / post separately under "Posts by type":

Why the fuss?

When you write on the internet, you are writing in sand. After the tide comes in, everything is gone. On the other hand, the ocean has a way of returning things when you least expect it to. The only way you can keep complete control is if you are paying the electric and communication bill for a server. Even then, the wayback machine at archive.org will sample your site every couple of months and preserve it for posterity and prospective employers.

From the point of view of a reader, the internet is as dependable as television. Anything can be deleted by the whim of the operator/the poster/ god. So if you like something and expect to refer to it again, you'd better hit save page for your own permanent copy.

pqe