Do you delete old accounts that are never used?

DigNap15

DigNap15

Well-known member
Like most forums (I imagine) I have quite a few old accounts that never post and never even Lurk

I have started emailing them to say that we are still here.

Do you keep these accounts open, or do you look at closing them?
 
DigNap15 said:
Like most forums (I imagine) I have quite a few old accounts that never post and never even Lurk

I have started emailing them to say that we are still here.

Do you keep these accounts open, or do you look at closing them?
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I never delete any account without the users authorisation because it's not like they take up much space. I'd leave them and not worry too much about it.
 
If they EVER posted, then the account remains forever.

If they registered and haven't been back since their registration date, then yes....but I wait 2-3 years before doing so (manual search)
 
I don’t see how deleting would benefit your forum. If anything it would do more harm if they ever decide to come back.
 
Aerodynamic said:
I don’t see how deleting would benefit your forum. If anything it would do more harm if they ever decide to come back.
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I can't imagine a user that's signed up and not posted once in 2-3 years will ever come back. They are probably going to be mostly spam or throwaway accounts. For me, I don't have a problem on my forum so I just keep them there since they don't take up any space. But there isn't really any harm as long as it's not an active user as that will be a loss.
 
JoyFreak said:
I can't imagine a user that's signed up and not posted once in 2-3 years will ever come back. They are probably going to be mostly spam or throwaway accounts. For me, I don't have a problem on my forum so I just keep them there since they don't take up any space. But there isn't really any harm as long as it's not an active user as that will be a loss.
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You never know JoyFreak. I’ve been on forums that I haven’t signed in on for years. Admittedly, I’m no great asset to any other forum, but there’s always a slim chance that user could come back and be active on your community. If they would find out about the deletion of their account they might be turned off. Or they might’ve forgotten in the best case.
 
Aerodynamic said:
You never know JoyFreak. I’ve been on forums that I haven’t signed in on for years. Admittedly, I’m no great asset to any other forum, but there’s always a slim chance that user could come back and be active on your community. If they would find out about the deletion of their account they might be turned off. Or they might’ve forgotten in the best case.
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There is a slight chance that they may come back but if they're serious about staying this time, then they'll make the effort to take a few seconds of their time to sign up again.
 
Yes I have been on a few forums that I have not visited for years, and then went back
Some of them are still going.

So its not a good idea to delete inactive accountss.
That being said mine is a general website, where the other ones were sepcific to one of my interests eg history or photography.
 
My community being so called "new", yes I deleted a few of my members, usually the "test" members.
The once who have posts on the community, I change their usernames.
 
I don't now but if my forum got really big and deleting unused accounts would help reduce resources, I would likely do it for that reason.

But they would have to be unused completely. If people are using them to lurk and not post, I don't want to stop them from that.

Not everyone wants to post.
 
Shawn Gossman said:
I don't now but if my forum got really big and deleting unused accounts would help reduce resources, I would likely do it for that reason.

But they would have to be unused completely. If people are using them to lurk and not post, I don't want to stop them from that.

Not everyone wants to post.
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My last registration is member #207016. XF not only tracks join date but also last activity. ANY user that has "last activity" beyond their join date, even without posting, is likely worth keeping in the database. Users that joined and never returned likely aren't (I clean up about 2 years).
 
woody said:
My last registration is member #207016. XF not only tracks join date but also last activity. ANY user that has "last activity" beyond their join date, even without posting, is likely worth keeping in the database. Users that joined and never returned likely aren't (I clean up about 2 years).
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Thanks for that info :)

That's helpful. Be that the case, i'd let the account stay.

:)
 
Generally not. Sometimes they do pop in and post, even if it's years later (the majority of them don't, but I have still seen it happen more than a couple of times).
 
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