On January 31, I posted my experience on the same type of plane to the other thread. The closed thread was merely starting the same discussion all over again. The fundamental purpose of FT is to share information, and users are not well served by having to dig through multiple threads with similar postings. It just wastes everybody's time.
The reason that I jumped in and closed the other thread immediately is that I am reluctant to close them after they have a lot of postings. It's better to stop them early and redirect the discussion to the earlier thread, as I did.
I'm sorry that your post got through in the 15 seconds or so between my post announcing the closing and the actual closing. I had no way of knowing that you were posting just as I was closing the thread. No slight was intended, as I'm sure you realize.
Nobody is trying to engage in heavy-handed moderating. I'm just trying to stop the information exchange from being unnecessarily chaotic. Having said that, if other people believe that I'm doing more harm than good, please say so, either right here or through private e-mail. My goal is to be helpful, and if I'm not accomplishing that goal, someone needs to tell me!
Bruce