absolutely stupid.
I concurr. It is both absolutley stupid and rediculous.
It is a lazy, half-hearted attempt at a quick fix.
There are much more elegant ways to do things.
The problem is, from my understanding, is that there is a split management structure on PPRuNe. Whereby the people that actually use the system (the mods) do not have any influence on its technical implementation (handled by some techies in the US as far as I can tell). The techies never use the site so they probably couldn't care less about the impact of a solution like this as long as it "works".