The suggestion is simple. Let users see what users are viewing their back alley threads. I'm not talking about a "Who's Watching" list, I'm talking a Who Viewed and a time stamp. Back alley threads are not safe and I'm sure there are a few individuals out there who have learned how to roll through back alley threads over the years...let's get some peace of mind and bring privacy to the back alley threads. 

I like this, I'm sure it'd give some peace of mind to the thread creator.

Given the complexity of the link generated for a BA thread, it simply wouldn't be worth someones time trying to roll the threads (and given the way they're generated it isn't a straight forward rolling but more of a 'brute force' attempt) to find the handful that might be valuable/helpful. I have ~20 BA threads at the moment, only 1 or 2 would actually be of interest to anyone other than myself. 

Mathematics can crack every puzzle, Satana. But yes I do agree that Google Docs is the way to go, but is sometimes less convenient and usually much faster than a quick edit in the back alley.  

While it's true that the BA threads could be cracked in that manner, security by obfuscation isn't security at all it's just leveraging the work/reward balance in the opposite direction, this would also be the case after the proposed change. You would only be aware someone has accessed the thread after they have accessed the thread, therefore shutting the door when the horse has bolted. 

Rather than putting (what I imagine would be a fairly significant) a code change in which doesn't actually fix the problem, I'd suggest using one of the various workarounds which already exist is a better solution for everyone. It saves the admin team time, allowing them to focus on actual gameplay improvements, and encourages users to actually solve the problem before an issue happens which could impact on their privacy/character/whatever. 

Gameplay improvements like renaming CAs or colored VIP forum names? Not trying to highlight non-game play improvements to bash admins, just pointing out improvements/changes are made to the game regularly that have no affect on the MR game play. You have a good point about the information already being compromised by the time I see who viewed it - and a very nice analogy :) 

Renaming CAs is/was literally a tiny piece of additional code with no large work overhead. It was done for users to have a little 'fun' (along with the profile pics etc) and due to the very low overhead it required was a decent investment of time (though I will admit it is complete fluff and something I'll never actually use myself). 

Forum VIP status does have a direct tie to gameplay, especially so now with the introduction of the 'tips' for the leading city, and may well have further implications down the road. I'd suggest that anything that improves the quality and quantity of public textual interaction in what is a text based game, one where the standard had fallen to an all time low very recently but has improved dramatically of late, should be considered an absolute must and not a 'fluff feature'. That is subjective though, so everyone is entitled to their own opinion (and I wouldn't suggest that the dramatic improvement there is directly attributable to the VIP status alone, but I will back anything that helps the improvement and carries it on in the future).  

I'm not suggesting your proposal is a bad idea, at all. I do like the idea of securing them. The issue is that the current idea doesn't actually solve the issue and from my own (extremely limited) knowledge of coding would be a very significant investment of time. Perhaps someone can think of a clever way that provides a full solution and wouldn't be such an onerous task (given the code is in place for locking HQ threads to specific ranks, perhaps it wouldn't be a huge step to allow BA threads to be locked to specific accounts? I've no idea tbh). If so, I'd be fully behind it. 

In doogle dream world, forums work similar to other styles of forums (vBuletin anyone?) where specific access would have to be granted to specific users and permissions are micro-manageable. Of course I know this has minimal benefit for a large amount of thought and work, so I would not be heartbroken to hear it wouldn't ever be considered. 

Part of my issue is wanting to catch these dishonest players who have figured out how quirks and how to game the code to their advantage. When rumors started circulating about back alleys being "crackable" it kinda spurned this thread. Maybe I'm taking the wrong path to get the finish line here.