If you had a mailbox, and that mailbox got nothing but junk mail .... wouldn't it make more sense to simply stop going to the mailbox and whining about what's in it, than require every junk mailer to consult vast lists of what mailboxes were off limits?
OTOH it's a rare rare thread that really needs a long list of mentions. Syrenn put one up a while ago to generate a "Who's Who" project; that's one of the rare ones. But "just to generate traffic" is certainly not a valid reason. If I put a thread up and it's a worthy topic, it should draw traffic (or fail to) on its own merits. I'd only toss a mention to a poster I had reason to believe would be individually interested for their own personal reasons. So for me the only legitimate uses would be if somebody is personally referenced in the post, or if they had a particular expertise/involvement in the topic that would make them valuable for input.
But that's a judgement call; there's no way to enforce that and no way for the site to judge a mentioner's motives.
OTOH it's a rare rare thread that really needs a long list of mentions. Syrenn put one up a while ago to generate a "Who's Who" project; that's one of the rare ones. But "just to generate traffic" is certainly not a valid reason. If I put a thread up and it's a worthy topic, it should draw traffic (or fail to) on its own merits. I'd only toss a mention to a poster I had reason to believe would be individually interested for their own personal reasons. So for me the only legitimate uses would be if somebody is personally referenced in the post, or if they had a particular expertise/involvement in the topic that would make them valuable for input.
But that's a judgement call; there's no way to enforce that and no way for the site to judge a mentioner's motives.