A recent change in Discourse removed the ability to set Slow Mode indefinitely on a topic. FroggyC expressed concerns about this change, stating that permanent Slow Mode is useful for moderating sensitive topics.
FroggyC suggested reconsidering this change and adding a “Forever” option to the UI. ondrej pointed out that topic slow mode wasn’t designed for permanent use and suggested selecting a custom date and time as a workaround.
FroggyC argued that forever slow mode should still be available, citing their forum’s policy of not autoclosing topics. codinghorror initially thought that “forever” was an available option but later confirmed that it was intentionally removed.
andrei explained that the “Enabled until” field is now mandatory, making it impossible to turn on Slow Mode forever. FroggyC acknowledged the workaround of setting a ridiculous date in the future but still advocated for adding a “Forever” option to the UI.
codinghorror acknowledged the request but noted that the workaround is sufficient for now.
I’ve noticed in the last version of Discourse one cannot set Slow Mode indefinitely on a topic.
This is a big problem for us. There are certain threads that I would like to have permanent slow mode on, just because of the topic. It makes moderating much easier knowing they won’t blow up if I’m not looking at it.
I would ask you reconsider this change.
Hello FroggyC,
I’m unsure when this changed however there have been a few topics such as this Issues when using slow mode on a topic forever stating their opinions on allowing slow mode forever.
Topic slow mode as Jeff pointed out below is not designed to be used permanently it seems non sensical to bring it back too since a topic won’t last forever since it will auto close once it reaches a certain number of replies. Perhaps you can select a custom date and time like this? Maybe don’t make the date as ridiculous as mine as it was just for demonstration 
We do not autoclose topics on my forum, as we don’t think necroposting is bad. Any discussion can be picked up again, and if it goes off topic we can split it.
Sure, picking a ridiculous date seems like a good stopgap. And I understand that the main usecase would be for limited slow mode.
But ideally forever slowmode should still be available, and this should be reflected in the UI better – something like a “Forever” option after the “Six Months” one would do it for me.
The backend obviously already allows for this, so it would just be a small UI change – a worthwile one, in my opinion.
Hmm @andrei handled that, supposedly “forever” was an item in the list, just like it is for suspensions – is it not? Did you scroll down? Perhaps we missed that item in the to-do list for the feature.
In the meantime, you can simply set it very far in the future. I don’t really see a problem here. You have the ability to do what you need to do. Set it to 2050. If your forum is around in 2050, then you can worry about it at that time 
No, there wasn’t the “forever” item in that list. We haven’t touched content of that list yet. But what we did is that we made the “Enabled until” field mandatory. Because of this, it’s impossible now to turn on Slow Mode forever.
And yes, it was a conscious design decision and if someone still needs infinite slow mode the solution would be simply to set it very far in the future.
The workaround of picking a ridiculous date into the future indeed turns this from a problem to an inconvenience, so thank you for that.
However, my suggestion to add “Forever” to the list still stands, I think. The option is not present in the list.
If you look at the thread linked a few messages ago by @ondrej, several people including me seem to be using the feature this way, so I would think there is a legitimate argument for this use case to be included in the UI.
Ok, noted, you have a 5-10 second workaround that you can apply as needed for now.
