Replied off list so-as not to drag all of -discuss into a public slag-fest of various companies. :-)
Props to Peter for reaching out-- it's much appreciated. -- Corey On Apr 9, 2013, at 5:13 PM, Peter Grace <[email protected]> wrote: > I know it's tough to change a cemented opinion, but for what it's worth, I'm > sorry your experience with SE sites is predominantly closed questions. I'm > going to toss some things out and if you're not interested in hearing more, > just delete this e-mail. Many of the questions people have about our sites > are answerable by reading <site>/about or <site>/faq, both of which have > gotten some overhaul in the style and layout departments which help to make > the read enjoyable. I know that asking someone who's already disinterested > to read a bunch of webpages is pretty silly, so I'll try to distill some of > the things I've learned as I transitioned from a user to an employee. > > * Closed != Deleted -- Questions that are "closed" are still visible to the > public because they still have a chance at being useful to the community. > We're pondering making changes to the verbiage to make it sound less > fatalistic/final. The fact of the matter is, if the person asking cleans up > the question and narrows it to the topic, it might get answered. Google does > not index deleted questions, and you need to have a very high rep (I think > 10,000?) before you can get access to deleted questions. Deletes are usually > for straight up useless content (spam, questions intended to troll, etc.) > > * It hurts to have people close your questions. I know, because many of the > questions I ask *still* get closed. I've gotten better at narrowing my > queries before asking but it happens, and I'm even a moderator on SF. The > hardest part, for me, was realizing that it was not vindictive or a personal > attack against me or my knowledge (or lack thereof) but instead it was a > method of trying to protect the quality of the site in general. > > * Stack Exchange is interested in one thing -- getting canonical answers to > questions. If you're hitting a lot of "Closed as Off Topic"-specific > questions it's because the question, as it currently exists, does nothing to > improve the quality of knowledge on that site. If it doesn't fit any Stack > Exchange site topics, well, we do have competitors where you could likely get > answers. Experts Exchange, Quora, Yahoo Answers, there's lots of places that > might be an acceptable alternative. All things being equal I'd love that > question to be at SE, but if there isn't a site yet for that particular topic > it's a missed opportunity for us. > > * There isn't an evil Stack Exchange overlord that viciously polices the > sites -- the moderators are elected by the community, and nine times out of > ten the questions are closed by regular community members after there's been > multiple "votes to close." The people with diamonds on their name are site > moderators who have special powers, you'll see a lot of closed questions > don't have moderators voting on the close. We do have a community growth > team who sometimes assists in moderator disputes, but we let the community > handle most of the policing. We're there to keep the lights on and make the > bits available, the community is the purview of the general public. > > At any rate, I'm willing to discuss any questions about SE more in-depth, > just drop me an e-mail at [email protected]. > > Pete > > > > > On Tue, Apr 9, 2013 at 6:04 PM, Corey Quinn <[email protected]> wrote: > > On Apr 9, 2013, at 1:48 PM, Craig Constantine <[email protected]> wrote: > > > Is everyone aware of this? > > > > http://area51.stackexchange.com/proposals/52519/network-engineering > > > This email has been closed as "Off Topic." ;-) > > -- Corey, who despises Stack Exchange's google bombing of the same question > I'm trying to find an answer to with "thread closed as off topic" answers, > and hence pointedly avoids the site as a direct result... > > _______________________________________________ > Discuss mailing list > [email protected] > https://lists.lopsa.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/discuss > This list provided by the League of Professional System Administrators > http://lopsa.org/ >
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