Timeline for Too many upvotes for poor quality answers
Current License: CC BY-SA 3.0
15 events
| when toggle format | what | by | license | comment | |
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| Aug 22, 2011 at 6:19 | comment | added | apathos | @slhck I completely agree with you - that is an awesome question and answer. I didn't know that myself, and enjoyed the read. But that question was looking for a long-form answer. The asker wanted to understand the process. But I can also see a great need at times for brevity and clarity. I guess it's just from my perspective that I seem to spend more and more time (on the internet at large) not in finding the information I want, but filtering it out of the mass of results. So when I see a short, direct answer, I find it beautiful. :) | |
| Aug 21, 2011 at 20:22 | comment | added | slhck | @apathos The difference is: Yes, it should be rewarded, but generally such answers should 1) not be rewarded as much as a more elaborate answer and 2) not be encouraged. If users continue to score with one-line answers, we wouldn't get the great answers. Consider this one here. Moab nailed it in a one-line comment, but the real answer has 1500 words and is awesome. (And thanks for taking an interest!) | |
| Aug 21, 2011 at 19:59 | comment | added | apathos | I'm kinda new around here, but right in the about page it says this is a Q and A site. I know I'd be awfully excited to find out this annoying problem I'm facing can be fixed with one 4-character command. While a lot of info can be valuable to people that want it, especially in this internet age there is GREAT value in having exactly the answer you wanted as fast as possible. Which, I'd just like to point out, is exactly what the original question answer wanted. Why should the answer not be rewarded when it was exactly what was needed? | |
| Aug 20, 2011 at 4:16 | comment | added | Simon Sheehan | If all they came for was a simple answer, they'd be better off asking in chat, or else it just makes the site look poor if we're full of one word answers | |
| Aug 20, 2011 at 0:36 | comment | added | Ivo Flipse Mod | @nhinkle Well we were discussing it in chat and I'm wondering if this should be a step up to free downvotes on answers as well. That way users should think twice about posting poor quality answers, for fear of getting downvoted. The problem users wouldn't read this question and else wouldn't agree either. With more downvotes, they don't get to disagree. | |
| Aug 20, 2011 at 0:25 | comment | added | nhinkle Mod | @IvoFlipse side note, the reputation cap does keep them from earning unchecked from a single popular answer. That aside, I fully agree that the voting is skewed. Unfortunately, 99% of users won't ever see this discussion, because they don't visit meta. We need to somehow get the word out about this - how? | |
| Aug 20, 2011 at 0:09 | comment | added | Tamara Wijsman |
@MatthewRead: On the other hand, the answer is bad and there is no reason to blame the question for being bad as explained in my previous comment. Let me explain why it is bad: Simple, by just saying cd - you are giving the man a fish. He wanted that fish so badly, now he got it. But, where did he got it from? If you don't explain that, the man can't fish for himself. He won't know that you can find such detailed information in the man page...
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| Aug 20, 2011 at 0:07 | comment | added | Tamara Wijsman | @IvoFlipse: In the current system, the question isn't bad as far as I can tell. The only reason you could close it is for the general reference close reason; however, this shouldn't be applied in a literal way. We can't really expect users to have fully read the manual of every command they use, this isn't really a case where we just get to say RTFM and thus this question is not bad at all. | |
| Aug 19, 2011 at 23:54 | comment | added | Ivo Flipse Mod | Just because the question was bad, doesn't mean you get to post a bad answer as well. But what troubles me most is that some of these answers got 5% of my total rep with one answer. That's just plain wrong. | |
| Aug 19, 2011 at 23:47 | history | edited | user59659 | CC BY-SA 3.0 |
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| Aug 19, 2011 at 23:44 | comment | added | user59659 | @Ivo Don't blame the answerer for a bad question. Simon, you also need to account for those who are looking for a simple answer. | |
| Aug 19, 2011 at 23:35 | comment | added | Ivo Flipse Mod | Besides if answer to a question would only be cd -, then perhaps its not a great question to begin with. Surely not something worth hundreds of upvotes. | |
| Aug 19, 2011 at 23:34 | comment | added | Ivo Flipse Mod | You would have had a point, if 80% of our visitors were also super users. But a lot of people keep making stupid mistakes, exactly because nobody ever bothered to explain them why things were the way they do. If we do the same, we're just another tech site and not making the internet a better place. | |
| Aug 19, 2011 at 23:33 | comment | added | Simon Sheehan | Most of our viewers aren't even registered on the site, a LOT of traffic comes in from Google. You need to account for those who are looking for a detailed answer, and it comes up on Google. | |
| Aug 19, 2011 at 23:27 | history | answered | user59659 | CC BY-SA 3.0 |