Timeline for When is an answer eligible to be flagged as "not an answer"? What to do?
Current License: CC BY-SA 4.0
16 events
| when toggle format | what | by | license | comment | |
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| Aug 26, 2018 at 18:01 | comment | added | slhck | @Scott As a former mod, what would always trouble me are flag reasons that require me to make a technical judgement. If the rationale is clear (e.g. question clearly specifies macOS, but answer is about Windows) and expressed as such in the flag reason (and not just “not an answer”), I'd say it's fine to flag. But that's my personal interpretation; not sure how the mod team handles it these days. I've been a little out of touch with the SE mod team for a few years. | |
| Aug 26, 2018 at 16:09 | comment | added | Scott - Слава Україні | So we’re saying that, if the question asks ‘‘How do I drive from Los Angeles to San Francisco?’’, and the answer describes how to drive from New York to Boston (or how to take the train from New York to San Francisco), then it’s not NAA, because it is an answer to some question that’s vaguely related to the one that was asked? You can understand how people are exasperated by this interpretation, right? | |
| Aug 26, 2018 at 16:01 | comment | added | slhck | @Scott Eh, that was over six years ago! I rephrased that one sentence – you were right in that it was illogical. About downvotes, I think I was talking about flagging posts and downvoting them which I perhaps thought wasn't necessary. Of course, one should always downvote bad content (to push it down, to make it fade out, to enable high-rep users to click delete, etc.) | |
| Aug 26, 2018 at 15:58 | history | edited | slhck | CC BY-SA 4.0 |
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| Aug 26, 2018 at 15:50 | comment | added | Scott - Слава Україні | @slhck: Sorry for treading on a moribund thread, but (1) Why do you say “comments that don’t really solve the problem but are off-topic”? ISTM that either “comments that don’t really solve the problem and are off-topic” or “… that don’t really solve the problem but are on-topic” would make more sense. (2) You say “for old answers and posts where you’re almost sure the OP will never return …, there’s rarely any point in down voting”. Well, as you know, down voting causes an “answer” to drop in the display for users who sort by votes, and down voting to −3 or below makes a post go dim. | |
| Mar 20, 2017 at 10:18 | history | edited | CommunityBot |
replaced http://superuser.com/ with https://superuser.com/
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| Mar 17, 2017 at 10:12 | history | edited | CommunityBot |
replaced http://meta.superuser.com/ with https://meta.superuser.com/
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| Jun 25, 2012 at 7:28 | comment | added | slhck | Finally, note that moderators should never have to judge the contents of a post. So, if something is an answer to the question, but just "bad", what should they do about it? But, if they see you genuinely trying to help, they will err on the side of clearing the flag as "helpful", even when a post is not deleted. In cases where you're not sure, visit our moderator chat room and drop some links there. | |
| Jun 25, 2012 at 7:26 | comment | added | slhck | Pruning old non-answers is of course allowed and encouraged! We always try to keep the signal-to-noise ratio high, no matter how old a topic is. However, for old answers and posts where you're almost sure the OP will never return (e.g. one-rep users who never came online again, deleted users, et cetera), there's rarely any point in downvoting, since the OP won't bother to fix their post or delete it themselves. If you find something that is really "not an answer" in the sense of what we've tried to clarify here, go ahead and flag. @killermist | |
| Jun 25, 2012 at 7:24 | comment | added | slhck | For these two cases (and generally, anything that is at least an attempt to answer the question, but a really bad one), just downvote and comment. The goal would be to have the OP delete the post themselves. This is even encouraged through the Peer Pressure badge. @killermist | |
| Jun 25, 2012 at 3:58 | comment | added | killermist | For things like superuser.com/a/54855/139040 which is snarky and doesn't try to actually answer the question or superuser.com/a/27184/139040 which doesn't really have any bearing on the question as asked, would it be better to bring the links over to VtC/D chat instead of flagging? Also, in following "related" questions, I end up in old weeds occasionally and I wonder if continuing to prune old non-answers is something I should be trying to do, or after a certain age (1 year or so), should I just ignore and just downvote them? | |
| Apr 19, 2012 at 12:54 | comment | added | slhck | Haha, no problem. Just my 2 cents anyway! | |
| Apr 19, 2012 at 12:47 | comment | added | Tamara Wijsman | I'll kind of ignore your answer till it receives enough upvotes or confirmation / edits from a moderator. | |
| Apr 19, 2012 at 11:42 | history | edited | slhck | CC BY-SA 3.0 |
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| Apr 19, 2012 at 10:29 | comment | added | slhck | Note that this is my personal opinion, not moderator policy. Feel free to disagree or point out problems. | |
| Apr 19, 2012 at 10:28 | history | answered | slhck | CC BY-SA 3.0 |