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09:00
@Pekka, ICBW - it's been an interesting day for encounters with 'interesting' people.
@JeffAtwood what was the random thought? Admit it, it was making sweet love to Adam D'Angelo
oh, it's a quote from the article
Quora is like Stack Overflow for douchebags.
9
@JeffAtwood "High quality content to surfers .. ", That explains it! Quora's entire user base lives in Los Angeles.
> Now you can anonymously express your crudest curiosities on Quora and receive thoughtful responses.
Uhm, isn't one of the founding principles of Quora that every account be tied to a real identity to prevent anonymity?
you can post anonymously, but ONLY AFTER LOGGING IN. I am not making this up.
09:02
@JeffAtwood ahahahahahahahahaha
It's hard to deny
@DanGrossman - he did say douchebag
seriously, every time I go there, it's just depressing. Pages and pages of opinions about utterly random crap.
Wow, they make you pass a quiz
Quora was like my middle school locker room .. the place just stinks, but it's impossible to pinpoint the exact location of the odor. I just didn't care for it.
09:04
Hey, at least they demand proper capitalization
Awww, I need to be logged in to even see the question in that article
That's something, isn't it?
Which, sad to say, is better than some of the users we have here
> Why is the community manager job so challenging yet rewarding?
That's a horrible question :/
> there seems to be no restriction to the type of content on Quora from animal sex to psychology of women
signs up immediately
2
09:05
What if you don't find it challenging or rewarding?
> How do I get over my low tolerance for stupid people? quora.com/How-do-I-get-over-my-low-tolerance-for-stupid-people
they're violating every rule we've ever learned about how to have a useful Q&A community, but hey, somehow it's gonna just work.. magically. :P
you know, because of the power of the facebooks and twitters!
I'm not sure "useful" is a big part of their overall goal
It's more "entertaining"
the latest Silicon Valley sensation: cwora! http://www.cwora.com/
2
SE will always have one competitive edge that I think would be impossible to duplicate. The initial core of users happen to be extremely bright and educated people (well, most of them).
I wish quora the best, but I honestly think all they can do is be a "better" Yahoo Answers.. which wouldn't be terrible, I suppose, given the abysmal quality of YA
09:09
@TimPost Thats always the most important bit - if you look at all the best online communities they have all succeeded because of the people not the software - I mean, just look at 4chan...
Software had nothing to do with the success of 4chan, that is certain.
@TimPost mmmm, I don't think the typical Quora user is less bright actually. At least not judging from the few Quora users I know. But their "ethics" on what makes good Q&A are vastly different from the culture on SO
I think we may be using a definition of "best" I'm not familiar with if 4chan is the prime example
4chan is a ginormous angry fruit salad
for example: where is the "meta" on quora?
09:10
What is this even supposed to be?
That's not a question, it's some guy using Quora as his personal blog
@JeffAtwood it's the discussion areas underneath the many news articles and blog posts about how great it is
Why don't we have blogs??? <ducks>
2
I dunno, from what I've seen Quora = The new digital sopbox
If that's the case then its destined to at least be extremely popular
I think the user base that hates frequent drama is drastically underestimated, if only because they rarely participate in on-line communities that are full of drama.
I have no doubt there will be many brilliant insights from really successful people on Quora (although we would probably call many of them douchebags :) But it's going to be far from useful Q&A
09:13
@Kragen give me an example of a useful URL from quora though
@JeffAtwood Never said it was going to be useful, just its going to be popular - Lots of people enjoy having a good moan! :-)
Quora is a joke :) Screw TechCrunch hype.
I'm sure that you could take 20 random people and give them a problem to solve, or a question to answer and you'd get something out of it. But if you give them tools and motivation, you get something much better.
we have done quite a few things to adapt ideas, as we have from other sources..
09:15
@JeffAtwood quora.com/challenges (code golf :)
38
Q: What can we learn from Quora?

Jeff AtwoodWhen we were doing the VC rounds, the company (rightly or not) that was on every VC's radar in the Q&A field was Quora. Link to sign up: http://quora.com/hackernews Quora is a question and answer site focused on getting really high quality, authoritative content on any topic that p...

@Benjol you might have just effectively banned cold golf :/
My phone's charging again. I think the 50-cent mini-USB cables I got from meritline aren't very high quality... I'm using the charger and cable it came with now.
28
A: What can we learn from Quora?

wafflesI'm adding this for everyone's amusement....

@TimPost, no-one does them better than LiraNuna. My all-time fave was
121
Q: Code Golf: Lasers

LiraNunaThe challenge The shortest code by character count to input a 2D representation of a board, and output 'true' or 'false' according to the input. The board is made out of 4 types of tiles: # - A solid wall x - The target the laser has to hit / or \ - Mirrors pointing to a direction (depends ...

09:17
W T F
But then what's not to like with lasers :)
@Benjol Mine too!
The only similarity is that both sites are Q&A. I tend to think the one that was founded and seeded with really smart people who know how to write software to make humans do what they want is going to succeed.
"Sorry, you must have an invitation to create an account on Quora." , well F&#* you too!
@JeffAtwood, despite all you say, haven't you implemented all of these?
24
A: What can we learn from Quora?

Shog9Ignoring all the ingratiating "social" bits, auto-followed topics (yeah, of course I want to be notified of any new questions about Paul Graham) and ugly, crowded, Facebook-ish layout... ...There are some good ideas: Topic (tag) pages have editable summaries, and display recent answers. (Expa...

Except 3, perhaps
Almost every good feature Quora has, the SO userbase has come up with independently
Is it me or is SEDE very slow sometimes?
09:31
Hmm, I haven't noticed it being particularly slow since it moved off Azure, but I suppose I haven't used it too much recently.
18 mins ago, by Jeff Atwood
we have done quite a few things to adapt ideas, as we have from other sources..
SEDE should be very fast at all times since it is on dedicated hardware with a lot of memory
Hmm.. anyway, I need someone who has gotten a editing badge near the last data update to test my new query here
I earned the editor badge 6 hours ago on dba.se
No, not that one. The silver and gold ones
A single edit is hardly a feat ;)
I didn't know you were querying for feats.
09:37
Strunk & White / Copy Editor?
@TimStone Yup
Hmm... the query doesn't seem quite right
Ah, count me out then, not quite there even on SO. Though now that things are a little less hectic around here maybe I can find some more time to clean up stuff (and perhaps answer a few more questions here and there, heh)
@YiJiang, show us the query then...
0
Q: cloud computing

prajnaI want to know how to implement cloud computing practically. how can I implement c program as the service on it?

09:40
2
Q: Set up MongoDB on Nodejs server using Node-Mongodb-native in EC2 environment.

seatoskyhkI got help from many people here and now I want to contribute back. For those who are having trouble to make a nodejs server work with mongo, here is what I've done. Environment: EC2, AMS-Linux-AMI Purpose: Take a http request and log the query, ip and the timestamp into MongoDB. Steps 1) ...

^ This isn't a question, it's a tutorial. Close?
Uh oh, I think my company has new competition
I'm already out of close votes :/
@DanGrossman Ask to split answer section into new A?
@YiJiang Not sure what you are trying to achieve but user ID 48503 got theirs on 2011-01-07 according to the data explorer.
@YiJiang, yes
09:41
@DanGrossman I'm not :)
@Kragen It says 117, I bet the thing is over counting here
I'd vote to close this one too
0
Q: Node.js: Shall I use Vows or Expresso or NodeUnit or Zombie.js or All??

donaldHi, What shall I use when developing a node.js application? Regards

@YiJiang You're right, very slow for me, but then it is a loooot of data
@YiJiang Heh, now I understand your comments about SEDE being slow - it needs a query execution plan feature adding!
@YiJiang Yeah, its definitely over counting then - according to the data dump user 425275 doesn't have the badge, but the query says they have 249 edits.
502 edits for me :_
@YiJiang, I think your counting once for each type of edit, so if I edited title and body and tags on one post, I get 3
09:49
@YiJiang Why are you counting tag edits?
@Benjol Yeah, but I really don't know how to dedupe it
@TimStone Eh, those count as edits too, no?
No, I don't think so.
Perform a total of 100 edits between questions and answers

* Edits to your own posts do not count
* Edits to CW posts do not count
* Edits that consist only of tag changes do not count
* Tag wiki edits do count
@TimStone Okay, let me update the query then
I'd say you need to group by RevisionGuid first
Also, can't you figure out the post history type IDs first to avoid that inner join? :P
09:52
Global warming protest.
@TimStone Well, yes... hmmm
ISNULL(p.CommunityOwnedDate) should check for CW status, yes?
I believe so, yeah.
> Incorrect syntax near the keyword 'WHERE'.
Grrr... what sort of error message is this
In computer science a syntax error refers to an error in the syntax of a sequence of characters or tokens that is intended to be written in a particular programming language. For compiled languages syntax errors occur strictly at compile-time. A program will not compile until all syntax errors are corrected. For interpreted languages, however, not all syntax errors can be reliably detected until runtime, and it is not necessarily simple to differentiate a syntax error from a semantic error; many don't try at all. A syntax error may also occur when an invalid equation is entered into a c...
:smirk:
The kind that lets you know you have a syntax error near WHERE? :P
09:58
where is that syntax error near where
@Reno Oh, haha
@YiJiang, down to 417 with this (ugly) query:
DECLARE @UserId int = ##UserId##

SELECT COUNT(*) FROM
(
SELECT DISTINCT ph.RevisionGuid
FROM
    PostHistory ph
  INNER JOIN
    PostHistoryTypes pht ON ph.PostHistoryTypeId = pht.Id
WHERE
    (pht.Name = 'Edit Title'
  OR
    pht.Name = 'Edit Body'
  OR
    pht.Name = 'Edit Tags')
  AND
ph.UserId = @UserId
GROUP BY ph.RevisionGuid) AS SQ
DECLARE @UserId int = ##UserId##

SELECT
    COUNT(*)
FROM
    PostHistory ph
  INNER JOIN
    Posts p ON (p.Id = ph.Id)
WHERE
    (ph.PostHistoryTypeId = 4 OR ph.PostHistoryTypeId = 5)
  AND
    ph.UserId = @UserId
  AND
    p.CommunityOwnedDate IS NULL
  AND
    p.OwnerUserId != @UserId
GROUP BY
    ph.RevisionGUID
So I've still got a ways to go...
This is what I have right now
10:03
But its now under-counting
I don't include wiki tag edits, but I don't think they account for 40 or so edits
If a user edits the same question twice, is that 2 or 1?
@Kragen In my query 2, in yours 1.
Yours takes me down to 137, even further to go :(
Yeah, wondering which is right - mine is definitely under counting btw
@Kragen Would a sub-query perform better than a join?
Doesn't matter (or so I've heard and not that I've seen)
@YiJiang, not sure, sql is pretty smart
10:06
SQL server should optimise the difference away in theory (as long as the queries are actually the same)
I just find sub queries easier to visualise what's going on.
Does rolling back an edit count?
That query of mine is timing out :(
@Kragen It does not, I believe
@TimStone Well, that didn't quite work - apparently comparing to NULL is the correct method - msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ms184325.aspx
Oh, yes...sorry. I'm going back to bed :P
(And you want IS NOT NULL by the way)
Question, why does the Precognitive badge exist on SO?
@Benjol peace has been restored data.stackexchange.com/stackoverflow/…
@Benjol To inform people that A51 actually exists
10:14
auto banning is in place
@YiJiang, yeah, I just found the question on meta...
weird
If it's for frustration purposes, Beta already served that function :)
if you trigger 100 new data.se queries an hour you are boxed for an hour ... trigger 130 and you are banned for ever (until you write the unbanning code)
@waffles, that could be a bit low
how many were they doing an hour?
@TimStone Actually, it should be IS NULL, since we're looking for posts not owned by community
4 a minute
10:16
@Benjol Who's they?
@YiJiang is probably close to the limit now, with all the permutations of his query :)
@YiJiang, there were 991 pages of someone polling SEDE, one post at a time
meaning it would be below the radar at 240 ... so 100 seemed kind of reasonable
since Jan 16th
It takes more than a minute to run this query, so I think I'm pretty safe :-)
@Kragen Hahaha...
10:17
@waffles, @Yi needs help btw :)
@waffles Look up a bit, we were trying to create an edit count query
Me too - I decided to have a quick go and now this damn query is driving me insane!
12 mins ago, by Yi Jiang
@Kragen Would a sub-query perform better than a join?
data.stackexchange.com/stackoverflow/q/68772/… - This is my current attempt but I cant work out why it only returns 71 edits for someone who has the Strunk & White badge in the data dump.
10:19
is it timing out? a quick optimisation would be to only include users with more than 1000 rep
that would speed it up a lot
It even includes CW edits - the only thing I can think of is that its not including some edit types that it should be (like rollbacks or something)
@waffles Eh... how does that help here?
We're trying to query for the number of qualified edits made by a user towards the editing badges
My query there is currently timing out
hmmm we need a few indexes there
I'll add them
lol - love it
Hmmm... I wonder who that is
@waffles Is there anyway of accessing the Data Explorer's data through, say, PHP code? I've tried reading through some of the oData information, but it's difficult to understand
10:32
@YiJiang Have you tried downloading the data dump? Its a faf to set up, but it means you have the whole data set.
@YiJiang not much I can do ... the issue is a cold cache ... these pages are not in ram so the query is taking a while to load into memory ... try it a couple of times it should work on second run
@YiJiang ... the json interface is very straight forward
@waffles Can you point me to a tutorial?
the source is the best tutorial ... have a look at the uncompressed js files
@Kragen Well, I'm not sure if I want set up a SQL server to host several gigabytes of SO data
10:33
@waffles Will have a look, thanks
@YiJiang its also possible stuff was a bit on the slow side due to that robot flooding us
10:45
Hmmm... a bronze [discussion] badge awaits me on MSO, apparently
@Benjol That question there need the [stackexchange-2.0] tag
@YiJiang, done
@Benjol I think you might want to edit that question to be more focused, since I think, from the question your main concern here is one of moderation
If the world will end in 2012 why are we collecting collecting virtual badges and reps. Quora makes sense to me now. >_<
You'll also want to mention that sites will have to operate without mods until they've been assigned, which may take... ehrm... how long again?
@YiJiang, yeah, though that is the focussed version :) There are further ramifications - there's a big underlying discussion that needs to be had about just how democratic and community-driven SE sites really are.
There is a lot of talk about community, but personally I think the none of the big revolts would have happened if the 'overlords' had just come out and said that it's a benevolent dictatorship.
But that's a bit too much to fit in one question :0
10:55
Pah - I give up. I must be missing some post edit types or something (or the calculation used for Strunk & White badge is wrong)
@YiJiang, maybe I should delete my question, and ask that instead...
@Benjol Just edit it, it's similar enough anyway
@YiJiang, deleted, I'm going to ask the underlying question instead. Hope I don't get banned for life :)
11:24
@DanGrossman Can I flag that message for that picture?
Oh look, it started raining again
@YiJiang and @badp, before I post my question, can you think of - or find - any existing questions which talk about the autonomy-or-not of stackexchange sites?
I don't mind posting a controversial question, I do mind posting a controversial dupe :)
@Benjol um, I guess everything about closed questions talks about the non autonomy of SE as the be-all-end-all place about each topic
is that what you meant?
No, I mean what happened on math.meta at the end of last year, for example.
I mean moderators being rulers of all, until Jeff or Robert steps in
11:56
So, do I take that silence as: you're not there, you can't find any references, or you are shocked and awed by my irreverence? :)
@Benjol I'm... speechless by your blasphemous attempt at slandering our Dear Leader, Jeff Atwood! How dare you!!!
At least I didn't call him a website administrator :)
@Benjol They own the place...
ok, so no dupes?
I can press the big red button?
@Benjol GO GO GO!
Or, as @RebeccaChernoff commands you,
Jan 22 at 5:52, by Rebecca Chernoff
PRESS THE BUTTON
12:10
0
Q: Site autonomny and governance: community-driven democracy or benevolent dictatorship?

BenjolWe need to talk. We need to talk about StackExchange sites: about their autonomy, about governance. We need to sift through all the analogies that have been thrown around (democracy, policemen, administrators, overlords, etc.) and decide which ones are useful and truthful. Is StackExchange the...

I'm not really active on meta.math(s)...so what happened? high-rep rampage?
@tombull89, I don't have any really handy links to hand, but they got pretty irate about Jeff intervening.
@tombull89 Quite a few - a temp. mod quitting, several 'I hate this Stack Exchange feature' rants on Meta, one long term suspension... let's see, what else?
Oh yes, that 'Open Letter to Jeff Atwood' thing over a user refusing to not use the enter key in the comment field. Yeah.
It was pretty ... hairy, and nerves are still pretty raw over there.
wow...and something else more recent on SO as well?
@YiJiang seriously?
12:20
@tombull89, no
@tombull89 Yup, I can get you the questions if you want
ah ok, I think maybe I'm getting mixed up with something else
@YiJiang I'd appricaite that, sometimes there's just so much on different meta sites and different chat rooms it's tricky to keep track of everything
The most annoying thing was the general "we, mathematicians, are inherently different to you, developers, you can't possibly understand or discern that our name-calling and slanging matches are actually just 'robust discussion'"
19
Q: I quit. Here's why.

IsaacI have offered my resignation as a moderator to the SE team and I think it's important that I provide some explanation here. Principally, I decided over the past weekend to pull the advertising for math.SE from a local professional newsletter because I was no longer comfortable recommending the ...

No wait, that Open Letter one is different from the other incident, got them mixed up because both had email in them, heh. The Open Letter question:
25
Q: An open letter to Jeff Atwood

Akhil MathewDear Mr. Atwood, I have been an active user on Math.SE for several months now. I have enjoyed participation in the website together with the interaction with other mathematicians that it has brought me. I have learned much from the answers provided me by experts, and I am glad to have contribute...

@YiJiang, that's the nicer of the two letters...
One close vote... ;)
12:26
And this is the one about the User Who Won't Use Comments Properlyâ„¢:
-4
Q: Threatening emails from Jeff Atwood

Robin ChapmanI just received the following threat in private email from Jeff Atwood. I have no intention of corresponding privately with Mr Atwood, so I reproduce his message here. Mr Atwood starts with a greeting "Hi Robin". His bogus familiarity is neither deserved nor welcome. He accuses me of leaving mu...

And Quora users think we have no drama and other fun stuff. Meh.
@TimPost We have Unicorns! How dare they!
aw snap, Robin is a diamond mod
a fair bit indeed then.
I'll just get some popcorn
2
wait, unicorn replaced popcorn
I'll get something that ends in orn
That site has been a hot spot since se 2.0 had to figure out what to do with the 1.0 sites
I'm half tempted to flag the meta.math SE ones for moderator attention, but that would mean needing to make an account there
12:35
I though the 1.0 sites was the "avaible to buy/own use" ones?
They may be.. I lost track.. I thought math SE was the last 1.0 site that had to get on the new platform TBH
@badp, I'd say the 1.0->2.0 transition did cause quite a lot of scars
@Benjol Math.SE isn't really a SE 1.0 to 2.0 transition
@TimPost We have a place to hide the drama in, as opposed to what they have :)
@badp, a lot of it was over technical stuff, initially, stuff that could actually be resolved with a plan
12:38
There's a few (a lot?) MO users there, but the focus is different
I think custom latex hooks was one issue, for instance .. I can't remember them all
@Benjol At the end of the day, would you continue selling a product that goes against your values and just doesn't work?
Admitting you fucked up isn't easy
(Also weren't the SE 1.0 owners refunded? I think I read something about it.)
@YiJiang, I'm not saying it is. But it wobbled quite a lot of people's trust
mathoverflow, originally was a place that would befuddle even the most crafty programmer .. and it wasn't because of the math.
@TimPost Was it because of the titles? :)
12:40
@badp They were, I think - it was (Jeff?) who said that they didn't get a cent for the SE 1.0 sites
Sometimes I like to think they talk about the simplest things, then put scary sounding titles on them
@badp I think most of them never got as far as paying
"How to linearly combine zero-dimensional manifolds using ring operations?"
(How to add 2 and 2?)
@Benjol I had a SE 1.0 site, was never asked for money. We 'just knew' that the beta would end at some time and $119 was around the corner
actually I need to find out what "manifold" means :|
bbl lunch
12:41
Then no more $119 around the corner .. and here came 2.0
@all, just to be clear. I'm not saying that 1.0-2.0 wasn't the right or logical thing to do. It's just that you can say "we're all in this together" and then say "we're shutting you down, sorry", without admitting that there IS a power imbalance.
I was actually really happy when 2.0 came out
I thought it was a good move.
The quality of some of the sites was just horrible .. and being on the same physical network, lets just say great SEO wasn't looking too good
@TimPost I still think it's better than the 1.0 model
Ok, so what about the DynDNS "forums"/community site? that looks like it is powered by the SO engine...dyndnscommunity.com
The only viable 1.0 site that comes to mind is MO, to be honest
12:44
@tombull89, there are still several 1.0 sites around. but come april they're on their own (with the possible exception of mathoverflow, I believe)
Lesson learned: If you want to build great communities, recruit cooks over mathematicians.
Ok, it's just that the DynDNS one "looks" like a 2.0 site
in my mind, ayway
moms4mom.com is pretty good still
Any topic that has followers who don't really care about the interface much, or 'how stackexchange works (version X)' does well
@Benjol Ack! Green and purple! My eyes!
12:48
@YiJiang, content is king :)
@YiJiang EpicAdvice didn't suck either, despite its design...
(The top EpicAdvice user is now a 10ker on Gaming)
moms4mom are mostly guys
@badp, wow, that lunch was quick... (for an italian ;)
@reno, do you think so?
@Benjol ;)
Polly's on there :)
12:56
@Benjol just a guess D:
dont change the name, its cool D:
In the to 10, there are at least 5 ladies
> Public speaking is like having a baby - easy to conceive, hard to deliver
and impossible for men
@Reno Well, Obama's had quite a lot of babies... wait, what?
anyways, gotta go do some work...
13:01
Abraham lincoln had the best baby ever at gettysburg. jus'sayin'
Would somebody mind asking one more on-topic question on this proposal?
88
The Great Outdoors

Proposed Q&A site for all age groups who love the great outdoors, whether its camping, bushcraft, canoeing, kayaking, hiking, or even backpacking around the world, whatever your adventure we hope to answer your questions...

Currently in defintion.

It's been stuck at "needs 1 more" for days, driving me nuts
and Taylor swift's baby was aborted , because Kanye had to have a baby
@Reno Hahaha
Sometimes I hate Mac developers
Doing awesome stuff I just can't try
I think it's just out of spite!
@badp ahahahahaha
But on the other hand, it costs $20
13:06
@Pekka there's a free version too, it degrades over time.
<stereotype> This has market potential only on the Mac </stereotype>
@badp ah, didn't see that
Considering it's a toy mainly, it makes sense
$20 for that? Geesh...
13:44
Good Morning Tavernites
Well, just revised my nomination for the last time
Good Luck Tim!
I'm amazed that it looks like I'm getting past the nomination phase
Yeah, it all kind of petered out at the 11k mark - I was expecting to see the minimum rep at around 20k ish

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