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00:15
[ SmokeDetector | MS ] Misleading link, shortened url in answer: What should I look for when getting a treadle sewing machine second hand? by user4844 on crafts.SE
@MartinJames I don't eat fish for religious reasons. And am allergic to pineapple
 
3 hours later…
sag
sag
03:11
Possible serial downvoting?
I'm getting downvotes on some of my old posts from years ago.
user310756
@sag why are you bringing this into this room, It's a SO issue. Raise a flag on SO and we'll reply as to why this is happening
 
1 hour later…
05:21
[ SmokeDetector | MS ] Blacklisted website in answer, pattern-matching website in answer, potentially bad keyword in answer: How to repair an Exchange mailbox database in a dirty shutdown state? by Rama kanth on serverfault.com
@sag You'll need a moderator to confirm that
05:43
[ SmokeDetector | MS ] Bad keyword in answer, blacklisted website in answer: Game Development Institute? by sopha on gamedev.SE
sag
sag
@Magisch It's ok now. My rep came back because "user was removed"
06:05
[ SmokeDetector | MS ] Pattern-matching website in body, potentially bad keyword in body: Can you suggest the exact answer for this puzzle? by Benjamin Blalock on mathoverflow.net
These things happen :)
(and if the user hadn't been removed, chances are it would have tripped off the automatic serial voting system)
06:17
@JourneymanGeek Imo no
From what that looks like, it looks like it'd fall out of scope of the serial detection script
I obviously don't know exactly how it works, but I've got a pretty good idea
hope
nope
Nor do I ;p
tis' not for us non staff users to know
nope ;p
and I suspect a lot of the time we don't even notice unless a user points it out
I actually have a way to find serial downvoting relatively reliably, but there's so much of it and the effects are comparably minor that I don't bother
I'm fairly sure the CMs/Mods would come down on me like a ton of bricks if I flagged another 150~180 custom flags that take ages to investigate a week
@JNat daily network wide spammer for your kindly nuking... thanks! :)
(see their MSE account for recent spam)
07:06
What a mess Cathay Pacific has put my cousins in...
07:24
funny that I instantly know which user is meant here.
check
sigh
trash that message of me pls
@SonictheInclusiveHedgehog lol, which miserable airport are they stuck in for some undefined and unknowable period?
@MartinJames They were stuck in Hong Kong until we called CX and they rebooked them.
The one thing I like about the U.S. airlines is that they have better IT infrastructure than many foreign carriers.
07:40
So... what happened to the 1-star wall?
@SonictheInclusiveHedgehog maybe, but at leaat HK has, (by rep - not been there), a well-respected airport. Many US seem to be dumpsters with a runway attached:(
1 message moved to Chimney
07:54
@MartinJames It would have made it extremely inconvenient for us if they flew late, because they would have arrived at 12 midnight and then there's a 3-hour drive
The U.S. built their airports first, now they're the worst
@ShadowWizard gone
sd naa
but barely
@JNat thanks!
So.... sex addiction is a mental disease now... according to WHO
08:05
???
I think I might have seen many posts on SE stating that it's not a disease back then...
donno what will happen instead
08:20
Anyway...
The questions for ELL.SE election have been selected... umm, selected? No selection! Candidates get all questions!
@SomewhatMemorableName isn't any addiction considered mental issue?
@ShadowWizard assuming its an actual addiction
True.... that's why there were debates whether sox addiction did exist or not... until WHO declared it?
Also, video game addiction too :O
@JoeFriend really? You're not just saying that? You're really going to remove that bar?
@SomewhatMemorableName sure they exist...
08:35
@ShadowWizard Post 1: Already recently reported [ MS ]
@SmokeDetector ? migrate to Spam Overflow
gone
JNat'd
08:39
Just Naturally nuked
gnat'd (oh, that already exists)
I'll be here making terrible name puns all week
hm. We could do something about that...
@terdon heh, I'm mad that... our whole theme is basically the generic beta theme.
@JourneymanGeek that would bring my Journey here to an early end
"And that your honor, was when I shot him"
08:47
Magnifying @Mag
@Magisch I'm sure we won't mith them when you're through.
@Mithrandir what a random, but direct opinion of yours.
Spoken wisely. In a mage-ish manner, you might say.
@JourneymanGeek Yeah, I really hope they fix that.
@terdon i've made strongly worded complaints (and will keep complaining loudly until its fixed )
09:04
@JourneymanGeek post sad ash pictures, it'll be fixed in a day
sad ash pictures are a weapon of mass distraughtion
But removing the top bar from AU would make me (and many other users) veeeeery happy.
THink this will work?
@terdon oh, I think it certainly is going.
People keep thinking AU is somehow part of Canonical and get confused about what we do there.
or maybe this, cropped down to not show the not actually empty food dish
user image
3
I'll save this one for if it goes live....
user image
3
@JourneymanGeek this... doesn't look sad :O
[ SmokeDetector | MS ] Bad keyword in link text in answer: Recover data from fomatted SD card by captainfrey on superuser.com
@JourneymanGeek aww....
(that's from 06)
10:09
[ SmokeDetector | MS ] Bad keyword in title: Rapid Tone in the improbable occasion by GuadCorn on drupal.SE
10:24
I think this is the first time I find this: Presumption of innocence is a legal right in many countries and international human right under the UN's Universal Declaration of Human Rights, Article 11 as an argument in a meta post ...
-15
Q: Increase the number of votes required to close a question

CykerCurrently, it takes 5 close votes to reach the closing threshold. Each person with >=3000 reputation can cast 50 close votes per day. Problems: It's not difficult to reach 3000 reputation. One way to get that is getting 600 up-votes. This is a number reachable on one question. Getting up-votes...

(I went to Google instead of checking MSO/MSE ._.)
the sad thing is...
until they pulled that out, it seemed mostly sensible
well, I was offended from the start ...
Well adjusting voting thresholds for a larger site could actually be a good thing.
10:37
Yas. It should be 3 CV on SO
That would indicate not enough closevoters?
Meh, we need more close voters. We are a large site because we have plenty of users. They should feel enabled, valued and relevant.
@SomewhatMemorableName lol, human rights for h/w dumpers, but not for curators. If you took all the self-cancelling hypocrisy out of that post, there would not be much left.
erm, hardware dumpers? ;)
@JourneymanGeek we always have 5000+ items on CV review...
10:39
@JourneymanGeek lol, homework fly-tippers.
@SomewhatMemorableName so.. not enough closevoters.
ahh
I was trying to work out if you meant HVs
@MartinJames add a homework tag. Automatically close any questions with it ;p
@JourneymanGeek lol, if I could get it passed, I would propose it. Anyway, we did have a 'homework' tag on SO, but it got burned.
;p
I don't think TPTB would like the idea of butterfly mines (which IRL are utterly vile things) for hapless newbies.
Oh well, I took a bite on that meta post...
@JourneymanGeek I would not mid so much if the newbs could ask a half-decent question. Not even a good SO, question, just any question, as they might ask to a doctor, lawyer, accountant or garage technician, but no. It's so often just 'my car does not work right' or 'I'm feeling sick'.
10:45
@MartinJames as someone who has desktop support for most of my life...
I hear stuff like that a lot
Thats an utter pipe dream to get people in general to ask good questions
Welp, my keyboard doesn't work right.
It types by itself...
@SomewhatMemorableName Oh? mne s fne:)
Anyway, random topic change: I am surprised there are still highly negative scored questions on SO in the last 3 years
3 are locked ...
 
1 hour later…
12:44
Why does a serpent-wielding Englishman delete users and how can I protect myself from him?
13:00
Julia & Jason on July 10, 2018

Last month, Joe wrote about the Welcome Wagon work that we are doing to make Stack Overflow more welcoming and inclusive. Our current work involves projects across domains from asking questions to framing community standards and more; one project we have been working on is understanding how comments are used and misused on Stack Overflow.

We are a data engineer (Jason) and data scientist (Julia). As folks who code for a living and use Stack Overflow, as well as work here, we have certainly experienced and witnessed unwelcoming behavior in Stack Overflow comments first hand, whether through cond …

@AnneDaunted This is ... something that' a lot of folk are wondering.
The two comments there received no answer
So, they found the ultimate unwelcoming user. He asked why a question got a totally unrelated tag, and now he's featured for all eternity as someone who scares people away from Stack Overflow. That's really nice.
@Feeds I was fooled by "Log in to Stack Overflow" button -_-
@ShadowWizard wait what?
13:16
Read the blog.... see the comments "Hall of Shame".
If I'd see my own comment there, I'd feel very and utterly unwelcome.
And anyone can find the author of those comments easily with Google search, so it's same as if they wrote their name there as well.
Oh well... time for another clean-up...
@ShadowWizard that really does it ...
@SomewhatMemorableName If those comments are still there after being reviewed by dozens of SE employees, guess it means they should stay, not shoved under the rug.
(probably so that they can give them as example for bad behavior.)
I've edited the Q and flagged the comment as NLN
That's... cheating!
:D
13:27
[ SmokeDetector | MS ] Bad keyword in answer, bad keyword with email in answer, potentially bad keyword in answer: Did the Nazis kill Jews with gas chambers? by Allan Davis on skeptics.SE
Anyway, I don't really see why the 3rd comment's deemed "unwelcoming".
And the 5th comment might be unwelcoming if taken out of context...
(both are still there)
@shog9 was it really the intent of the company to make it so easy to find the users that left those unwelcoming comments? If yes, no words to express my feelings; if no, please fix the blog or delete the comments.
13:43
@rene gee, of only people didn't self organise into angry mobs
This comment really rubs me the wrong way:
@Yvette - the question has the [discussion] tag. Comments are meant for extended discussion at meta, there is no other way to have one. We went over this before, what is it that you try to accomplish? — Hans Passant 51 mins ago
Is it just me being sensitive or is that actually really rude couched in objectivity?
@Magisch I have no idea, since it's nln > Yvette's comment seems to be gone?
Also, it may be blunt... could have been couched better, could also have been a LOT worse?
13:55
Do comments not show up on the blog? I posted a comment, received a URL to the comment, but there aren't any comments.
@Magisch I'm personally not a big fan of 'we went over this before'... but it's sometimes necessary.
@Andy I think they stopped approving comments a while ago
Ugh.
@Magisch Hans has a point but he is also known to be direct. I can handle it but I take it if you find it rude.
I'm not sure thats why I asked
I don't feel strongly enough in either direction
@JourneymanGeek probably true, didn't want to organize a mob. I don't rule out there is a grand plan behind this and that all possible side-effects are account for ....
@rene I'd assume the answer is no
stackexchange is really big on no public shaming
@rene meant about calling out comments.
@Magisch I also assume no, yet current public evidence shows otherwise
Also if you think its bad enough to call out, maybe... delete them?
14:05
@JourneymanGeek ah
It would behoove that if you're giving an example of unacceptable behavior, that that example should be dealt with, yes.
@rene linky to the blog?
(the post you're referencing)
@Magisch scroll back a bit
@Magisch The "Welcome Wagon", scroll up abit
1 hour ago, by Feeds
Julia & Jason on July 10, 2018

Last month, Joe wrote about the Welcome Wagon work that we are doing to make Stack Overflow more welcoming and inclusive. Our current work involves projects across domains from asking questions to framing community standards and more; one project we have been working on is understanding how comments are used and misused on Stack Overflow.

We are a data engineer (Jason) and data scientist (Julia). As folks who code for a living and use Stack Overflow, as well as work here, we have certainly experienced and witnessed unwelcoming behavior in Stack Overflow comments first hand, whether through cond …

@rene deleting the comments won't help, Google cache it for long days, sometimes months.
14:07
^ shoo, another one-box :(
@SomewhatMemorableName some rooms forbid them ...
Anyway, I might already be biased against SE management, but I'm really curious of this
> We had 57 participants who made 13,742 ratings on 3,992 comments.
Who are they?
SE staff ...
Maybe I'm old fashioned but none of the 5 examples seem to be in any way unwelcoming to me
Some are rather direct feedback yes, but they're feedback. And there are no insults in there from what I can see
"You're doing something wrong" isn't a loaded statement imo
@rene ... I'm idiot. I skipped a whole sentence...
14:10
Especially the tagging one confuses me. Yes the sentence structure is odd but why is that a given to be assumed as malice and not that OP isn't a native speaker or has that quirk?
@SomewhatMemorableName if I confirm that I'm probably kicked from chat, so I'll refrain from comments ... ;)
@rene actually... I don't think so. They probably took some external people for this.
I think they took anyone who isn't an active user of SO
Probably paid them a bit to amend for the time, but 57 people are about all SE employees...
and then showed those comments in isolation
14:12
I've definitely gotten way worse comments on my posts that I also didn't find unwelcoming, so maybe it's my bias here
@rene Might be, hence easy to take them out of context.
but that still doesn't matter. I don't mind that random people classify comments. I do mind if those comments that deemed to be a problem can be linked back to an individual, whether the comment is awful or not.
Dillemma of how to show a proof that there are perceived unwelcome out-of-context comments.
This should not be a witch hunt but publishing as they did makes it easy for the SE outer world to pin point the specific problem users.
They've been deleted, it was an oversight on my part. I thought they were deleted, so I didn't ask anyone if they deleted them, because it didn't occur to me to do so.
I take 100% responsibility for it, and I'll make amends if anyone is adversely affected by my oversight.
14:18
I still feel you need to redact the blog a bit, Google doesn't forget easily ...
@TimPost Deleting them is not enough. Any enterprising user can find the authors on SEDE within minutes
and that ^
Or at least until Sunday and the next datadump refresh ...
@Andy @YvetteColomb I wonder, was this user suspended before on SO? I have a feeling that's not their first suspension. (Don't want details, just yes/no. :)) Thanks!
Not my position to give user history.
@TimPost are all the comments found to be unwelcome deleted? Or only those few featured in the blog?
14:25
Probably privileged information that the mods signed an agreement not to reveal
@Andy user now rants on MSE about their suspension, so I think it's fair to know if they're lying.
(they claim it's their first suspension.)
@ShadowWizard The ones on the blog. We're still doing analysis on the remainder of the set / exposing the tool to additional perspectives / etc.
I see.
Any reason those were selected to be in the blog, or just random?
Yes.
Will any further steps be taken to anonymize the authors of those comments?
like can someone scrub them off of the current data dump in SEDE?
14:28
We're editing the blog post right now
@TimPost thanks
Ah, nice. Sorry to be so persistent over this but it's a tad bit delicate. Some of these users have linked professional reputations that could get ruined over something like this
It's okay. While this was an honest mistake I agree that we can't be too careful in correcting it. Also removing the comments from SEDE.
@TimPost just curious are you informing the authors of the deleted comments?
and there is the first MSO post: meta.stackoverflow.com/q/370793/578411 /cc @TimPost
14:39
@Mgetz Yeah, I'm going to get an email out to them as soon as I can (I think I'll have my hands full for a few hours, at least)
@TimPost I'm also a little concerned that your rating system rates comments without context
I'm a little concerned that you're a little concerned, but I gotta go type paragraphs for a few. I'll field questions about this as soon as we get it managed.
sensing endless concern loop
breaking loop by not being concerned about it
@Mgetz The way comments are displayed (depending on the # of them, voting, etc) - folks often) see them completely out of context, and it's iffy if people that don't expand them aren't seen again (anon users are difficult to test). So, we kinda need to see what people think seeing them randomly.
Fair enough
14:45
In the spirit of being unwelcome.... looks like we made the OP here pack their stuff and leave. Probably for the best?
@rene no. Should be fixed now.
Yes, thanks.
Suddenly too much drama, brain asploded, need to sleep.
@Mgetz they're shown in threads, which is... actually more context than mods get by default when evaluating flags from the dashboard. Probably could be improved, but I doubt it's relevant in most cases.
12 mins ago, by Mgetz
Fair enough
14:57
Some ideas toward improving this:
4
Q: Mod Tooling for comments UI improvement suggestions

AndyI am going through the moderator tooling over the next [timeframe] and create some feature requests that I think would improve the UI a bit. I have more radical suggestions for a complete overhaul, but I imagine that's going to be even more work than the number of UI things I'll be posting. (Scre...

Feel free to chime in there if you have thoughts...
@Shog while you're here, can you advise how to turn this unwelcoming comment into something that is welcoming?
> The code you posted cannot yield this result. Please post the real code if you hope to get any help
@Shog9 A serpernt-wielding Englishman?
I just scanned the blog post... Something that's not exactly explicitly said but seems pretty clear if you read between the lines: comment ranking gets pretty wild as you start to include people who can't readily interpret the technical aspects of comments. This was something we observed in past experiments as well, and while not surprising it probably doesn't improve with added context; you kinda do need to be able to understand what you're reading.
@ShadowWizard I'm the wrong person to ask; that doesn't strike me as particularly unwelcoming.
heh, that makes you the right person to ask if you were hoping it wasn't considered unwelcoming
But... I have the dubious advantage of having seen thousands upon thousands of questions with code that doesn't illustrate the problem being asked about. So I probably skew toward assuming that the comment is accurate. YMMV.
15:01
@Shog9 that's... unsettling.
why?
Because, at least for me, you represent SE.
What is unwelcoming about that message?
if there's one thing you should be taking away from this blog post, it's that folks have wildly different evaluations of certain comments.
Hence the value of collecting ratings in aggregate.
One person thinking something is unwelcoming - or not unwelcoming - means almost nothing.
@Shog9 if that one person has lots of influence, it means a lot.
15:03
depends
Maybe SE chose these comments to show that SO is actually not that unwelcoming ;-)
"if that's the worst they can come up with"
Actually those aren't real comments anymore. "These combine elements of real comments to show typical examples"
I mean... I delete comments at the drop of a hat. Welcoming, unwelcoming, rude, funny... If they don't appear to be immediately useful, get rid of 'em.
@Shog9 There are cultural aspects too, I'd be very curious to see which countries have the highest proportion of 'rude' comments
@Mgetz uh-huh... Culture clash is a thing
16
A: Define "subtle put down"

Shog9Hanlon's razor applies here, I think... That may well be just a very poor answer. Comments have and will be deleted at the drop of a hat. If you raise a flag and a comment doesn't seem to be contributing anything useful, the moderator handling it will likely take you at your word that it's probl...

15:06
@AnneDaunted :D
rorschach test for blog readers
if you see unwelcoming, you're welcoming. If you see welcoming, you're unwelcoming. If you see Slender Man, kill your coworkers.
4
What about removing badges for comments (e. g. pundit)?
I just saw Slender Man...
Your poor coworkers
@AnneDaunted I don't see many users complain about the minimum comment rep because they want to earn the badge
15:12
Seriously though: I wouldn't recommend reading too much into this. Julia & Jason are... data people. They tend to be pretty up-front about stuff. That's like their whole job. They're doing this because they believe it's a path to truth, a way to get past conflicting opinions about what is a problem.
The "science" part of social science is... a notoriously rocky road, but I think it's worth trying - just keep in mind that we're gonna need a ridiculous amount of data to actually make concrete conclusions here.
@rene But why have them at all? At best, they have no effect, at worst they encourage useless comments.
y'know what'd be a cool badge? A badge for comments that prompted edits. Could even be awarded if the comment was deleted after the edit was made.
Kind of a pain to audit though.
@AnneDaunted sure but in that light most badges have no effect
@Shog9 thanks for this statement. It's really reassuring me personally.
We’re going to be doing some maintenance on the Data Explorer for just a bit to patch it up. It’ll be back online right after.
15:15
Noooooo
Yes, I just found out
@Shog9 I kind of remember we had a hat for this specific action?
@SomewhatMemorableName we did?
I was about to save my query
quick! copy-paste!
15:16
I did
At least the identification issue was rectified immediately
@rene sorry!
> Think!

> for 6 separate questions or answers, post gets edited by owner after you comment on it -- [Winter Bash 2017](https://meta.stackexchange.com/questions/304340/winter-bash-2017-hats)
The last thing SE needs is to be responsible for ending some well meaning user's careers
@SomewhatMemorableName wow, that sounds like a good badge hat
15:17
@SomewhatMemorableName but how do you know it's your comment that prompted the edit?
@Taryn are you re running an import?
@rene nope, just doing some patching.
the import would take hours
OK
Does the patching have to do with certain comments showing up?
nope, lots of patching of servers this month
15:19
I've saved my query in a gist
but I guess I could just truncate table comments while I'm at it
Just run that at production
@Taryn or delete the 5 specific ones
those are already gone
@rene don't tempt me
I did a variation of "for every table in database truncate table" today on production
then I regenerated the mssql master service key
and shut off the agent to change the configuration
15:28
@Magisch And, when you restarted the stuff the database files refused to be attached again?
@rene SEDE should be back up
I can confirm that, yes
thanks
@Taryn Was SQLServer patched to 2017 RTM? IIRC it was on a RC before?
@rene it was already on 2017, I applied CU8 to it
Ah, ok. Thanks
np. we brought it to 2017 RTM when we did the upgrades in Feb-March 2018
15:39
I must have mis-remembered which version I saw back then.
@rene Nah it all worked fine ... somehow
Even the messaging problem fixed itself
Awesome! I love code that fixes themselves. I have a bunch of that laying around here, waiting for it to do that trick ...
16:35
You've noted that Canonical's top bar has been removed from Ask Ubuntu. This Ask Ubuntu Meta question states "Canonical reached out [...] about making some design changes on Ask Ubuntu to reflect the official Ubuntu site's new design guidelines"; the wording suggests that SEI is legally obligated to implement this top bar under the Ubuntu trademark license agreement. Are you sure this change doesn't violate SEI's agreement with Canonical? — bwDraco 13 mins ago
19
A: Is Ask Ubuntu "official" Ubuntu?

8128Canonical gave permission for Stack Exchange to use the Ubuntu trademark and logo for Ask Ubuntu. A Canonical employee also assisted in the site's new design to help meet the Ubuntu Brand Guidlines. Beyond that Canonical has made no public announcements relating to Ask Ubuntu. (So we must assume...

> Canonical gave permission for Stack Exchange to use the Ubuntu trademark and logo for Ask Ubuntu. A Canonical employee also assisted in the site's new design to help meet the Ubuntu Brand Guidlines [sic].
I'm pretty sure compliance with the Ubuntu Brand Guidelines is mandated under the trademark agreement.
Jan 1 '16 at 8:37, by bwDraco
I would not be surprised if the letter stated something along the lines of "you are reminded that Ask Ubuntu is required to comply with the Ubuntu Brand Guidelines ... we ask that you make the following changes ... you must include a navigation bar at the top of each page on askubuntu.com that is substantially similar to the one displayed at ubuntu.com ..."
16:51
@bwDraco I don't think those cover the top bar, only use of the Canonical and Ubuntu logos.
Hmm...
Then why would Stack Exchange have gone through the trouble to implement the top bar?
And why would a Canonical employee have played a role in site design?
To show that there was a special relationship between AU and Canonical, I think. And Canonical links directly to AU and has it as one of the places users should go to support.
Which is an absolutely horrible thing and causes no end of problems since we have users who have no idea what SE is and think they are asking stuff of Canonical employees.
The question becomes, "are you sure this complies with the Ubuntu brand and design guidelines, as the trademark agreement likely requires?"
@bwDraco What makes you think it doesn't? I haven't looked into this for a while, but I've never heard of Canonical insisting on the top bar.
design.ubuntu.com doesn't exist for no reason.
16:55
@bwDraco Yeah, but all the guidelines I've heard about tended to center on the logos.
See, for instance, the lack of top bar on omgubuntu.co.uk
Perhaps the requirements have been relaxed?
I dunno.
But it's historically something I've noticed with Ask Ubuntu and the text of these Meta posts has long led me to believe SEI is contractually obligated to implement it.
I really, really don't think the top bar has anything to do with this at all. That was just a joint decision between the two companies. And one I have been against since first joining AU, long before becoming a mod there.
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