Tavern on the Meta

Journeyman Geek

00:24

→ 21 messages moved to Chimney

starball

02:59

@Catija are you okay with being pinged with support-like questions about things about site mechanics and other related things that you would probably know due to your experience?

also, how are you doing lately?

Feeds

05:43

stackoverflow.blog/2023/11/15/…

Journeyman Geek

06:54

→ 3 messages moved to Chimney

Journeyman Geek

08:26

ugh

I got one of those wierd grey-area problems

My dad uses a website for some of his media needs, and I'd like him to be able to access it via his smart TV. There's no android TV app (though there's a phone one) , so I figure there'd be a browser for it. Most of the ones seem dodgy, or are not free, and the one that seemed ok... has strange zooming problems

and I've no idea (amusingly as a former mod) if its on topic for SR, so I'll need to ask

also needing to turn on a TV to test things is annoying

Tinkeringbell

08:43

@JourneymanGeek Not sure you're asking in the right place then :P

Journeyman Geek

lol

I'm just thinking aloud cause it was too quiet

and asked on SR

Tinkeringbell

09:20

Ah. :) It is very quiet in here at times, that's true :)

SPArcheon

10:43

@JNat Asking again, and this time to you specifically (and I assume you can guess why). Given the current way the site works, how does the company expect users to fix accepted answers to abandoned questions that have been made invalid (NON just obsolete) ? Just let the site provide wrong info, look the other side and hope the original OP will fix their answer? Because most of the time the probability of someone returning to the post to update the info are close to zero.

NOTE: this is NOT about code, so please don't turn this in the usual "framework version, still relevant SO-centric answer"

terdon

10:56

@SPArcheon What changed in how the site works? Can people not edit?

SPArcheon

@terdon Start here:

Nov 9 at 12:49, by SPArcheon

303

Q: How do we encourage edits to obsolete/out of date answers?

As the network ages and we have answers that are 7+ years old, we run into situations where changes in technology, etc. result in a once great answer becoming out-of-date, obsolete, or somewhat problematic. We don’t want to lose or delete these answers, due to legacy applications that still need...

Short version: answer made invalid by new events in an Anime.

Nov 9 at 13:45, by Tinkeringbell

@SPArcheon Edit them, preferably some kind of timeline-y fashion?

followed suggestion to the best of my understanding, rejected by employee as "changing answer intent"

Final result: accepted answer still wrong, +1 token to my "why should I waste time helping" stack.

terdon

@SPArcheon sounds like something that should be taken to meta. I doubt JNat was acting as an employee there. More likely they acted as a long time Anime site user and ex mod.

SPArcheon

I think by now it is a Meta.SE topic, not Anime.

terdon

Why? I mean, it sounds like a dispute over a specific edit, right?

SPArcheon

But I already know that if I was to post it here it would be hijacked by the usual idiotic SO-centric view

@terdon True, but that issue is relevant for every site.

On SO you have the standard "Excuse" "yes but software version is relevant" so you fix it by claiming "this was the appropriate answer for this version of the tool"

But for most other sites it is nonsense

Suppose you have a book and a character dies. Someone ask what happens and the correct answer is to say they died.

Then, two books later the character is revealed to have survived

Journeyman Geek

11:04

@SPArcheon I'd just post a new answer, referencing the old one, and mention how things got changed - or if you're particularly brave, ask a new question referencing the old one mentioning the old one is obsolete, then self answer

SPArcheon

@JourneymanGeek there is already a correct answer and I already paid my rep tax to downvote every wrong answer. But the correct one has 2 vote, the accepted 7

terdon

@SPArcheon but the specifics matter. I have no idea if I, personally, would have accepted your edit for instance. It depends on how it was done etc. So asking on the local Meta seems like the right thing to do since this is a specific content dispute.

SPArcheon

@JourneymanGeek Based on how the site works, user will be presented with the wrong, accepted, high voted answer.

Journeyman Geek

and we assume users will actually look past that?

Tinkeringbell

11:26

@SPArcheon "Did Tink's idea" is usually not the way to go about it when I'm talking about sites I have no activity on. If that's not what Anime wants, it doesn't suddenly become a good idea just because I said so.

Had I known you would just go do stuff, I'd have kept my thoughts to myself.

I thought we were having a general discussion, just with a specific example.

SPArcheon

@Tinkeringbell I wasn't accusing of you of anything, just pointing out that it seemed quite reasonable.

Tinkeringbell

Yeah well I can make loads of things seem reasonable, that doesn't make them good.

SPArcheon

@Tinkeringbell I would say that your idea is far more good than "post another answer and hope it will become the accepted one"

Tinkeringbell

'Get rid of sticky accepted answers' is another option.

That way it won't be shown on top, and users can filter for 'newest'

SPArcheon

The "obsolete answer" vote/flag some suggested is yet another, but those require dev work and therefore are even less realistic

terdon

11:39

@Tinkeringbell that's been done on most sites, right? It's a site option.

17

Q: Would you like to have the accepted answer pinned or unpinned on UNIX & Linux?

I've just been made aware of Unpinning the accepted answer from the top of the list of answers where it says: Currently we are planning to move forward with one of two scenarios, based on your feedback: Unpin the accepted answer on all SE sites by default and pin it back on a few sites that ask...

discussion answers user-interface accepted-answer

Tinkeringbell

12:00

@terdon I think so, yes. meta.stackexchange.com/a/369914/369802 the list of sites that wanted to keep is short, ~~and the default (IIRC) became 'unpinned'?~~ I see the post was updated to say that didn't happen after all

JNat

@SPArcheon I couldn't guess why, no — had to read a bit to understand that this is actually a dispute over a suggested edit. I don't understand why you're asking me what the company feels about this. Nor why this is not a conversation had on either the Anime site's Meta or main chat room.

if I'm not acting according to that specific community's guidelines for circumstances such as these, then let's have that discussion where that community can weigh in, and I'll correct my approach in the future. Alternatively, I didn't act against the community's guidelines, and we had a useful discussion for that community.

SPArcheon

@JNat Because I assumed your single-handed reject was done as an employee and not as a standard (mod) user. My bad. As for "why here" it is because I don't care to get that edit made anymore (I mean, I tried, I failed, I don't have more time to fight windmills) but I do want to know what the company would suggest to handle this cases.

That answer is accepted and it is *objectively wrong thanks to new plot details. It is accepted, so it gains more visibility than the correct one. How do you expect to fix this?

As I said, even if you post a correct one that won't fix the fact that the accepted one is wrong. Changing the accepted answer is something only the OP can do... and usually they will be gone by now.

JNat

@SPArcheon While I understand your frustration, I think you're framing this in a way that contributes further to it. I was a member of that community way before I was an employee — I was there from day one, and one of the original mods. I think you know very well that it is not a part of the job description to go through the suggested edits queue, which suggests that any time a staff member does that, they're doing it as a community member.

Now, if you think I shouldn't do it because I have a diamond, that's a different matter and one that should, again, be discussed in that community's Meta site.

There's no "what the company would suggest" here — that's you still misreading my action as that of an employee

SPArcheon

No, you are still misunderstanding mine. You said you weren't acting as an employee there and that I accept (that would bring the question: are you also an elected mod on Anime? Because you still rejected an edit with a single vote thanks to the diamond) .
My question here is asking to the company what should be done in those case. Picked you out because like I said 1) I assumed you were acting as an employee and presenting an official position on the topic and 2) you are an employee so even if that wasn't official maybe you can get some insight on this.

I think the issue is clear, right now we have no way to "remove" accepted obsolete answers turned wrong.

JNat

@SPArcheon but why would the company have anything to say about how that specific community wants to handle this issue?

different communities may come to different conclusions on this, as you yourself identified that SO handles this in their own way

mind you: yes, changes to the software can help here, and I'm not discarding this

SPArcheon

12:12

@JNat Because for once this doesn't seem something that should be left to the community. This is an issue that impacts every site where info about a topic can change without any way to attribute those to a specific version of a framework.

JNat

assume the edit had been rejected by the community. Would you still feel like you were fighting windmills? Or would you have gone to their Meta to discuss?

SPArcheon

@JNat I would still have brought it up here for the reason I just mentioned.

JNat

@SPArcheon if a random assortment of users from that community had rejected that edit you would have pinged me here to ask me what the company thought of that rejection, and how those cases should be handled?

SPArcheon

@JNat well, that should be clear base on the previous answer... The one where I said "it was a single vote rejection so I assumed it was an employee action" - so no, I wouldn't have pinged you but I would probably have mentioned it here still.

JNat

if you wanna talk about it in the context of the Anime site alone, again, I recommend discussing it on their Meta. If you wanna talk about it more broadly, on the network level, I'd recommend looking for existing posts on MSE, and potentially starting your own discussion.

I know outdated content is something that's been thought about in the Teams context for a while, and I see it was an area of focus for a few quarters 'til mid 2022.

I don't remember what came out of it

to set expectations properly: I honestly don't know if working on this is gonna be prioritized or not

Mithical

12:26

The only thing I recall that came out of it was the "trending" answer sort option for SO.

SPArcheon

13:22

@JNat there are already a ton, and many only see the SO side of the issue.

Alas, they did nothing in the end.

7

A: How to deal with obsolete answers?

Speaking of out-of-date answers, now that you can't change your up-vote/down-vote after 5 minutes, only new eyes can add new votes to an answer, until the answer is edited. So an answer that was correct and got up-votes for it, but is now wrong, will only get down-votes if new viewers notice the...

here someone also notices that you can't change your vote on an answer if it becomes invalid

You would need someone to edit it.

Transcript for