> If I was just now learning to program, an abrasive comment on SO would not turn me off to programming, but it would make me dislike certain types of people mo

> If I was just now learning to program, an abrasive comment on SO would not turn me off to programming, but it would make me dislike certain types of people more, and in the future I would steer clear of that particular website. This actually describes me fairly well. I began seriously pursuing programming as both a hobby and profession about 6 years ago. I was turned off by SO's somewhat prickly community, and to this day only use it as a search engine. That's just it, though : SO is just SO. As valuable as it is, it's still only one resource among many. That was true then, and is even more true now. What your comment helped me internalize was that one of my principle objections with the OP is that the scope is overly broad. It's not so much about "beginners vs professionals" as it is about "Stack Overflow vs the uninitiated". It's perfectly legitimate to write about how to correctly ask questions on SO, but framing it as some sort of macro issue concerning the programming community at large feels wrong headed to me.