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There's so many assholes on SO, but there are also people who are incredible at explaining stuff. Unfortunately the assholes are far more promiscuous with down

There's so many assholes on SO, but there are also people who are incredible at explaining stuff. Unfortunately the assholes are far more promiscuous with downvotes, closing and toxic-responses than the good people are with _any_ response. To make it worse assholes see it as their duty to "police" SO to maintain the quality of the forum and will be laughably smug about justifying their actions. The sad thing is it doesn't have to be that way. In fact, the person with the most high score, Jon Skeet, is remarkably gentle and kind in all his interactions. It is a pity more folks don't see him as a role model to emulate.

ChrisDutrow 11y ago
I participate in a circle of people who e-mail new questions that we ask (and answers). If we think the question needs work, we make suggestions. If we like the question, we up-vote it. The extra up-votes help with other people taking the question seriously and it actually getting good answers. If you or anyone else wants to be included, shoot me an e-mail (its in my profile)
- crispyambulance 11y ago
  That's a really cool idea... To be sure I understand, are you saying you're in a group that preps questions for SO and then buttress them against spurious closures/downvotes?
  - ChrisDutrow 11y ago
    If we think it is a good question, we upvote it. I believe this conforms to the rules :) Definitely email if you are interested. And to everyone else reading this: its an open invitation, we'd love to meet some more hackers!
Latty 11y ago
I don't think this problem is as big as people make out. There definitely are the asshole types (unfortunately, a lot fo them are the helpful people after they got burnt out trying to feed the help vampires). There is a middle ground. There is a need to get rid of low quality content or content that doesn't fit on SO - if you remember the time before SO, you remember the experience of wading through the piles of rubbish and nothing that was forums and resources for programmers of the past. The reason SO is different to those and better is because they know what type of content works on the site, and they intentionally limit the site. The right answer is to try and help those people who post the wrong stuff in a nice way (point them at the right places, explain the issue), move on quickly, and answer good questions.
- crispyambulance 11y ago
  > The right answer is to try and help those people who post the wrong stuff in a nice way (point them at the right places, explain the issue), move on quickly, and answer good questions. Indeed, I wish that behavior was more common on SO. Unfortunately, smug remarks, closure and downvotes are the norm. This might be understandable for questions which are clearly ill-conceived, but it happens to ernest, sincere questions as well.
  - Latty 11y ago
    To be fair, they have been cracking down on those kinds of comments - there are even filters that stop you posting certain common toxic comments. It's not perfect, but they are pushing the culture away from that as much as they can. It's worth noting closure isn't always a negative thing - questions closed as a duplicate give the asker an answer and work as pointers for others.

ChrisDutrow 11y ago

I participate in a circle of people who e-mail new questions that we ask (and answers). If we think the question needs work, we make suggestions. If we like the question, we up-vote it. The extra up-votes help with other people taking the question seriously and it actually getting good answers. If you or anyone else wants to be included, shoot me an e-mail (its in my profile)

crispyambulance 11y ago
That's a really cool idea... To be sure I understand, are you saying you're in a group that preps questions for SO and then buttress them against spurious closures/downvotes?
- ChrisDutrow 11y ago
  If we think it is a good question, we upvote it. I believe this conforms to the rules :) Definitely email if you are interested. And to everyone else reading this: its an open invitation, we'd love to meet some more hackers!

Latty 11y ago

I don't think this problem is as big as people make out. There definitely are the asshole types (unfortunately, a lot fo them are the helpful people after they got burnt out trying to feed the help vampires). There is a middle ground. There is a need to get rid of low quality content or content that doesn't fit on SO - if you remember the time before SO, you remember the experience of wading through the piles of rubbish and nothing that was forums and resources for programmers of the past. The reason SO is different to those and better is because they know what type of content works on the site, and they intentionally limit the site. The right answer is to try and help those people who post the wrong stuff in a nice way (point them at the right places, explain the issue), move on quickly, and answer good questions.

crispyambulance 11y ago
> The right answer is to try and help those people who post the wrong stuff in a nice way (point them at the right places, explain the issue), move on quickly, and answer good questions. Indeed, I wish that behavior was more common on SO. Unfortunately, smug remarks, closure and downvotes are the norm. This might be understandable for questions which are clearly ill-conceived, but it happens to ernest, sincere questions as well.
- Latty 11y ago
  To be fair, they have been cracking down on those kinds of comments - there are even filters that stop you posting certain common toxic comments. It's not perfect, but they are pushing the culture away from that as much as they can. It's worth noting closure isn't always a negative thing - questions closed as a duplicate give the asker an answer and work as pointers for others.