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I've used stackoverflow for years and have never heard it put like that. "Stack Overflow ultimately has much more in common with Wikipedia than a discussion fo

I've used stackoverflow for years and have never heard it put like that. "Stack Overflow ultimately has much more in common with Wikipedia than a discussion forum. By this I mean questions and answers on Stack Overflow are not primarily judged by their usefulness to a specific individual, but by how many other programmers that question or answer can potentially help over time." Personally I would have been much more understanding of the process of using stackoverflow if I knew this, and so would many of the people who get stung expecting an answer to their question. In reality the user is contributing their question to the community, not asking a question in the traditional sense. That's my take anyway.

deleted 8y ago
[deleted]
neuland 8y ago
Given this though, is the question / answer format really suiting the purpose?
- sureaboutthis 8y ago
  It did but there aren't enough mods and knowledgeable users to monitor and police the tremendous inflow of off topic questions and answers.
  - neuland 8y ago
    I guess what I'm trying to say is by either adding features or moving to a different model, they could reduce the flow of duplicate/bad questions and lackluster/mismatch answers. One area I wish there were more support in is to aggregate all the knowledge that is split across multiple questions. I think this could be helpful for beginners, but also is extremely specific areas as well. For example, I imagine that a lot of these bad questions come from beginners. So, aggregating answers about common beginner misunderstandings with a library or system into a wiki page. Or, there could be a "getting started" type page that goes over the basic steps and concepts. This is obviously getting into the business of writing docs for projects that either don't have them or don't have good ones, but it seems from the existence of stack overflow that this is actually necessary. Then again, there seems to be tons of questions on projects with really good docs and tutorials. So, maybe you're right and it's just that the people asking bad questions / giving bad answers don't read docs.
    - trowawee 8y ago
      They tried that[1], and it didn't work out for them. [1]: https://meta.stackoverflow.com/questions/354217/sunsetting-documentation https://meta.stackoverflow.com/questions/354217/sunsetting-d...
torstenvl 8y ago
I think this is a good observation, but I still don't think it completely explains the hostility on SO, which quite often seems like an even more hostile and juvenile version of certain Linux distro mailing lists. It honestly seems like most of SO is people screaming "RTFM n00b!" and downvoting questions into oblivion.
- crispyambulance 8y ago
  Yeah, it's a big turn-off. I think the game-ification of SO (in the form of badges, scores, privileges and rules) attracts personalities who crave that shit and don't see any problem with being harsh and dismissive to others that don't follow the rules (as they see them). Regardless of how much SO may say that it's about "the community" rather than the individual, it BECOMES personal when an individual has a genuine problem and gets treated like crap. The whole stack-exchange scene has become an incredibly weird place to ask a question. I find value in it and use it everyday, but I dread asking a question there.
  - gaius 8y ago
    that don't follow the rules (as they see them The rules are exactly what is gamified via the points and badges system. You can’t fault anyone for responding to the incentives they are given, when explicitly set out by the site owners via that system. The personalities attracted by it are the ones that made it successful, by design. Otherwise it would be just another Yahoo Answers. The “rules” only changed after those contributors had made it a success. Some of those people apparently feel it was a “bait and switch”.
    - crispyambulance 8y ago
      > You can’t fault anyone for responding to the incentives they are given, when explicitly set out by the site owners... Oh yes you can! I remember stackoverflow in the early days and it was useful from the beginning. Sure, there were always some persnickety zealots who acted as self-appointed police "protecting" the community from subjectivity and duplicate questions with all the sensitivity of a clock-maker wearing oven mitts. In the last 5-6 years, however, it has been overrun with such strange behavior. One can't simply ask a question unless it meets an unreasonably high standard-- and even then perfectly good questions get slapped down for no reason at all.
sureaboutthis 8y ago
A version of that is published in the Help Center and The Tour--both which everyone is directed to but nobody reads--and then everyone argues with us about.
- EpicEng 8y ago
  If no one reads it then perhaps they need a better mechanism to explain this stuff.
some_random 8y ago
> Personally I would have been much more understanding of the process of using stackoverflow if I knew this, and so would many of the people who get stung expecting an answer to their question. What do you mean here? Why does a separate answer to unknown future readers take precedence over the answer the poster (and other future readers) was looking for?
- TeMPOraL 8y ago
  Why is probably explained somewhere on codinghorror.com. Probably in many places. The issue isn't why that is, but the very fact that it is so. It's not obvious, and it's not really how people use StackOverflow, in the same way Kickstarter used to believe (probably still does) it was about investing in indie creators, whereas people really used it as a preorder store and a marketing platform.
deleted 8y ago
[deleted]
codinghorror 8y ago
> Personally I would have been much more understanding of the process of using stackoverflow if I knew this, and so would many of the people who get stung expecting an answer to their question. My gut feeling is that this worked better in the past because Stack Overflow was at a smaller scale, and the audience was a bit more insular and willing to read stuff about how the systems work on Stack Overflow (programmers love understanding rule systems; it's literally their job most of the time). Now that SO has achieved permanent world scale, the constant influx of new people who don't take the time to learn the ambient norms before posting, and thus cut themselves on what they perceive to be unnecessary sharp edges, is getting .. large. Most of this could be solved by a very detailed, educational multi-step /ask page in my opinion.
- m_myers 8y ago
  I admire your optimistic view of how many users would read such a manual when all they want to know is why doesn't this code do what it's supposed to and can you hurry I need this by 5 pm? But... I do agree that a detailed, educational multi-step page (with examples!) would be an improvement over the current here-are-the-8-rules-for-asking-ok-now-have-fun page.

deleted 8y ago

[deleted]

neuland 8y ago

Given this though, is the question / answer format really suiting the purpose?

sureaboutthis 8y ago
It did but there aren't enough mods and knowledgeable users to monitor and police the tremendous inflow of off topic questions and answers.
- neuland 8y ago
  I guess what I'm trying to say is by either adding features or moving to a different model, they could reduce the flow of duplicate/bad questions and lackluster/mismatch answers. One area I wish there were more support in is to aggregate all the knowledge that is split across multiple questions. I think this could be helpful for beginners, but also is extremely specific areas as well. For example, I imagine that a lot of these bad questions come from beginners. So, aggregating answers about common beginner misunderstandings with a library or system into a wiki page. Or, there could be a "getting started" type page that goes over the basic steps and concepts. This is obviously getting into the business of writing docs for projects that either don't have them or don't have good ones, but it seems from the existence of stack overflow that this is actually necessary. Then again, there seems to be tons of questions on projects with really good docs and tutorials. So, maybe you're right and it's just that the people asking bad questions / giving bad answers don't read docs.
  - trowawee 8y ago
    They tried that[1], and it didn't work out for them. [1]: https://meta.stackoverflow.com/questions/354217/sunsetting-documentation https://meta.stackoverflow.com/questions/354217/sunsetting-d...

torstenvl 8y ago

I think this is a good observation, but I still don't think it completely explains the hostility on SO, which quite often seems like an even more hostile and juvenile version of certain Linux distro mailing lists. It honestly seems like most of SO is people screaming "RTFM n00b!" and downvoting questions into oblivion.

crispyambulance 8y ago
Yeah, it's a big turn-off. I think the game-ification of SO (in the form of badges, scores, privileges and rules) attracts personalities who crave that shit and don't see any problem with being harsh and dismissive to others that don't follow the rules (as they see them). Regardless of how much SO may say that it's about "the community" rather than the individual, it BECOMES personal when an individual has a genuine problem and gets treated like crap. The whole stack-exchange scene has become an incredibly weird place to ask a question. I find value in it and use it everyday, but I dread asking a question there.
- gaius 8y ago
  that don't follow the rules (as they see them The rules are exactly what is gamified via the points and badges system. You can’t fault anyone for responding to the incentives they are given, when explicitly set out by the site owners via that system. The personalities attracted by it are the ones that made it successful, by design. Otherwise it would be just another Yahoo Answers. The “rules” only changed after those contributors had made it a success. Some of those people apparently feel it was a “bait and switch”.
  - crispyambulance 8y ago
    > You can’t fault anyone for responding to the incentives they are given, when explicitly set out by the site owners... Oh yes you can! I remember stackoverflow in the early days and it was useful from the beginning. Sure, there were always some persnickety zealots who acted as self-appointed police "protecting" the community from subjectivity and duplicate questions with all the sensitivity of a clock-maker wearing oven mitts. In the last 5-6 years, however, it has been overrun with such strange behavior. One can't simply ask a question unless it meets an unreasonably high standard-- and even then perfectly good questions get slapped down for no reason at all.

sureaboutthis 8y ago

A version of that is published in the Help Center and The Tour--both which everyone is directed to but nobody reads--and then everyone argues with us about.

EpicEng 8y ago
If no one reads it then perhaps they need a better mechanism to explain this stuff.

some_random 8y ago

> Personally I would have been much more understanding of the process of using stackoverflow if I knew this, and so would many of the people who get stung expecting an answer to their question. What do you mean here? Why does a separate answer to unknown future readers take precedence over the answer the poster (and other future readers) was looking for?

TeMPOraL 8y ago
Why is probably explained somewhere on codinghorror.com. Probably in many places. The issue isn't why that is, but the very fact that it is so. It's not obvious, and it's not really how people use StackOverflow, in the same way Kickstarter used to believe (probably still does) it was about investing in indie creators, whereas people really used it as a preorder store and a marketing platform.

deleted 8y ago

[deleted]

codinghorror 8y ago

> Personally I would have been much more understanding of the process of using stackoverflow if I knew this, and so would many of the people who get stung expecting an answer to their question. My gut feeling is that this worked better in the past because Stack Overflow was at a smaller scale, and the audience was a bit more insular and willing to read stuff about how the systems work on Stack Overflow (programmers love understanding rule systems; it's literally their job most of the time). Now that SO has achieved permanent world scale, the constant influx of new people who don't take the time to learn the ambient norms before posting, and thus cut themselves on what they perceive to be unnecessary sharp edges, is getting .. large. Most of this could be solved by a very detailed, educational multi-step /ask page in my opinion.

m_myers 8y ago
I admire your optimistic view of how many users would read such a manual when all they want to know is why doesn't this code do what it's supposed to and can you hurry I need this by 5 pm? But... I do agree that a detailed, educational multi-step page (with examples!) would be an improvement over the current here-are-the-8-rules-for-asking-ok-now-have-fun page.