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Stack overflow is a 50/50 gamble. You either get help or some self righteous jerk flags your question and tells you youre stupid. I hope the new CEO fixes this.

Stack overflow is a 50/50 gamble. You either get help or some self righteous jerk flags your question and tells you youre stupid. I hope the new CEO fixes this. Their brand equity is really bad but you use them because you don't have that many options.

umvi 8y ago
> Stack overflow is a 50/50 gamble Only when asking questions. I find in my work I read/use 100 questions or more for every 1 question I ask. SO is amazing 99% of the time, and a bit of a gamble that 1% of the time when you have a specific question you couldn't find resources on.
- linuxftw 8y ago
  Yeah, as someone who has never asked a question, I can generally find what I'm looking for without much effort. So, from a 'drive users from google search' perspective, the current moderation model must be working quite well. I have little sympathy for questions asked by complete beginners. SO is probably not the best place for that kind of thing.
  - moate 8y ago
    >>I have little sympathy for questions asked by complete beginners. SO is probably not the best place for that kind of thing. Welcome to the problem (as I see it) with SO! As someone who was a complete beginner during the modern age of SO, I can tell you that it sure helped me get into my current career (which is not coding related whatsoever) by driving me away from the profession. "Who the fuck wants to work with assholes like this"? Was I asking stupid questions? Of course! Does anyone on SO owe me anything? Not even a tiny bit! But this is a cultural choice. If this is what you want, then it's doing exactly what it's supposed to. But many people don't want this. If I go to a library, the librarians will help me to the best of their ability. That doesn't mean they teach me French, but at least show me where the French books are. More often the tone from a comment was "lol, gtfo n00b or get gud m8" which is unhelpful. Rarely was I getting a suggestion of a resource that could help me answer the question I was posing. "RTFM" isn't useful if you don't know what that manual even is. There's all sorts of people with all sorts of personal stories about their experience with the SO community, ranging from "I wouldn't be the CTO of my company if not for them" to "I will never work in this industry again". I'm not saying I'm right, or that things need to bend to me. I'm just putting a perspective out there.
    - hashhar 8y ago
      SO has always explicitly stated that it aims to be a repository of knowledge. And since theres no site which offers the kind of help you mention (which involves discussion, going back and forth, trying some code, discussing again, trying new code and reaching aha moment) it all goes to SO as well. Reddit will help you much better for that usecase.
      - moate 8y ago
        I'm bowing out of this, as I wasn't trying to have a discussion. SO was not helpful to me. I hate it and the coding community so much I left the industry as I was starting out. My story is not unique, and other people have also been driven out by this culture. This is my personal story. That's all it was. Ya'll have fun.
        umvi 8y ago
        You say you hate the coding community so much yet you like hanging out on HN? HN is the essence of the coding community! Hackers sharing cool stuff with each other. Please don't judge the entire coding community based on a bad experience with SO zealots. We aren't all mean, I promise :)
    - umvi 8y ago
      I mean, there's got to be a minimum bar, right? It's more like going to a library and asking the librarian for help and then when pointed to a book admitting you don't really know how to read and then asking the librarian for help learning how to read. I'm sure you could find a kindly librarian willing to help you learn to read. But the librarian might also be wondering why you never learned to read in school and might get frustrated if the library is busy and other patrons need help. Just curious, why did you choose to use SO to learn programming instead of taking a formal course with a real teacher?

umvi 8y ago

> Stack overflow is a 50/50 gamble Only when asking questions. I find in my work I read/use 100 questions or more for every 1 question I ask. SO is amazing 99% of the time, and a bit of a gamble that 1% of the time when you have a specific question you couldn't find resources on.

linuxftw 8y ago
Yeah, as someone who has never asked a question, I can generally find what I'm looking for without much effort. So, from a 'drive users from google search' perspective, the current moderation model must be working quite well. I have little sympathy for questions asked by complete beginners. SO is probably not the best place for that kind of thing.
- moate 8y ago
  >>I have little sympathy for questions asked by complete beginners. SO is probably not the best place for that kind of thing. Welcome to the problem (as I see it) with SO! As someone who was a complete beginner during the modern age of SO, I can tell you that it sure helped me get into my current career (which is not coding related whatsoever) by driving me away from the profession. "Who the fuck wants to work with assholes like this"? Was I asking stupid questions? Of course! Does anyone on SO owe me anything? Not even a tiny bit! But this is a cultural choice. If this is what you want, then it's doing exactly what it's supposed to. But many people don't want this. If I go to a library, the librarians will help me to the best of their ability. That doesn't mean they teach me French, but at least show me where the French books are. More often the tone from a comment was "lol, gtfo n00b or get gud m8" which is unhelpful. Rarely was I getting a suggestion of a resource that could help me answer the question I was posing. "RTFM" isn't useful if you don't know what that manual even is. There's all sorts of people with all sorts of personal stories about their experience with the SO community, ranging from "I wouldn't be the CTO of my company if not for them" to "I will never work in this industry again". I'm not saying I'm right, or that things need to bend to me. I'm just putting a perspective out there.
  - hashhar 8y ago
    SO has always explicitly stated that it aims to be a repository of knowledge. And since theres no site which offers the kind of help you mention (which involves discussion, going back and forth, trying some code, discussing again, trying new code and reaching aha moment) it all goes to SO as well. Reddit will help you much better for that usecase.
    - moate 8y ago
      I'm bowing out of this, as I wasn't trying to have a discussion. SO was not helpful to me. I hate it and the coding community so much I left the industry as I was starting out. My story is not unique, and other people have also been driven out by this culture. This is my personal story. That's all it was. Ya'll have fun.
      - umvi 8y ago
        You say you hate the coding community so much yet you like hanging out on HN? HN is the essence of the coding community! Hackers sharing cool stuff with each other. Please don't judge the entire coding community based on a bad experience with SO zealots. We aren't all mean, I promise :)
  - umvi 8y ago
    I mean, there's got to be a minimum bar, right? It's more like going to a library and asking the librarian for help and then when pointed to a book admitting you don't really know how to read and then asking the librarian for help learning how to read. I'm sure you could find a kindly librarian willing to help you learn to read. But the librarian might also be wondering why you never learned to read in school and might get frustrated if the library is busy and other patrons need help. Just curious, why did you choose to use SO to learn programming instead of taking a formal course with a real teacher?