Is it possible to link approach0 so it is easy to find/use?

@copper.hat I thought I had... in section on searching for duplicates.

This sounds like a good move. I expect to get some warnings on some of my answers, and I don't plan to work on my searching skills (solving math problems is fun for me, learning to use math search tools does not sound fun to me), but it sounds like it will make the site a better resource and I give preemptive thanks to those who will do the work to implement this.

@XanderHenderson I meant on the Ask page. I realise SE may not be copacetic.

Upvoters, please leave comments as to why you agree. Downvoters, please leave comments as to why you disagree. This is a meta post, please explain why you are satisfied or dissatisfied with the resolution.

This was long due. Thanks for bringing it up.

+1 This is a welcome post from the moderator team. I might add to the "Keep Interactions Civil" section that one should simply refrain from posting a comment if one is not confident of being able to keep it civil. Leave it to others to do the job: not every post that needs attention specifically requires one's personal attention.

Thanks for this. I guess it is now my turn, and try and learn to be more civil about dupe answering. Knee jerk impulses don't seem to work there either.

New users can also be directed to the Constructive Feedback chatroom, where people are willing to give constructive feedback and advice on how posts can be improved.

Just wondering, how do such answers make it more difficult to clean up low-quality questions? And does this mean anything if someone "essentially completely" answers a PSQ but only in the comments?

@CalvinKhor Such answers encourage more PSQs because the askers are getting positive feedback (an answer) and so think it is ok. So their next question will also be a PSQ. People who see the question and the positive feedback may also act similarly. So they make is difficult to clean up low-quality questions because they breed more such questions!

@user1729 well I thought that was covered in the later part ("encourage further low-quality contributions in the future".) I read "clean-up" to mean e.g. closure/deletion/mod intervention of the question that recieved such answers. If this is the correct reading, then my question is what becomes harder to do?

@CalvinKhor Ah, good point! Another reason is: a question with no upvoted or accepted answer and a negative score is automatically deleted after a certain amount of time (I'm not 100% positive of the conditions, but that's approximately correct). So answers save the poor questions from automatic deletion, so deletion ("cleaning up") would need to be done by hand.

@user1729 More details on how roomba works can be found in the help center.

@user1729 I thought about adding a link to the constructive feedback chatroom, but decided against it, as a there is a reputation threshold for chat participation (15, I think?), and a lot of new users don't hit that threshold.

Unpopular opinion: I've felt for a while now that the policy doesn't work, and even its goals are not particularly useful. We now have a huge number of questions, many almost (but not quite) duplicates, filled with "context" to make them of narrow interest as possible, searchable only by people who have Latex skills and have heard of Approach0. Most of the people who use this site seem unable or unwilling to search, and no amount of shifting the blame onto them has changed this. Meanwhile, many in our community display thinly veiled hostility to these people, and those who choose to help them.

@TheoBendit Your observation is partially correct, which is why this post is mostly about the policy that casually answering low-quality posts is against the rules. This will now be enforced more actively. You can try to frame the activity as helping somebody, but as a matter of fact it is breaking the rules of the site and going forward will be treated as such more actively. Why shouldn't we be "hostile" towards users knowingly and actively breaking and undercutting the rules of the site? As explained the push-back should be respectful, but it will be forceful.

@TheoBendit: it is expected that users of the site learn $\mathrm\LaTeX$ skill (there is tutorial for beginners as well as the more comprehensive version). And if one uses raw query of approach0 the searching is not difficult.

+1 for taking the time for this helpful post @XanderHenderson. Btw, you need 20 reputation to participate on chat. Another btw, do we have statistics on how many post fall in the category of low-quality? say a day?

@quid I don't doubt that this will be enforced; you can consider me warned. The dogma here on MSE has managed to turn things on their heads. Helping people is really hurting them and the site. Clueless new askers are actually unwelcome pests. Rules are not automatically just, just because they are communicated clearly. This will be a dark time in the history of MSE.

@ParamanandSingh I am aware of the expectation, but all of my experience here tells me that it's unreasonable. When do we expect our users to respond positively to this campaign of discouragement? Or is that the point: to push our more helpless users towards the door?

@TheoBendit what are you talking about? why don't you see this as positive?

@Verónica (1/3) I disagree with this policy, and hearing that it shall be enforced more strenuously is highly disappointing. This site is supposed to be for mathematics students at all levels, but this policy biases against elementary students, and fuels the hostility against such students, and those with the temerity to offer their help.

@Verónica (2/3) These are the people who most need such help; there are an enormous number of them each year, stuffed in courses of hundreds of students or more (these days especially, often with extremely limited face-to-face time with instructors), and are just finding their feet with mathematics. And we down-vote, close, delete, and even sometimes berate the askers under the unfair, unfounded assumption that they want to cheat on their homework.

@Verónica (3/3) When they predictably receive these gut-punches, they walk away, and we shift the blame to them for not putting the effort into learning and conforming to our silly rules. This policy represents our community's latent desire to, rather than bring people up to a standard, weed out the "wrong sort", so that we don't have to deal with them. That's why I'm less than enthused about this particular announcement.

@TheoBendit it is indeed unfortunate that for too long the focus was only on users asking, often in good-faith and maybe even to the best of their ability, while some power-users took advantage of their posts to engage in a game they enjoy often to the detriment of these very users they pretend to help and the site as a whole. You can try to reframe it all you want, but this policy does not target in any way the weak, the unknowing and the helpless. Instead it challenges some power-users that know exactly what they are doing and could perfectly well contribute in a constructive way instead.

@quid Why is it detrimental to the asker to help them when their question is "low quality"? I understand that giving someone a ready-made answer is not always helpful to the asker, and I'm a big believer in hints and continued support over an "answer-and-run" approach, but I don't see why it's necessarily true that answering "low-quality" questions is unhelpful to the asker! Also, perhaps you could inform me as to the "advantage" taken by power users? Is it internet points? I'm going to guess it's useless internet points. It seems nobody cares about rep quite like the caretakers.

@TheoBendit "Nobody cares about rep" not quite : the new users coming in care, because that's some ambitious ones want to be, including me when I started out. Then you see the kinds of questions they answer and continue the trend.

@TheoBendit You are only thinking from the point of view of the asker when you say : Why is it detrimental to the asker to help them when their question is "low quality". It's detrimental to the site, that's what. That it helps the asker or not is a question that people differ on.

@TheoBendit For the (1/3), according to what Xander wrote here, new users are going to be treated well :), the goal is to guide them to the site norms, to the link, and even an advice.

@Verónica This has always been the goal. The result has been "This is not a do-my-homework-for-me site!" comments inserted on these users questions, followed by very low engagement by most such users. The policy has had ample time to work, but instead it has done harm.

@TeresaLisbon Our perspective on what is good and bad is completely inverted. Helping people indiscriminately is bad (and henceforth shall be punished). Rambling questions, filled with very specific, personal thoughts on a problem are good, and will be helpful to everyone. Mathematics can be learned by reading, rather than doing. None of this makes sense.

@TheoBendit re 'perhaps you could inform me as to the "advantage" taken by power users' It is stated right there in my comment 'engage in a game they enjoy'; what the exact game is depends on the user. For some it's the points, for others it's to spite others, for still others it's feeling like a political dissident without actual risk, etc.

@quid Oh, is that why I come to this site? Maybe it was just me trying to "reframe" the issue to be about helping people on a mathematics help site. But no, it's clearly a dictatorship simulator, and I'm being disingenuous. I'm sure I'll go far on this "advantage" I've apparently stolen (by largely following the rules, if not the spirit of said rules).

@TheoBendit I think the purpose of the enforcement is to help users ask better question (by not responding positively to poor ones). I think both Problem Statement Questions and rambling questions (filled with very specific, personal thoughts on a problem) are bad. Providing context shouldn't be focused on not cheating or life stories, but instead should be about helping the answerer to understand the askers level. So saying the question is Exercise X from book Y is good context as we can see what they should know and verify they copied it correctly.

@TheoBendit: just to confirm "it is unreasonable to expect people will learn $\mathrm\LaTeX $" or "it is unreasonable to enforce the policy being discussed here"? The most compelling reason for learning $\mathrm\LaTeX $ is the beauty of those math fonts. Almost anyone will fall in love with them. As far as this post is concerned it is not about discouraging askers, but rather discouraging the spoonfeeding of askers with ready made answers.

@user1729 That is well-put, and despite what I've said so far, I do understand that this is the purpose of the policy. I do have serious doubts about this purpose being at the front of the minds of people who enforce it, but I agree that this was probably the reason this policy was formed. I also think it just doesn't work, by and large. A small number of people ask better questions, while a large number walk off, embarrassed and deflated. Context is great when the asker can provide it, but otherwise, it's purely for our benefit, not for theirs.

@TheoBendit "Helping people indiscriminately is bad" Yes, it is. I care if I find that the users of this site are completing someone else's homework that they copy-pasted onto the sheet, even though it's not my business. I vehemently agree with the fact that some responses to bad questions can be vituperative and must cease.But with that behind us,I will do everything I can to make sure that an OP makes the best use of what I have to offer her, which is not just an answer, but a discussion and helping them format and state their questions clearly and contextually.I deem this important...

... because that's how I learned mathematics. I was taught to write mathematics, draft my questions carefully, then saw them answered, and I learned from it. I understand that not every child comes from that background, and I am going to say it once again : the policy is not going to be thrust. It is going to be in effect, but not thrust upon users. I often let the occasionally reasonable offsite question off the leash nowadays. I'm softening. But I can't, I simply cannot take the homework questions being copy-pasted and answered. I'm strong about this feeling.

@ParamanandSingh Latex is a valuable skill to be sure, but the time when you need help with maths frequently does not coincide with time that you have the time and energy to learn a markup language. I also don't see this distinction between targeting askers and answerers. The askers are already receiving the requisite hostility, but are failing to be discouraged due to people actually trying to help them. This movement is trying to plug that last hole, so they have less reason to hang around.

And as for our stance on elementary questions : I hope, pray fervently that our attitude towards it changes, because the observation of @TheoBendit is very apt in this regard.

@TeresaLisbon The indiscrimination I'm talking about is not the help provided, but to whom the help is provided. I think, in practical terms, we agree on how best to help these people (we've seen each other's work "in the field", so to speak). I'm happy to leave a comment encouraging an answerer to instead engage in a hint, or a conversation instead of an answer next time, but I think (possibly unlike you) I would prefer to leave an upvote than a downvote for anyone trying (and moderately succeeding) to help.

@Theo: I can sense that you want to treat new users like very soft or charming way. First, if they post a pqs, then they screwed things up in the first place. Ok, fine, we could comprehend that it was a misunderstanding. After that, they might see their question closed, and here comes again, they are going to see the Informative-Box. They might see also a message, that might be taken as unfriendly, well.. but then, they have the opportunity to try again.

It's not that "you!, you screwed things up in my wonderful site math.SE, get out forever ", they are given more chances, idk how many more. It's up to them to give up, or to put effort to comply the standards of the site

@TheoBendit This is getting crowded so I will leave now, but I just want to reply to your "Context is great when the asker can provide it" remark - everyone can provide context! It is things like what you covered in your course, what tools you think you might need to use and why. I think as a site we need to do two things (1) shift away from "what have you tried" as a context reason, and (2) be more lenient when people don't say what they've tried but instead give other forms of context, such as I mentioned here and above. [And (3) direct people towards the constructive feedback chatroom...]

@user1729 Regarding the (3) : I'd be extremely happy if people started using it. I'd be so, so happy just helping people improve their questions and understand their problems better.

@Verónica If users interpreted these things this way, there would be basically no issue. Also, we'd see these users try and try again, but most of them don't. There are definitely good intentions built into the system, but I think it's harmful, especially when enforced with greater intensity.

@user1729 Fair enough. I would like to point you to the answer I linked to in a previous comment, regarding the possibility (or not) of context. Otherwise, thank you for arguing with me so respectfully.

@TheoBendit First of all, thanks a lot for bringing in your opinions, I agree with a lot of them! I think our subtle disagreement is on how to help : I feel that answering such questions shouldn't be the direct response. If I have to be honest, I actually don't particularly mind it if high-level PSQs from a user who has a history of being well-acquainted in a certain subject, were answered as long as the answer was of sufficient quality. My problem is with people rushing in without clarification. I don't think a user copy-pasting homework should be helped, for example ...

@TheoBendit regarding detrimental, what you seem not to realize is that a lot of the hostility is actually created by the users answering. Their activity contributes to things being rushed and frustrations for those that try to get improved questions. I'm not sure what you mean with "we'd see these users try again". Any number of users try again. Often with a new account for the old one got blocked. There are users that burn through dozens of accounts, never really trying to improve at all because it works out about alright without.

No @quid, this hostility frequently predates the hasty answer, or sometimes is applied when no hasty answer is forthcoming. Unless you mean the mere presence of people who want to help these askers is the cause of this tension, in which case I'd point out that it's not fair to dump this tension on the askers.

... where I see that we have a question and then an FGITW answer in no time, that just has one line : counterexample is ... , and move on. I just think I want the time to write longer answers, but for longer answers I want to be able to gauge the user a little more, perhaps get to know them more, and for that I often use comments unless the post itself is nice enough. I just wish that more people use the comments for this purpose. That's where I think we differ, but I'm happy that I'm living in diversity. Reading some meta threads has made me see the rainbow of opinions in MSE.

@TheoBendit I meant the latter. It is the general climate. I agree it is not good to make the (new) users asking the victims of this situation while those power-users answering too much can go on to do as they please. This is precisely why this policy shifts the focus of our attention toward the power-users that undercut our policies and contribute to a hostile climate on the site.

@Theo "Also, we'd see these users try and try again, but most of them don't" well... Theo.. in that case that indicates this: There was not enough interest from their part.

@quid So, at what point do the responsibility for the toxic interactions of users fall the users' heads, instead of mine? I wonder if ever we will see a crackdown on an actual problem like that, rather than a manufactured problem like helping people?

@Verónica This is what I mean about blame-shifting. I know you're not really "blaming" them in the sense that you're accusing them of doing something wrong, but you're saying that the primary reason they walk off, discouraged, is they just weren't interested enough. There's an enormous amount of complex information to parse, especially those who aren't proficient in programming, and some people don't have the time or the headspace to learn this stuff while studying at uni. To simply attribute it to a lack of interest is completely standard here, but is also disingenuous.

@TheoBendit I appreciate you bringing up haste as seen from the side of a wannabe-answerer. I just want to make sure that you that is a chicken-and-egg problem. The curators must act in a hurry because we have power users answering anything they can while ignoring the norms. I plead guilty to seeing their haste mostly as a race to get more rep. Even only as a race to get more rep. You do realize that i would have posted hundreds more references to "How to ask a good question", if it weren't for homework answering power users.

(cont'd) I simply haven't had the time because the next power user must be stopped. I have advocated a policy that anyone being able to answer a question in under ten minutes should go find a more difficult question. This policy may give me the time to help the new user instead of spending the energy to stop the power users. I don't see this leading to treating new users badly.The power users have been the focus of my curation efforts for many years already.

@JyrkiLahtonen What is still missing from your explanation, though, is why these power users have to be stopped. Quid talked about an "advantage". TeresaLisbon talked about the "health" of the site. I don't see what goes wrong if a hasty answer or two (or a hundred) gets through. Perhaps an asker gets some substandard help, but at least they get some help. Sure, we get more duplicates, but as I discussed several comments ago, this repository idea has proven itself useless to most mathematical students. We've already seen that they don't search, either unable or unwilling...

@TheoBendit it's not clear what you are talking about. We frequently take actions against hostile comments (that you might not know about them does not mean that they do not exist). This very post here also mentions this problem and is rather clear in that those are not tolerated. I'd estimate that the number of suspensions issued for being too aggressive in enforcing the sites policies, easily is an order of magnitude above those issued for undercutting the sites policies via answering too much. Once again reality does not align with your narrative of oppression.

@JyrkiLahtonen ... When do we expect students to actually start finding our repository helpful? Such a repository is no more or less helpful than a sheet of worked solutions to exercises, an approach I often avoid when teaching.

One of the problems I have with many of these downvoter types is that they almost never post any questions themselves. They make it really hard for me to not view them as major haters, and math minors, in the words of Kanye.

@quid I am talking about you blaming the toxicity in the community on the people trying to help the most people. I know you deal with particularly toxic comments, but in your previous comment, you blame it on the answerers. "Look what you made me do" is not an excuse for abuse. Rather than a pinned commitment to further prosecuting these answers, I would prefer a commitment to crack down on brusque and discouraging comments with new users.

@TheoBendit I have to wonder if you actually read the post. In any case your perception seems to be highly selective. "When engaging with users (old or new) who have posted (or answered) a low-quality question, remember to remain polite and courteous. Please do not issue unpleasant orders or leave judgemental comments: we will not tolerate rudeness, even when in the context of a honest attempt to improve the quality of the site. Please do not engage in long back-and-forths with other users. If a gentle, polite comment does not change someone's mind, please leave a flag and walk away."

@TheoBendit Why not ask for a commitment to crack down on rude comments to new users and also a commitment to crack down on FGITW-type, multiple-dupe answerers to context-less questions? I'm not trying to be combative here, I'm genuinely asking. I feel that enforcing the site policy on quality standards of posts and enforcing a neutral/positive tone in the comments (especially to questions by new askers) can go hand-in-hand. P.S.: This thread has grown quite long, so feel free to ignore my question if it exhausts you.

@Theo I agree there are other things to consider when being part of this site, but interest is absolute key, even if the user had deficiencies, like "i don't speak english". so don't say is disingenuous.

@TheoBendit We have vastly different narratives, and for us to make some progress it is necessary that we be aware of the differences as opposed to seeing others only in the light of our own narratives. You say these people are trying to help as many askers as possible. I often see them as only trying to help themselves. Either to collect more rep, or simply to boost their self-image (or a desire to remain "scientifically relevant"). Neither narrative is accurate because they focus on one aspect only. The truth is more complicated.

@Verónica I really meant no offense to you by my comment, and I'm sorry for putting it indelicately. You are, of course, right that interest is absolutely essential, but I think there is an unreasonable expectation put on new users. There has to be interest, but there doesn't have to be "learn a new markup language and read pages of meta just to ask a single question" interest.

@TheAmplitwist It is getting exhausting, but I can't deny such a polite invitation to argue! As I said in my first few comments on this topic, I disagree with the policy. So, I don't want a crackdown on both, because I don't want this policy enforced at all. It's something I've learned to tolerate, but the way I see it, the more this policy is enforced, the more damage we do to students.

@TheoBendit I occasionally try sport analogies, so.... We all like math. We want to play this game. We need a set of rules for all to have fun. Imagine this were a baseball club (or soccer). The power users ignoring the rules is not unlike half the players ignoring rules on infield flies (baseball) or off-sides (soccer). Because they just want to play ball, and score more runs or goals. Ruining the game for the other half.

I have not seen Theo moved by the incredible numbers of people responding to him. I knew to expect such responses from some users. But I'm afraid some users will not be happy unless they can do what they want again, wrt answering. Else, @Theo, Take time to right a carefully thought out response, because your comments have largely been repetitive in scope. We've already read your earlier comments. It is not helpful to your case to repeat them again and again.

@JyrkiLahtonen I don't see this as a game. To me, this is an opportunity to help people with their maths. I won't deny that I love doing that, but it's not a game. It doesn't need a lot of rules. There doesn't need to be any fairness in how the rep points are distributed. If you help someone, in my books, that's good. A hasty answer is not as good as a well-considered answer, but it's better than no help at all. However, I do think there's also room here for those who want to treat it as a game, and try to solve as difficult problems as possible. But, for me, help should be the number 1 goal.

@TheoBendit Jeff Atwood (a co-founder and the first CEO of StackExchange) once famously said "StackExchange is a Wiki first". But I stop now, because we are running in circles.

Your concept of "help" has already been challenged by a number of users.

@TheoBendit Thank you for responding :) It's well past my bedtime, so I'll get back to this thread tomorrow. And there are a wealth of opinions here that deserve careful consideration. I think Jyrki's observation above deserves repetition, namely that the truth is more complicated than any one narrative can describe. I hope that at the end of the day all of us will find more things in common than differences.

@amWhy I did challenge quid back, but I haven't heard back.

Are there any attempts of turning MSE or SO into a wiki? because it doesn't seem like the current strategy has any hope of achieving it. I think some sort of "curated mse" would be a possibility.

@Theo, what you said was already addressed by quid, and others.

@amWhy I must have missed that comment. I didn't see anyone who explained why trying to help someone who posts a "low-quality" question must necessarily fail.

@TheoBendit first, things related to this have been said here. Second, it is rather off-topic here. Third, this was frequently discussed in the past. Finally, nobody has to explain this to you. Why do we have to host low-quality question? We don't have to if we don't want to. We don't want to and that's that. (More could be said on this, but just to be clear nobody has to explain that something must necessarily fail, etc. In any case you are constantly moving the goal-post.)

@HereToRelax In the early days it was discussed whether we want to allow questions about homework at all. Some felt that it is a good way to bring more people to the site. Some were concerned about academic ethics and were totally against it. Yet others thought a compromise where the asker is expected to show a keen interest in learning is better. That compromise became the norm. Some left the site in disgust. Some started answering all homework questions ignoring the compromise rule. Things have snowballed from there.

(cont'd) For a couple of years the homework answerers went on unchecked. Then those who wanted a curated site learned about deletions. Then the fighting began.

@quid Well, I don't know where these things were said, so I can't respond to them. Teresa Lisbon did say a bunch of things I largely agreed with on the topic, by slightly misinterpreting my intention, but that was about it. And indeed, you don't have to explain anything to me. If you want to participate in this discussion, then there might be certain social expectations, but you can do as you like.

@TheoBendit it's off-topic here. In any case to request that it should be explained 'why trying to help someone who posts a "low-quality" question must necessarily fail' is borderline bad faith. Can you explain why it must necessarily work and certainly is not harmful? No you can't.

I think there is at least 1,000,000 questions that clearly have no place in the site if we want it to look like anythign ressembling a wiki. I don't think deletions are a suitable tool since there's at most like 50 people who are serious about deleting large amounts of questions.

Yes, I can @quid. It's because I use my discretion when deciding what help to give a person asking for it. This is an announcement that policy shall be specifically enforced to a greater degree, and I want to be sure that it is generally helping people and this site, rather than doing active damage to them. One of the core principles behind this policy is the assertion that, generally speaking, it is better that people do not offer help to users who can't or won't bring their questions up to this mammoth standard. So, actually, this is very much on topic.

@TheoBendit you did not answer at all.

@quid At this point, your main contributions seem to be attacking me personally, trying to reframe my own motivations, answering your own questions for me, and ignoring the answers I am giving. I suggest we drop this for now, and maybe come back later, because I'm starting to get annoyed.

That's precisely what you've been doing to everyone here, @Theo. Yes, drop it.

@XanderHenderson Thank you for the well-written post explaining the change in moderator procedure. Although it's not stated explicitly, I assume users that basically answer, or just give a useful hint, in the comments are also to be discouraged. However, how about just posting a link to another site's page, e.g., a Wikipedia page, which explains a concept the OP is asking about. This doesn't directly answer the question, but it may help the user figure out the answer on their own. I do this occasionally, with low quality questions or even PSQ's, but is this now also discouraged?

Most social media platforms struggle to find a user base, however here we seem to want to get rid of them or something. Most of the questions on the site are nowhere even close to being suitable for a math wiki kind of thing. Given that 1) there is already so many users that are perfectly happy with many questions not being amazing stuff and 2) it should not be at all hard to create a "curated subset" version of the site, I don't see why we can't have the current site with people asking and answering low quality stuff and also have a "cured site".

However that probably won't happen, the parent site probably doesn't care enough. We can't even get a dark mode so w/e

With that being said I'm going to continue to answer questions as long as I enjoy it. I am able to get at least a couple of "thanks a ton this really helped bla bla bla" most days I am really active. So for me this is enough. If I get suspended then it's going to be extremely tragic i guess (not).

@JohnOmielan I can say with certainty that posting a comment with a helpful Wikipedia link is perfectly okay. And not at all discouraged.

@JohnOmielan The goal of Math SE is to help people by connecting them with the answers to their questions. If an asker has a question but is unwilling or unable to bring that question into line with the site's standards, I don't think that it would be terrible to help them in the comments. The end result is either (a) they get their answer (as a comment, in an off-site link, or in a duplicate question) and then their question is eventually deleted, or (b) they improve their question, get an answer, and the question is preserved for future readers.

@Theo I think I can get your point. See, there was recently created a facility for learning MathJax. I don't think we all expect them to be pro when using MathJax when asking their first questions, but at least a use of it to facilitate the visualization of the math they want to write. Regarding the -tons of pages- that you mention, I think they can be taken (or summarized) as 2 pages, if one follows the 2 links that are included in the RHS bulletin displayed when one is going to ask a question.

@Verónica I do encourage users to learn MathJax. It's a handy skill. I'm unconvinced that it is a good thing to take such a hard line on getting users to learn it. "Tons of pages" may have been an exaggeration, but it's a big hurdle for many of these students. Asking for help from strangers is a vulnerable time for these students, and being (often brusquely) directed to two walls of text is demotivating. I do support (and sometimes participate in) a more gentle pointing towards these pages - the standard comments of the user 5xum are particularly exemplary in this respect.

@TheoBendit I am not sure that anyone is asking new users to learn MathJax, necessarily. It would be great if they could, but that isn't really the point. Rather, we expect users to learn MathJax if they wish to continue contributing to the site. One of the ways in which veteran users can help newbies is by helping them to format their questions using MathJax. If someone has the spare time to write an answer, certainly they also have time to help improve the question first, n'est-ce pas?

I am in full support of veteran users helping newbies in this way, @XanderHenderson. I'm not so certain about the last sentence, but I wholeheartedly agree with the rest.

@HereToRelax You ask why we want a curated site. You obviously were not there in the usenet era. The initially useful newsgroup sci.math was destroyed by lack of curation. I can equally well ask. If you want to answer everything and anything, may be you like another site like Quora, Reddit or Yahoo!Answers better?

@TheoBendit We are again at the basic disagreement about the purpose of this site. You seem to think that the purpose is to help as many askers as possible. I think that math rather than people is the primary thing. The two goals can coexist if a compromise is formed, and also enforced. In my eyes you want to have it all your way, and are unwilling to abide by the compromise.

Or, reusing another analogue. Somebody said about Singapore (where they have a 500 dollar fine for tossing a gum wrapper on the street) "This cities laws on littering are too strict. Yet, somehow every other city is covered in garbage."

@Jyrki This whole post is about shifting the compromise away from my position. Was I supposed to sit quietly and just let it happen? Regarding the prioritisation of maths, I've said it before, and I'll say it again: I think think the number one problem we face in maths is maths anxiety. It is painful to watch us exacerbate it, every day, over and over again. Regarding Singapore, why not $500 and some jail time? I bet littering would become even less prevalent then. In the bad old days, the ancient Spartans used to punish thieves by death. I bet that was a deterrent!

No, @TheoBendit. The whole point of this post is to begin to enforce that compromise. You see, violations have had no consequences up to this point. Much acrimony on the site has come from users ignoring the compromise. At least that's how I (and many others) see it.

I suspected as much @Jyrki. I saw the implementation of the policy is part of the compromise. But, whether it's a compromise or not, as best I can tell, this is a move that will make MSE (and yes, maths in general) worse. Regardless of where you define your personal sliding scale, it's important that this stuff be ventilated. For example, Verónica seemed genuinely baffled that there was even another side to this argument!

Agree about the need to vent and ventilate @Theo. Actually I have been doing just that for at least 8 years now. All that while the targets of this enforcement effort continued to ignore the compromise and never showed up to discuss the details of the implementation. This, more than anything else, is why I gradually became more militant about it. Continuing with the soccer club analogy. Half the members continue to count goals scored following an off-side. I sort of understand the reason: Why wouldn't they if no referee ever blows the whistle? But it still shows a disregard of agreements.

(cont'd) That's how frustration builds up. And erupts. Too early for me to have a sigh of relief, but if this will get firmly enforced, I suspect the site will become much more friendly.

I feel your frustration @Jyrki. I've watched as the moderation team has gradually stacked more people who strongly disagree with me. This was my main concern about Xander becoming the new mod. And while this move may drive out those who want help and those who are willing to provide help, let's not confuse this with increased friendliness or peace; this is just what happens when you successfully oppress your opponents. Like I said before, this will be a dark time in the history of MSE.

@TheoBendit Agreed about the math anxiety part : which is exactly why I want to emphasise two things : one is that closure is not the be all and end all of the matter. Two : the comments can be liberally used to generate context, in fact elementary users will surely want to engage more , they can be very enthusiastic and vibrant in conversations. I think where we differ is in the giving of an answer. I have a problem even if the answer answers the question and conversation starts below the question. The basic problem is that the answer can be the end to the conversation, while a comment ...

... if carefully chosen (and I know you will understand this, @TheoBendit) can do wonders, bring the OP into the comments, where they share that they made similar attempts or saw similar things before, and edit the question with these. These could even turn out to be clarifications (example : I saw a question where a derivative was being asked for, and only after 7-8 comments was it found we were looking for the "normal" derivative) so all that can go in the question post. IMO if a PSQ mentioned the source and level of OP alone , in the absence of an attempt, I'd be happy...

... because to be honest, all I'm trying to eliminate is one thing : dishonesty, whether it's copy-pasting a question, posting a contest question with one line mentioning source because you're guaranteed upvotes, posting a question and calling your friends to up vote the question on a chatroom ... I promise, however, that the policy is not going to be enforced in an alienating manner. Math anxiety can be removed by having heart-to-hearts with users, which I love to do. Thinking about an answer as a move of "closure" of such a question should make answering such questions a premature move.

(CORRECTION : In my first post of the three above, it is : "conversation starts below the answer").

@TheoBendit The problem for us,is truly this : we are here to help such users. Users, however, need varying levels of help. Some are ok with hints, some are ok with complete answers.I have given an MSE user my gmail ID and we have discussed some questions over video call.That's how much help I can offer. The problem is, how patient are answerers with OPs?Either everybody jumps to give an answer, or jumps to say : "show your attempts".If everybody showed more patience , we can deal with questions one-one and make sure more answerers walk home satisfied.(That's TOO many comments, I'll wait now!)

You are absolutely an MSE exemplar, @Teresa. I agree with everything you said, except possibly that closure is not the end. For too many, it does become the end. I know that most of us are well-intentioned towards askers, but there's an influential group whose intentions I trust less. I have recently found, for example, a recent troubling trend of questions gathering a delete vote within half an hour of the question being posted! The user(s) responsible for that evidently do not have the students' growth at heart. Thank you for the invitation to talk, but it's not you who needs to hear me. :-(

@TheoBendit I sincerely hope that patience grows ; whether it's patience to wait to close a question, patience to gauge and understand a user and their query before answering. Basically, quick closure is the response to quickfire non-gauged answering, which is the response to answering before the question gets closed. The only solution is that patience grows. To give an example,here three comments were left, and then an answer came, then the user says : hey, I know everything , but I got this wrong in a test, I don't know why.

I requested the user to insert this into the post, that hasn't been done yet, but I'm going to say that if I'm extra determined I will take permission, do it once for a new user, and then tell them to manage it next time. Honestly, I'm with the facilitation of more people using the platform, after all it gets us brownie points in the math community, but we need a lot more patience for that, and there's also the question of how reputation comes into play regarding answering questions fast, one could say answering fast when the question is visible gets you more views and more up votes.

I'm not going to comment on the last point because that's something internal to people and their principles, but I'm going to say that patience is the single-most important thing everybody needs to develop, and now we can argue if the close-squad or the PSQ answerers need more of it, but then the site guidelines somewhat favour only one side here for a variety of reasons. So more is demanded from potential answerers. Anyway, I'm also here to say this : please , those who don't agree with the policy, comment here and discuss the matter. Please!

@TheoBendit Just in case it is not clear. Many of the delete votes I have cast are chiefly targeting the busy-body answerers. Because deletion is the only deterrent at my disposal. In other words, deletion is the only that brings the answering machines out to discuss the matter. And the only thing community moderators can do. When serving I, of course, had more powerful tools at my disposal. But I hope you agree that suspending power users would have been unnecessarily harsh and too abrupt a change in the site dynamics. I didn't have the stamina so I resigned.

(cont'd) Now that mod team has been expanded, and they have reached an agreement internally, it will be easier. Also the outlined measures seem more commeasurate with the severity of the rule violation (the offence is rather mild in comparison to those we suspend users for).

@JyrkiLahtonen I have been answering stuff on r/learnmath and r/math on reddit lately if that helps. As to quora and yahoo answers, I don't think it's possible to find a lot of recent math questions. I also don't like quora for other reasons but I don't think you would care (I wouldn't to be fair).

@TheoBendit You said "I've watched as the moderation team has gradually stacked more people who strongly disagree with me." The maxim in American politics is that elections have consequences. Perhaps the election of more hard-line moderators should be taken as a signal that the members of the community who are interested in policy here largely align against you on this issue.

I will also point out that the ideal use of this site, as I see it, is that (a) a new user asks a question; that question is likely to be of very low-quality, because new users are often not equipped with the tools to ask good questions, so (b) several veteran users edit in some MathJax formatting, ask questions to help clarify, and help the asker to ask a good question, and then (c) one or more people answer the question.

The problem is that, right now, many questions are answered without that intermediate step. Answers often appear in less than five minutes. This doesn't give the community any time to look for duplicates (which are generally a good way of connecting an asker to an answer), nor does it give the community time to improve the quality of the question. The asker, satisfied that they have an answer, leaves, and never returns to improve the quality of their question.

Finally, as I see it, the procedure outlined above is likely to shield new users from much of the politics of this site, as it targets the most prolific answerers, and not the newbie askers. If answerers can be convinced to slow down and help the asker to ask a better question before they answer, it is much less likely that new users will have questions closed or deleted, and that they will, on the whole, have a better experience on this site.

@Theo FYI, FYC, I was baffled that there was even another side to this argument.

@VerónicaRmz. The other side exists, it very much does. It's just that the proponents of "the other side" may have come to meta earlier and voiced their opinions, they only do so now if you catch them on bad questions and tell them off.

I don't believe in an "other side", I just believe in people having different meanings to what it means to help and what constitutes help, and I think people have to sometimes compromise on the differences between their beliefs and the site's guidelines. "other side" seems too confrontational for me. I want to talk and convince users, and I think the user who spoke here did so with that intention. But some others are there who don't listen, they will have to swallow more bitter pills then.

@Theo I am fairly sure I will be friendlier, to new users and everybody, really, when I am less frustrated. But I'm just a drop in this ocean, so that's not necessarily very relevant. You brought up last elections. I recall being surprised how poorly the openly anti-CRUDE candidate did. Have you considered the possibility that opinions favoring quality control are actually more popular than you think?

And FWIW at the time of the last election Xander was definitely more balanced in his views about CRUDE matters than I was. After all, he was also active in the chatroom GENTLE designed to collect material the proponents felt was wrongly closed/deleted.

Otherwise, people will think that stuff just goes into CURED to be CRUSHED to pulp. Honestly.

@TeresaLisbon given that there is Reopen and Undelete in CURED, I don't see why that is necessary.

It's actually better if it's in one room.

Rather than have two camps.

@quid It's personalized 1-1 feedback for users as I envision it, and as Xander mentioned on CURED, a user comes into CURED for understanding what went wrong with their question and they see avalanche after avalanche of "delete this","close this", I just think they walk away with the impression that this is a machine for culling questions. I don't want that impression, that's all.

If that impression were not created, then I'd be extremely happy to have CURED as the same room as well.

@TeresaLisbon I'm not so convinced of that. I had create a room "explain the downvote" or some such thing for all those that just could not get why a post was downvoted. It did not find many takers.

In my opinion ultimately many/most casual users care much less than some want to think.

Sorry to drop out, I might be back later.

@quid Very true, what you say here. That's also the reason why enforcement is a slow process, because most people are neutral to meta opinions. Feel free to reply anytime!

@TeresaLisbon 'anytime'

Of course, the point of having two camps is that one could act antagonistically to the other. But as somebody who will flit between both camps, as long as we can get the room running, of course, I'd be very happy to participate in both rooms. Right now the constructive feedback room is about as empty as a sauna in the middle of the Atacama desert. (HAHA, you got me there!)

And with that pun I'm really gone. :-)

bye bye!

@JyrkiLahtonen Xander stuck around to keep an eye it in Gentle. The room had ulterior motives that were primarily meant to benefit few users. Ine of your nemises, @Jyrki, in particular. It was removed because of that. Xander was an active user of CURED long before his election, so your memory is off quite a bit.

And, @Jyrki CURED was CURED some time before Xander's election, and Gentle was gone long before Xander's election.

Sorry for suddenly jumping into a discussion that has been going on for a while and seems to have years of history even beyond that, but I now have a question...

So the meta post says "If you encounter a user who consistently answers low-quality questions over a significant period of time, and polite references to this post do not seem to be helping, please raise a flag on one of their answers." and "we will warn that user via private message before we take any further action."

I'm sort of just wondering what is the plan beyond that? I mean, I like to think that people who spend that much time on this site are reasonable and willing to engage, but what if they firmly believe that the best way to help people is to answer in as much detail and as quickly as possible, and can't be convinced otherwise?

@ElliotYu Then users sending friendly reminders that are ignored will need to flag such answers, so moderators can deal with them.

@ElliotYu I believe Xander's message clearly articulates that.

@amWhy Yes, I understand that part, flag and move on, that's why I quoted from the meta post. Though my question is not really what I'm supposed should do, but what the mods plan on doing beyond private messaging. Or in other words, what does "taking further action" entail.

@quid Besides DEC makes for less of a catchy name than does CURED, and users have successfully used CURED to successfully request reopening and undeletion, under appropriate circumstances.

I mean of course you can tell me that wondering about this means I haven't really moved on, but...

@ElliotYu Oh, no. I understand. Mods will have to issue official warnings, after which, if behavior continues, just like any behavior that continues to violate site policies, after warning, a suspension, likely brief, will be issued. But continued violation would lead to longer, and longer suspensions.

@amWhy I see. Good to know 👌

No mod likes to suspend users. They'd prefer that users change problematic behaviors earlier, rather than later. It will take some time. And I don't think any lightening bolts from "high above" will strike anyone immediately. But patterns of some of the most prolific answerers of low quality answers are already known. Hardly scratches the surface of answerers in general.

@TheoBendit My previous comment was to address your comment to Jyrki, on which you mentioned me. And just to clarify, in case there could be a misunderstanding here, I was baffled on what you were saying in your comments, after I asked you "why don't you see this as positive?"

@amWhy At one point I did say that it was too early to change the ordering of letters. Sorry about it anyway. Yeah, GENTLE started out having the air of a pity party, and probably ended that way also. Nevertheless, I want to commed Xander taking a good faith look at the "other side" as well.

@JyrkiLahtonen indeed, he did, to his credit. No problem.

Best of luck with the enforcement. I failed in that, but the current diamond bearers seem to be able to approach the task less emotionally. For the better.

@JyrkiLahtonen I wish you wouldn't consider your term as a failure. You did an awesome job; seriously. I still count you among my best four mods ever! And, actually, things you felt culpable for, are precisely qualities I think the best mods share, on some level. I just hope you realize how highly respected you've always been: before, during, and after your term as a mod!

@TheoBendit "I've watched as the moderation team has gradually stacked more people who strongly disagree with me." You think this is all about you? Wow. That's a huge problem of yours. I've been around longer than you. Stop seeing this site as revolving around you. Users led the pressure, some mods as well, but don't you dare write users off as pawns of the mods, who "stacked us" to sabotage you of all users. Do you realize how absurd that sounds?

@amWhy Just to keep the record straight, GENTLE is currently frozen for lack of activity.

@XanderHenderson Thanks! I never knew exactly what happened. I am corrected. Thanks.

@ElliotYu as a rule a user who acts counter the policies of the site even after those were explained by moderators will be suspended.

I now see @amWhy explained it already very well.

@quid ;D

@TheoBendit what do you mean by "in maths"? The site is for people studying mathematics, that is, for the most part they chose to study mathematics specifically. Do undergraduate maths majors really suffer so much from math anxiety? Yes, some things are hard and maybe intimidating but "maths anxiety" for students that for the most part specifically chose to study mathematics, I don't really buy that. In any case it's not my experience with people studying mathematics.

It's a much propagate misconception that the target audience is whoever has a maths question. The target audience is, I quote, "people studying math at any level and professionals in related fields", clearly the inclusion of the second part only makes any sense at all when the first does meaning something restrictive. The "any level" refers to a graduate/undergraduate distinction, in contrast to the preexisting MathOverflow that was not "any level" but graduate level and above.

Of course this does not mean that we should become exclusive, but it does mean that the target audience are people specifically studying mathematics and we should keep their interests in mind.

Whoever wants to contest the above could start by explaining the point of saying it is for "professionals in related fields" in a context where the former part means nothing and "any level" is (mis)construed as "anything at all."