The Factory Floor

HDE 226868

02:19

Wow. worldbuilding.stackexchange.com/q/141298/627 was posted, and the guitar solo from "Hotel California" popped into my head unbidden, and played for a while before I understood the association. That's kinda creepy.

I haven't listened to the Eagles in . . . ages.

Secret

04:13

in The h Bar, 2 hours ago, by Secret

Hey @vzn (and others who may be interested). Recall that past dream I had where I experience that strange loss of consciousness feeling that is sunyata like? Well, last night dream brings this up to eleven:

When your mind is so hopelessly stuck in analytic philosophy that even ineffable mystical experience takes a highly structural form

I seriously don't think anyone can expect pure consciousness can be arranged, let alone in a structural fashion

bilbo_pingouin

09:04

@HDE226868 that should trigger a few meta discussions, shouldn't it?

we need to define how many questions we want on the HNQ, if/which questions should not appear there (blacklist) to name those mentioned in the post itself...

or is it too early for that?

Kepotx

well, correct me if I'm wrong, but the main issue with worldbuilding and HNQ is not really the quantity of question, but rather the quality, with questions that don't match WB standards (opinion-based or off-topic) but reach HNQ and get a lot of answers because they are fun

bilbo_pingouin

the new HNQ offers two parameters per site: reducing the number of questions that could appear (0-5), and kicking off questions from the HNQ.

The first one concerns the quantity, while the second is about the quality.

But should our moderator actively do something about it?

That's why we probably need some meta discussion, don't we?

Mithrandir24601

09:30

@bilbo_pingouin Hint: yes

Although for kicking a question off HNQ, it's possible a mod might need to do that at short notice, so it's possible that could happen without a meta discussion (as the point of that is to do something quickly, which is sort of the opposite of meta)

@Kepotx I'd argue those questions should be closed quickly

Kepotx

@Mithrandir24601 that's also what the meta post says, and I agree with it

bilbo_pingouin

@Mithrandir24601 I don't think the mods should start a meta discussion for each individual question that should be sent off... but they need some sort of guide-line to know when the community feels that a question be sent off

Mithrandir24601

@bilbo_pingouin Hmm... Well... Umm... Sometimes... But it's also possible that... Essentially, the HNQ is crossing the line between it being to do with a site on SE and the network as a whole, so... I guess it's not particularly my place to talk about that sort of thing here?

(I'm not a WB mod)

bilbo_pingouin

09:51

I mean that in the same sense that we had discussions to know what "too broad" means, etc.

we tried to come up with some principles/rules

and the same might apply for the HNQ handling

Kepotx

10:35

thing is: would there be that many questions that are good enough for the website but not the HNQ?

I fail to get examples of questions were mods wouldn't want to be in HNQ, but still open

bilbo_pingouin

which is why I feel like we need to clarify. Maybe there aren't.

JDługosz

11:00

Hello everyone

bilbo_pingouin

Hi

John Locke

11:28

Maybe instead of posting on meta, discussions about taking questions off the HNQ should be done in a chatroom, so whoever is on the site at the time can discuss it in real-time. That way, decisions would be faster, still involve the community, and there would be one place for all discussions about questions on HNQ

Worldbuilding Meta

16:59

0

Q: Answer contains description of real-life animal torture and my edit request was denied. Is such content acceptable?

A user posted a pretty disturbing description of actual animal torture in an answer. Instead of flagging the whole answer I tried to remove the offending passage while keeping the actual answer, but to my surprise it was rejected. Is content like that actually acceptable on this Stack Exchange?

discussion

Mephistopheles

17:32

We regularly talk about WMDs, terrorism, eugenics, and genocide. Why are people surprised that this would occasionally come up as well?

Gryphon

I'm not sure if the answer has been modified, but the way it is now the description isn't really graphic. I don't think there's much of a problem.

Mephistopheles

Anyway, this q just began collecting VTCs as I do temporary suspensions, any idea why?

12

Q: How can The Temple of Elementary Evil reliably protect itself against kinetic bombardment?

This building is the centerpiece of my world and the reason for everything. Why would chromatic dragons and adventurers fight together? To take down this temple, of course. But why do I need them? I'm a bloody god for fork's sake. I mean, the goons at the temple have charged particle beam weapons...

science-based military-defense

@Gryphon ?

Gryphon

@Mephistopheles I don't know why. That's wierd.

Mephistopheles

@Gryphon I think it confirms my theory that if you were to expose a question to every single person on WB: SE all of them would eventually collect enough close votes, meaning every question in this site is a bad question, you just hadn't realized it yet.

Bwhaaahaaaa OMG we just DDoS-ed the webpage of our school, involuntarily!

Gryphon

@Mephistopheles How?

Mephistopheles

17:48

@Gryphon The next week is going to be special, so we had to sign up for various programs, the only problem is las time I checked, there were around 789 students online, simultaneously

Gryphon

@Mephistopheles Hmm, yeah the server is probably not built to deal with that.

Mephistopheles

@Gryphon "I'm the avatar, you gotta deal with it!"

It also gave me a nifty server-side error

Gryphon

I've got a similar story, actually. In Ontario, all Grade 10 students have to write a literacy test, which is required to graduate from high school. In my year, they decided to try doing it online and decided all of the students would do it simultaneously to prevent cheating. The issue is that there are a lot of grade 10 students in Ontario.

Mephistopheles

@Gryphon Did at least something catch on fire?

Gryphon

@Mephistopheles Not as far as I know, but the pass rate was abysmal because the average person had about 5 minutes of their hours-long test before the server crashed

I was lucky and got about half an hour, which was enough for a pass. I don't know what my actual mark was though.

Probably pretty bad.

Mephistopheles

17:56

@Gryphon Okay, back to the closeEvotes. The only comments I received were one saying the goons would probably demand pay in cash, and one asking why I wasn't using magic

Gryphon

Yeah, I'm not one of the downvoters or close voters, so I can't tell you their reasons. It doesn't seem close-worthy to me.

Mephistopheles

I DIDN'T WANT A PORTAL STRAIGHT INTO A NEUTRON STAR THAT'S WHY @FROSTFYRE! THAT'S WHY YOU DON'T MAGIC!

Mithrandir24601

@Kepotx Questions that aren't safe for work? Questions that are deliberately made to be as click-baity as possible for nefarious purposes?

I don't think it applies so much here, but there are SE sites that have had these sorts of questions before

Gryphon

@Mithrandir24601 We've had some nsfw questions before.

Mithrandir24601

@Gryphon Did they hit HNQ?

Gryphon

18:09

@Mithrandir24601 Not as far as I know. Most were downvoted pretty heavily.

Mephistopheles

@Gryphon Other than the reverse rape one, I don't remember any nsfw content

what did I miss?

Gryphon

@Mephistopheles That was the one I was thinking off primarily. Also the torture one.

Actually, I think the torture one hit HNQ.

Mephistopheles

@Gryphon It did!?

Mithrandir24601

@Gryphon Right, so whether or not NSFW questions are OK on WB, the discussion about whether they should be on HNQ might need to be held network wide i.e. on main meta (although if there's a discussion on WB meta separately, I don't see how it could do any harm, to be fair :P )

Mephistopheles

@Gryphon I thought everyone had a hate boner for that one and sent it to the minuses faster than Stalin!

Mithrandir24601

18:12

But the one who just entered the room is a better person to talk about that sort of thing in this room

Gryphon

@Mephistopheles It got a lot of both kinds of votes.

@Mithrandir24601 This is true.

HDE 226868

@JohnLocke (cc @bilbo_pingouin and @Kepotx) The kicking-a-question-off-the-HNQ tool is really a last resort - a hammer for when the system kinda breaks down and a problematic question gets on the HNQ. It's going to be pretty sparingly used.

Mithrandir24601

*problematic question that doesn't need to be closed or deleted :P

Mephistopheles

@Gryphon Just to be sure, was there a meta-post about it?

9

Q: Reasoning behind deletion of gruesome content

Yesterday, there was a question of rather gruesome content. OP asked on how to make female-on-male rape a torture practice. No surprise this question got disliked a lot simply for its content - not most peoples favorite topic. While I did read some of the comments and people discussing their dis...

discussion specific-question deleted-questions

HDE 226868

@bilbo_pingouin That could be useful, although I don't know if people want or think we need to lower the limit from 5. We seem to be handling things decently as it is, and we often have more questions than that on simultaneously, so even 5 would be a reduction.

@Mithrandir24601 Yup, that.

Mithrandir24601

18:14

@HDE226868 Isn't 5 the highest by default now?

Gryphon

I don't frequently see more than 5 questions on HNQ at the same time, so I doubt that limit will be too much of a reduction.

HDE 226868

@Mithrandir24601 Yes. Typo by me.

Mephistopheles

@HDE226868 Problematic stuff can be hidden though

Like deep

High IQ stuff

and without a solid grasp of theoretical physics most of the jokes will go over a typical viewer's head

HDE 226868

@Mephistopheles I'm not sure what you mean by this.

If you see problematic content, flag it and let us know.

Mephistopheles

@HDE226868 Sigh, I was making a reference

knowyourmeme.com/memes/…

Btw, do we regard Rick and Morty as high as XKCD?

Gryphon

18:21

@Mephistopheles Apparently most of us aren't as meme-knowledgeable as you are.

I had no idea what you were referring to either.

Hosch250

@Mephistopheles Somehow, I think just being subjected to that would be torture for most people.

Also, I read a few years ago about a gang of women in Taiwan doing that.

Mephistopheles

@Hosch250 OK I DON'T WANT TO HEAR THE DETAILS!4!

Hosch250

I have no details.

HDE 226868

Yeah, let's . . . maybe not go there.

Hosch250

I already told you all I know. It made it into the international news.

It was just a gang of women doing what gangs do.

Mephistopheles

18:24

Geez, I watched people get roasted on trains by millions of watts, but that's... just horrendous

Hosch250

Well, not any better or worse than the other way around.

But yes.

I mean, a lot of guys I've mentioned it to seem to be more callous about it happening the other way, so I make sure to mention the flip side of it to try to make them think.

Mephistopheles

18:42

@Gryphon I noticed it. That's why I have to rely on "Glarnak will drag you down the toilet into hell" type of humor.

John Locke

19:24

@Mephistopheles But XKCD has tons of theoretical physics!

Space-time is like some simple and familiar system which is both intuitively understandable and precisely analogous, and if I were Richard Feynman I'd be able to come up with it.

Mephistopheles

@JohnLocke The Salt is rael

Mephistopheles

19:36

So, you've got any tips for making a question series? these would be covered:

"The Elementary Evil (EE, for short) comes in all shapes and sizes. The StackExchange degradations, King James with his army of Meantimes and Maybe Laters, the armsies and virginias (NSFW), Yuri from Red Alert 2, around 288 different variations of four killer-animatronics, and more. but they can be broken down into several groups with fairly uniform characteristics:"

One question about surviving one group

John Locke

19:55

I had trouble understanding what your question was asking at first, but figured out by the end of the question. You might want to consider rephrasing the first paragraph to give clearer information like:

Who owns the temple, you or the goons? How does the temple relate to the bunker? Are they the same thing or connected? Who owns the satellites? Are you the god, or are you defending against a god? I would also avoid using the second person, when you say "You successfully defended the building if...".

@Mephistopheles See above

Mephistopheles

20:19

@JohnLocke So?

12

Q: How can The Temple of Elementary Evil reliably protect itself against kinetic bombardment?

This building is the centerpiece of my world and the reason for everything. Why would chromatic dragons and adventurers fight together? To take down this temple, of course. But why do I need them? I'm Anon Alighieri, the god of absolute hyper death. The temple is the base of my greatest foes, an...

science-based military-defense

James

20:36

@Green Hey @NexTerren you too. @AndyD273 you three

AndyD273

@James Hey

James

I got an estimate for a worldbuilding themed custom moleskine notebook. Let me know if you are interested. That goes for anyone else in chat as well.

2

Mithrandir24601

20:53

@James Depending on cost and postage, yes!

John Locke

@Mephistopheles That's a lot better, at least for me. My one question is why the satellites are under your control but you still have to sustain an attack from them.

Mephistopheles

@JohnLocke Uhm, what do you mean?

John Locke

@Mephistopheles you say "and I have 12 unhackable satellites and the 13th satellite, The Moon, at my disposal, ready to crush my enemies and drive them before me as I hear the lamentation of their women." But then say "Your defense is successful if the underground factory suffers little to no damage and remains functional after an all-out, f#ck-em-all barrage of 13*24=312 rods."

@James Mole skin? If it isn't the fur of a mythical creature, it's not Worldbuilding themed.

Maybe it's made of cardboard, but still. If it's cardboard, then it should be made from either the Womping Willow, the Tayan, or one of those trees in the Wizard of OZ

AndyD273

21:18

@James What does the estimate come out to?

Mephistopheles

21:38

@JohnLocke I don't. The temple gets the... oh I see.

Fixed.

And I think a worldbuilding themed custom human skin notebook would be awesome.

John Locke

21:59

@Mephistopheles It would be more straightforward to just ask how they protect themselves from the satellites

I would change the 3rd paragraph to
I mean, the goons at the temple have charged particle beam weapons, so nuking them isn't really an option, but that still leaves them vulnerable to kinetic bombardment. They know I have these satellites, so what defence(s) do they use to protect themselves?

Shalvenay

22:22

hey there @James and @Mithrandir24601

Mithrandir24601

23:03

@Shalvenay Rytsas! How're things?

Shalvenay

23:22

@Mithrandir24601 alright here, still wishing I could catch @James around at a time when I wasn't off at $work :P as for you?

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