CURED - 2021-05-04

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Teresa Lisbon

05:09

At the end of this next thread of conversation with the moderator, it seems we are the aggressors, and the PSQ answerers are the unfortunate oppressed folk. PSQ answerers are rule breakers, let it be known. Any semblance of kindness is going to get you either stoic silence or an outburst, which we flag and then the comment disappears. So hang on, I'm supposed to be kind all the time, but the "oppressed folk" can do what they want, roam around, throw insults at us, and we flag and move on...

... Am I the only one who thinks that we are the ones swallowing our feelings while they roam around guilt free as a result of this behaviour? I have no problem if the flags are handled, but I'd like to see PSQ answerers called out in a way that appeases me far more than it is doing at the moment. The problem with the system is quite simple : the ones being visually called out are the ones trying to help follow the site's guidelines as we saw here..

... call the PSQ answerers out more visually like they call us out, please! I'm not saying that I want to harm them in any way, but I want more visual clues that action is being taken, and that our efforts are not being ignored. If you set conversation standards for us, let the same standards be set for them. Once that happens, we can reduce the conflict : by reducing the ultimate source of conflict, the PSQ answer.

Paramanand Singh

05:48

@TeresaLisbon: it is easier to come to this chatroom and tell us show more restraint. I wonder if there is a room where PSQ answerers hang out and some mod can go and reach out to them and ask to follow policy guidelines.

Teresa Lisbon

@ParamanandSingh I wish there was a unilateral way of sending a message to them more personally. The EoQS post sends a message but it doesn't hit hard. How do I know that? From statistics pre and post the message.

Also @ParamanandSingh Thank you for the optimistic message, I did have one yesterday which I put up (someone put it up for closure on CURED, I checked and found it had been edited) but I did not project it as positive. Perhaps I should do this more.

Paramanand Singh

06:19

@TeresaLisbon: I think while handling those flags related to answering low quality questions will ensure that the answerers are getting some private message from mods. Not in every case but at least for some cases and some users.

Teresa Lisbon

@ParamanandSingh Right, that's my hope as well.

Paramanand Singh

It is just that these things are not public the way we are are getting messages to restrain ourselves in this chatroom.

Paramanand Singh

07:09

While going through the close queue I found one question which was good (attempt included and and asker showing willingness to learn) and worth keeping open. Turns out it was part of audit and I passed that.

So it appears questions in close queue are rarely worth keeping open.

TheSimpliFire

07:55

Nice update. Math.SE might benefit from a three-vote close and five-vote reopen.

Pedro Tamaroff

08:39

@amWhy The policy was discussed and we all agreed to it. This is pure speculation. The policy comes with a request to keep interactions calm and to flag and move on. Please do this. I won't engage with messages that include unnecessary comments, or suggest I am doing something which I am not, etc.

Please stop reacting like we're attacking you, this is not what is happening. :/

Thanks for the clarification on the review queues.

Paramanand Singh

08:57

@TheSimpliFire: that's really a good news. Hope it gets implemented soon on mathse.

Teresa Lisbon

@PedroTamaroff OK , agreed. I will follow your guidelines, on the lines of what you say, with the aim of preventing conflict. All I hope is that this does not dilute the spirit in which the EoQS post was drafted and is meant to be implemented. I will keep statistics of my own, not for the intention of targeting but for evaluating the effectiveness of my actions. Thank you.

Teresa Lisbon

09:13

On second thoughts, @PedroTamaroff I will place my grievance in the meta thread for EoQS as you request, where I'll try to frame my points more carefully. I don't want to be rude in any way, but I still have some things to say, and I would like to see a good response.

Pedro Tamaroff

Good!

Teresa Lisbon

I think I've done it, @PedroTamaroff on the EoQS post. Please take your time to reply, I need to go for football training now!

Pedro Tamaroff

@TeresaLisbon I don't see the post as of yet.

@amWhy I am talking about calling out a specific user. What I wrote above was in response to @TeresaLisbon's question (and it seems that answer was well received by her). I am not singling out a user here, just calling to everyone's attention things that will help the day to day experience in the site.

Paramanand Singh

10:17

@PedroTamaroff: it appears @TeresaLisbon has posted a response to that EoQS post and all these responses are now part of a chat. In particular see this by Teresa

Pedro Tamaroff

Oh. I was expecting a meta post.

Teresa Lisbon

10:59

@PedroTamaroff Sorry Pedro, I wanted to keep it in the EoQS chat itself, since it was relevant there. I don't think a conversation between us warrants a meta post by itself, although yes, I would like it if others participate as well.

So I left something there. I just want to tie up loose ends and make the role of the community moderator clearer vis-a-vis the EoQS guidelines, and I'm continuously thinking of things that are hitting me as I'm going through the procedure. I'm not asking for a reward for the work I do, but I wanted more visual pointers to the fact that the EoQS implementation is making a difference, and wanted permission to do a few things in this regard by myself. That's the crux of what I wrote.

Martin R

@TheAmplitwist @TeresaLisbon, @ParamanandSingh: After reading the responses I decided to close the question as a duplicate.

Teresa Lisbon

@MartinR It was always fair to me! In particular, "converting one setup to another" I don't really much difference between the setups to begin with. Another thing : I up voted the comment containing first response of the duplicate defender, but it was basically because I expected something harsh (possibly even the lack of a response) and it was a better defense than I expected. Just encouraging the fact the user did reply!

Paramanand Singh

Finally it is settled @MartinR.

Paramanand Singh

11:41

PSQ, please close

Xander Henderson

12:33

@TeresaLisbon I think that a lot of the PSQ answerers very sincerely believe that they are helping people and that they are being attacked, also. They also likely feel like they are "swallowing their feelings". It is going to take a little bit of time to get to a new equilibrium.

I also don't want to start acting until (a) I have a fair amount of data, and (2) enough time has gone by to make the excuse "Oh, I didn't know about the new procedure!" unrealisitic.

José Carlos Santos

@ParamanandSingh Deleted.

soupless

Should this question be edited with a tag soft-question and reference-request?

The Amplitwist

12:52

@MartinR Thank you, Martin! And also to @ParamanandSingh for engaging in the comments under the question. It's worth mentioning that Sam OT responded politely to the comments, and I appreciate that even though I was not convinced by the arguments presented.

Teresa Lisbon

@XanderHenderson I think I accept this point of view : but I want to measure the equilibrium. I want to maintain independent statistics to measure the equilibrium/ want the moderators to bring me disclosable numbers that allow me to gauge if the community enforcement is effective or not. That's what I'm asking for. For example, are the number of PSQ answers going down? Are the number of PSQs being closed before an answer comes in going up? I need numerical evidence...

... that the enforcement is working, and is not being pushed back a by counterargument. It's like a marathon, if you have to finish you have to keep the same speed throughout. The push must be there. That's why I am asking for it. SQL scripts, disclosures, whatever. I want numbers to prove that enforcement is working and I want to study them.

soupless

@amWhy Well, the most recent ones seem to be targeted voting.

Paramanand Singh

13:09

@amWhy: I wasn't really aware of the scale of downvotes you are receiving. I don't know if such voting can be detected easily because they are spaced out in time.

Maybe those from yesterday around 16:56 can be reversed.

amWhy

It's amazing to me how Pedro only addresses me when I'm not here? @Pedro should come back and say publicly he will join other mods to start protecting users here, and focus more on the real culprits on this site.

José Carlos Santos

@ParamanandSingh I would be amazed if they could not be reversed.

Teresa Lisbon

@ParamanandSingh Well, the times certainly indicate in and around 16:56 that something is amiss. Listen, the pressure on us is far more. I'm sorry , I know we are not running a regime here, but @XanderHenderson What do you think is the presiding feeling that a PSQ answerer must be going through when they see this policy and then see a PSQ they wish to answer? Because from what I know, the presiding feeling for me, when I see seven PSQs answered in a row, is despair. I go through :

Elliot Yu

As far as I can tell from reading meta threads on this, targeted downvotes are not within the purview of site mods, only admins, because site mods don't have access to voting records of each users, so they can't see who did the voting.

amWhy

@JoséCarlosSantos ... But I really have nothing to say to you.

Teresa Lisbon

13:14

140 questions in a day. PSQ answerers go through how many? Let's see the statistics. I'm sorry, I don't want to be measuring feelings, but I still want to say that somewhere, deep down there, there is the divide that says : "we are correct, they are wrong". "We are serving the site, they are destroying the site". These feelings preside over me, and dictate my actions.

Elliot Yu

On the other hand, the script that clears issues like this (and automatically hands out suspensions to people who are doing it) only runs once per day, I think. So there might be a delay between when it happens and when the system detects it and deals with it.

amWhy

@ElliotYu It's a systematic problem. Some mods have escalated former flags to CMs, but they've done nothing. Other mods have refused to escalate. That's why I'm asking @Pedro to prove, by escalating, targeted downvoting against me, likely by users he's long protected.

Peter

D

Teresa Lisbon

Now I don't want to make it an us vs them scenario, but think about this it this way : I see content that supports my viewpoint far more than they see content that supports their viewpoint. Please use moderator tools to check how many posts I visit , how many posts @amWhy visits and how many posts any of your suspects (if any) visit. The feelings go higher for us, the emotions go higher. The actions will then of course be more accentuated, if anything. That's why we need protection.

José Carlos Santos

@amWhy You have nothing to say about what? The fact that you are being targeted?

@Peter Well, this was fast.

Peter

13:19

D

amWhy

@ParamanandSingh It's all up to the mod who challenges it, if they challenge it, as to whether to escalate to CMs. Even that means little these days.

Teresa Lisbon

PSQ answerers will have feelings, enough of that has been made clear on meta, but I think it pales in comparison to ours, not only due to the number of posts we visit but also the fact that the site guidelines , as they are , seem to favour us and yet we seem to be getting the short end of the stick. The EoQS is here and I'm very happy about that, but I want evidence of enforcement, as I mentioned many times already. Feelings are not going to mean such users go scot-free...

(Out for some time)

Peter

D

D

D

Elliot Yu

PSQ, please close

Peter

C/D

Elliot Yu

13:34

@Peter 🤝

Peter

13:48

D

user1729

14:28

PSQ to close

Elliot Yu

PSQ, please close

Xander Henderson

Does anyone know if there is a better version of this question running around?

See also.

This seems like a pretty common exercise, and I feel like it is the kind of thing which ought to have a canonical answer, but I am not finding a better dupe target. :\

Elliot Yu

15:03

Btw is this room also for closing as dupe?

soupless

@ElliotYu I think, it is a yes. Almost every discussion about posts in the Review queues was made here,

The Amplitwist

@ParamanandSingh Would you have a moment to look at some more duplicates of Choice of $q$ in Baby Rudin's Example 1.1 that I've found? I took upon a small project to try and find all the duplicates of this question, and there are still 6 open questions that look like duplicates to me.

Paramanand Singh

@TheAmplitwist That question is already famous with 35 questions linked to it. If you can send links to those 6 open questions, I can try dupe hammer

Elliot Yu

In that case, I think we've got a dupe here ;D

The Amplitwist

@ParamanandSingh Sure! Here goes, in chronological order: One Two Three Four Five Six

Elliot Yu

15:23

PSQ, and seems like trying to cheat on an exam, probably close?

Pedro Tamaroff

@amWhy I will not engage in conversations where you accuse me (or other people, for that matter) of doing things they are not doing.

Serial downvoting is always taken care of, meaning we contact the CMs and they take action. Sometimes no evidence is found, and there is not much we can do as mods (i.e. we are raising a "next level" flag, and it is up to the CMs to invalidate the votes or decide not to.)

amWhy

@PedroTamaroff You do not engage with me ever. This is the first time you've stuck around long enough for me to respond. And when I have responded, you've said "sigh" and left, twice. I will not engage with you where you are playing such games.

Pedro Tamaroff

15:38

@amWhy I left since you started a rant about me.

You are the only user here that has reacted like that to what I posted initially.

amWhy

Pedro, all you have shown us, in this room, is taking issue with actions taken against problematic users from participation in this room. I want to here you say publicly, here, or in chat, or in another chat, you taking issue with users who target us for following suggestions regarding the new policy. Some mods have earned deference; you have not. I will leave if you continue to rant in this chatroom.

Pedro Tamaroff

Sorry, that won't happen, since I am not taking issue with anyone because of that.

user1729

PSQ to close.

Pedro Tamaroff

I believe I have been clear, but if you have any questions (for example, maybe the request above was not clear enough or there are doubts regarding how to enforce the quality standards) you can always ask. For example, @TeresaLisbon has asked for clarification and I think that was productive.

On the other hand, my time and energy is limited, and I won't dedicate it to reading rants about the moderator team or claims that we are protecting users or whatever.

amWhy

@Pedro Also, you intimidate users here. I refuse to let you intimidate me. So the deference from others is not due to any arguments from you, it is due to folks being intimidated by you and your occasional sprees intimidating users here.

Pedro Tamaroff

15:43

@amWhy What exactly is intimidating?

amWhy

Come back, @Pedro, when you're willing to converse with us, and not preach to us.

Pedro Tamaroff

What are you talking about?

I am asking: what exactly is intimidating in what I said before?

@amWhy Come on, drop the act.

amWhy

@PedroTamaroff See, you dismiss me out of hand. I am not acting. I really wish not to engage with you when you keep up the snarky comments to me.

Pedro Tamaroff

@amWhy Ok. Let us reboot: can you please detail what you mean by "intimidating users here"?

I have made a simple request, and you are the only user in this chatroom that decided to start accusing the moderator team of things.

amWhy

@PedroTamaroff No, not the moderator team. And if you'd like to speak with me, let's do so privately, where only mods have access.

Pedro Tamaroff

15:52

@amWhy What do you mean "not the moderator team"?

Before you say I am "protecting" users or something. Do you realize that I:
1) couldn't care less about protecting users, there's literally NOTHING to get out of it, it is a complete waste of time
2) if users are breaking the rules (for example revenge downvoting) it is our duty as moderators to take care of it (and we always do this)
3) even if I wanted to protect users (whatever this means) I do not really have time to do that and there are 9 other moderators, I cannot really go against the global decision of 9 other team members?

amWhy

@PedroTamaroff I am not upset with all moderators, so certainly not the team as a whole.

@PedroTamaroff .... if you'd like to speak with me, let's do so privately, where only mods have access. This conversation is off topic in this room, as are most of your interruptions here. I will not talk with you here, when you continue to show a pattern of trying to humiliate me publicly.

Pedro Tamaroff

@amWhy I am not trying to humiliate you.

I do not really understand how you are getting this from what I have wrote.

amWhy

There are eleven room owners of this room. If you think my calling out you is calling out the mod team, then I don't understand why you disagree with all room owners. This is not my room to waste space trying to converse with you, because doing so has become off topic in this room, as undermining the purpose of this room. I'll be happy to speak with you privately; but this is not the place to do so.

Paramanand Singh

@TheAmplitwist: apart from fist question rest five have been closed as dupe. For the first one I don't have dupe hammer in "analysis" tag, so I gave just a close vote. I wish Rudin had himself explained the choice of $q$ in his book. It would have saved us a lot of trouble.

Pedro Tamaroff

@amWhy Sorry, I do not really have the time/energy to engage in private conversations like that. Already having to engage in conversations like this is honestly too tiring. If you'd like to contact the moderator team privately you can always do so, if we have to contact your privately will do when necessary.

For the moment, I encourage you to stop thinking someone in the team is after someone else or that someone in the team is protecting someone else, and consider that our messages and recommendations are being issued to improve the experience of all users in the site.

amWhy

16:04

If you do not understand the consequences of the imbalance of power to actively maintain, please do not antagonize any of us in this room. Try entering the Cafe, and taking your mod hat off momentarily, because you face no consequences for your excesses, but everyone of us here does, e.g. you made sure to prove you were boss to me yesterday.

Elliot Yu

@PedroTamaroff I think it's possible that when you posted the three point suggestion on how to approach answers to PSQs, people who are active in notifying those users and flagging such answers feel as if they are reprimanded for taking action to improve the website according to the EoQS post, while on the other hand there is a perception of inaction from mods. My read of @TeresaLisbon's most recent comments on the EoQS discussion room gives me the same impression.

@PedroTamaroff I'm not claiming that the mods aren't acting on rule breaking answers to PSQs, just that there's a perception as such, because people active in reviews are seeing the same users whom they've just notified/flagged engage in rule-breaking behaviour again.

Pedro Tamaroff

For example, the pointers above are not meant to be pointing fingers at anyone or antagonize people, they are intended to keep rows between users at a minimum. Telling users they are violating a rule already leads to backlash when we moderators tell them that, and having users do it inevitably leads to drama between users.

We want all of you not to have to deal with backlash from your messages, for one.

Hence, the recommendations above.

@ElliotYu There are many flags and a few mods. The new enforcement only started a while ago, so please be patient. We are definitely looking at all the flags, and we appreciate you pointing to the posts.

amWhy

@PedroTamaroff Okay, then go on your merry way, which you happily do every day, washing your hands of this site whenever it suits you. Just saying... You asked... I've tried to help you see what you fail to see, or don't want to see, and then you blame me. Don't you dare utter your second to last sentence. You have immunity from sanctions, no matter what horrible things you say. That you cannot seem to get this, and are unwilling to spend the effort in another space to talk in a without your

...without your mod-performative posture, says it all. Please do not invade this chat to castigate any user here.

Paramanand Singh

@PedroTamaroff: I agree with your last comment about being patient. I hope there will be a visible decline in "PSQ answering" activity especially by a few of the most prolific PSQ answerers. We have waited this long for such policy like EoQS, a few more weeks is no big deal. And in the meanwhile let us remind ourselves that "keep interactions civil" is also a part of EoQS.

Elliot Yu

@PedroTamaroff I appreciate that. I don't have as strong a feeling as some others, not having enough rep to access the close vote queue and all. Sorry for butting in, but I just wanted to put forth a conjecture on how the conversation went south...

The Amplitwist

16:13

@ParamanandSingh Thank you for your help! :)

Pedro Tamaroff

@ElliotYu Thank you, that's helpful.

I will edit the initial message to reflect some of your comments.

Arctic Char

C1, C2

The Amplitwist

@ParamanandSingh I have also found 10 questions that ask how to find a rational between another rational and $\sqrt{2}$. I had flagged some of them as a duplicate of Choice of $q$ in Baby Rudin's Example 1.1 but they were voted to be left open in the review queue, so perhaps a better duplicate can be found for them?

For instance, one such question is Finding Rational numbers. Does Need help with proof for Dedekind cuts on $\mathbb{Q}^+$ seem like an appropriate duplicate target?

amWhy

@ParamanandSingh That's something Pedro needs to keep in mind, as well, with an alert for him to recognize that not all flags are merit-worthy; that flags can be used, just like DVs to target a user, in each direction. A couple mods need to evaluate the merits of flags from disgruntled users from a bit less of a biased perception. Pointing out that an answer violates, or "fails to follow" the EoQS, is honest.

Arctic Char

C3, C4

Paramanand Singh

16:22

@amWhy: yup, the "us" in "Let us remind ourselves" is for everyone who supports that policy of EoQS. I also expect that PSQ answerers react to such pointing out in a civil manner.

Teresa Lisbon

@PedroTamaroff If I don't point a finger, how can I tell a person what they are doing is wrong? IS it wrong? Can we agree on that much? I mean, the EoQS post says : "they are not good for the site as a whole". So that's a common denominator. How do I tell them that? I feel mere direction is too passive, and when I'm given a reply that politely declines/ abuses , I flag and move on, okay, but I can't see the same user again, can I?

amWhy

@ParamanandSingh Exactly, that's my point, and a point that Pedro has not understood.

Pedro Tamaroff

@TeresaLisbon You don't have to tell them anything. That's the job of the moderator team. :)

amWhy

@PedroTamaroff Then start doing that work!

Paramanand Singh

I mixed up while writing something in my last message so removed. Nothing secret.

Pedro Tamaroff

16:25

I know it may feel bothersome not to be able to "call people out", but we cannot have that happening in main, it would be complete chaos.

Teresa Lisbon

@PedroTamaroff Well, I don't know, the problem is the abuse/ comment is kind of directed at me : so I feel responsible for replying to it. Perhaps I should defer : but that comes back to the point of visibility : I don't see a visible response, it seems to happen behind a curtain, and that's why, I'll be honest, I suspect it of not happening as well, a legerdemain of sorts.

Pedro Tamaroff

@TeresaLisbon If an abusive comment is directed at you, it will always be deleted.

Teresa Lisbon

For example, let's say a moderator left a comment saying : you were rude to this user who did nothing but point out the rules. Please don't do this again.

I think that would go a great way to ensuring that users did not repeat this behaviour.

Paramanand Singh

I think it is expected of us with respect to new policy of EoQS that we can comment below the PSQ answer like "please refrain from answering low quality question. For more details see EoQS policy".

Pedro Tamaroff

@TeresaLisbon This is done in private, not in public.

What I have done many times is leave a more general comment, reminding users to keep interactions civil.

I think this serves the same purpose. ;)

Teresa Lisbon

16:30

@PedroTamaroff Yeah, that's kind of my issue really. The action seems to happen behind a smokescreen. The problem with "keep interactions civil" is that it seems to put the blame on both sides, rather than see that in truth the rudeness in the conversation was rather one-sided. I need you to visibly take action on rude flags more, if I am being honest.

I think this word visible is becoming my focal point of interaction with the moderators.

amWhy

@PedroTamaroff Please link us to many such posts, because I highly doubt it. What can we agree counts as "many"? Ten times, a dozen, because each of us have surpassed two dozen times. @Pedro, you keep trying to win over fans, yet never address the hard questions.

Pedro Tamaroff

@TeresaLisbon I understand, but this request for visibility does go against the way moderators operate network wide.

You seem to be requesting some kind of "public trial" on users.

This is not going to happen.

Think about what kind of "regimes" do those kind of things. ;)

It is not the good ones!

Paramanand Singh

I don't think we need any public trials (I had one last year on meta and it was not a very enjoyable experience, but yes it helped me improve on certain fronts). What we really wish is "a noticeable decline in PSQ answering from the usual group of PSQ answerers" (sorry for repeating this).

Xander Henderson

@TeresaLisbon This is hard to do: if we leave a comment saying "be nice" and don't delete the offensive comment, the offensive comment remains. If we leave a comment saying "be nice" and delete the offensive comment, then we have publicly named-and-shamed a user for rude behaviour. This runs counter the SE mindset, which insists that past behaviour should be left in the past (except with respect to the moderation team, which does have access to those data).

amWhy

@PedroTamaroff No, not true: your work yourself is public, in this chatroom. Please try to stop running behind the skirt of secrecy. You claimed you commented many times.... show us. Comments are public. And, stop coming here to publicly shame users who work in this chat, to win favors with the users you do support.

Pedro Tamaroff

16:34

@ParamanandSingh That will take a while.

Xander Henderson

@ParamanandSingh That is going to take time. There are years of inertia here, and it is going to take a little while for the entire community to start changing. Give it a couple of weeks.

Maybe a couple of months.

Paramanand Singh

Yes we can wait that long. Not an issue really at least for me.

Pedro Tamaroff

@XanderHenderson Yeah, my bet is a few months.

Arctic Char

D1, D2, D3, D4

amWhy

@XanderHenderson @Xander I totally get that. But Pedro has abused that, by publicly shaming some users, but refusing to shame other users, because that should be private. Where is the error here? Hint: Publicly invading this space to only shame users.

Teresa Lisbon

16:36

@XanderHenderson "we have publicly named-and-shamed a user for rude behaviour" well, on CURED as well, we seem to get some comments saying we were not civil here and there. I mean, all I'm asking for is reciprocation : you nudge us, you nudge them. With the same degree of visibility, because we don't have a problem going around having our IDs plastered across posts with disgruntled authors leaving comments. I am happy some of these get deleted, but I think for as long as they stand, it's shameful.

Arctic Char

D5, D6, D7, D8

D9, D10, D11

Xander Henderson

@TeresaLisbon (1) Most of the most troublesome answerers don't engage with meta at all. They don't chat, they don't post on meta, and so on. (2) I try, in general, not to call out any particular user, and ask for civility here in broad terms.

With respect to (2), I, personally, don't really care about being overly civil---academic discourse is often blunt to the point of appear hostile (even if it is not).

However, this room gets a lot of scrutiny, and there are rumblings in the rest of the SE network (and on the Math SE meta) about how toxic and awful this room is. I care about the work done here, and don't want CURED to be targeted by the network in the way that it often is.

Paramanand Singh

Sorry people. I need to leave this important discussion for dinner. Will return tomorrow. Bye and good night (or day)!

Teresa Lisbon

@XanderHenderson Part (1) : 100% true. (2) Ok point conceded. But I'm just going out to say that we are ready to lose our anonymity to take abuse from the community. In some sense, because the moderators are not doing that (and they have their reasons, fair enough) the abuse/angst is directed at us, who write the comments. That's kind of what we have to face :

Xander Henderson

Thus I think that we need to maintain a higher bar and set a higher standard for this room. Because of the additional scrutiny this room receives, the standard of behaviour is commensurately higher.

Elliot Yu

16:41

@XanderHenderson Well, I know this is a design philosophy of SE, but this lack of feedback from reports/flags is seriously kind of frustrating... There's no pingback from reporting a comment that ends up deleted, there's no rejection/acceptance notification on flags (even if temporary) besides the counter on # of helpful flags for badges. The results aren't invisible, but really mute. Of course I don't expect you guys (site mods) to be able to change that, but still...

Xander Henderson

@TeresaLisbon When brought to my attention, I have responded to several users. I have made a few public comments (e.g. "No, really, please read the policy."), have silently deleted rude responses while leaving the original comments directing users to the meta post alone, have declined flags explaining the new policy, and privately contacted users.

However, I don't see all of the behaviour being described here, as I am not online as much as several of you seem to be (this will likely change in two weeks, after I finish grading finals, but I am swamped right now).

@ElliotYu You should be able to see a list of the flags you have raised, and how they were handled: math.stackexchange.com/users/flag-summary/165060 .

Elliot Yu

@XanderHenderson Ooh nice. Sorry I guess I didn't explore the website as much as I thought I did...

Xander Henderson

@amWhy I'm not sure what you want me to respond to. Your last comment to me was "Can moderators who dropped in a month ago for the first time ever, and since only engages with some, every time coming to call out users, i.e., publicly shaming them, also refrain from hostility and public scolding? Because Pedro is being hypocritical.", which I understood to be rhetorical, and aimed more at Pedro than myself.

vitamin d

@XanderHenderson If I click on the link, I see "Page not found
We're sorry, we couldn't find the page you requested."

Xander Henderson

@vitamind Yes.

Teresa Lisbon

16:48

@XanderHenderson Good luck with grading your finals! Perhaps I will search for good examples until you return. Till then, see you, I don't want to disturb you. I hope other moderators will step up!

Xander Henderson

Because that is @ElliotYu's flagging history, which is private.

Replace the number at the end with your own user ID to see your own flagging history.

vitamin d

@XanderHenderson I understand. Thanks.

Xander Henderson

In your own user profile, click the highlighted text:

user image

vitamin d

@XanderHenderson I can see my flag history now, thanks.

1 hour later…

s.harp

18:21

Is this the right place to ask for feedback/action on a question I think was wrongly closed?

Xander Henderson

@s.harp This is not an inappropriate place for requesting such feedback.

Constructive feedback might be a better place.

s.harp

@XanderHenderson the question in question is not my question

rather a completely innocuous and normal question that got closed

Teresa Lisbon

18:36

@s.harp Can you place the link here?

I'll take a look personally and get back to you. We may not be able to converse here, so I'll see what I can do.

s.harp

2

Q: When the map $\phi: B(N_1,N_2)\to B(N_2^*,N_1^*)$ defined as $\phi(T)=T^*$ is onto?

Let $N_1$ and $N_2$ be two normed linear spaces. Then, we define a linear map $$\phi: B(N_1,N_2)\to B(N_2^*,N_1^*); \quad T \mapsto T^*$$ where $B(X,Y)$ denotes the set of all bounded linear maps. This is a linear isometric map. Now, I am thinking when this map is onto in the infinite-dimensional...

linear-algebra functional-analysis

Xander Henderson

@s.harp Personally, I think that question was appropriately closed.

It lacks context (a reference, motivation for the problem, the asker's background, etc).

s.harp

There are so many questions without such contexts, the question itself is novel and interesting enough

the motivation for the problem is "I am thinking" about when its possible

postmortes

@s.harp Maybe, but the thinking appears to have stopped at asking the question. I think to be a good question further thoughts about what the answer might be are needed, and to be a great question it needs to be interesting to other people as well

2

I would have voted to close, had I seen it in a review queue.

amWhy

→ 4 messages moved to Trash

s.harp

18:43

@postmortes these standards seem somewhat counter-productive, but also inconsistently applied. I understand that the site has problems being spammed by questions about high-school algebra, but for questions about higher mathematics I think even idle thoughts can result in interesting questions

but I will desist from pushing the point

postmortes

Well yes, but it's normed linear spaces and adjoints -- it's barely higher mathematics

A first course in Banach spaces would cover the necessary material and a good undergrad can definitely handle that

Teresa Lisbon

@s.harp Let me give an example of how it could have been improved. The addition of obvious cases could have been helpful e.g. "For the following $N_1$ and $N_2$, it is onto" (with or without reason) "For the following $N_1$ and $N_2$ it is not onto" (with or without reason) : "in the following exercise in this book , we were asked to show that for this $N_1,N_2$ it is not onto" etc.

(This is for starters)

s.harp

@postmortes higher mathematics is everything that isnt school mathematics, at least I thought this was the consensus. But more specifically here we have an interesting and not directly obvious (to me) characterisation of reflexivity in a simple condition

Teresa Lisbon

Now, we also have the situation where the author can state their source. Is this a question from a book? Are you wondering about this having read a certain example from somewhere? The answer is interesting, but unfortunately the question has to be interesting enough for the answer to be revealing. Your answer is good no doubt @s.harp, but I'd have loved a little more initiative from the user in this regard.

s.harp

@TeresaLisbon personally I think that would have made the question less interesting - especially if the OP has no idea about it doing this would just waste the readers time with trivial examples

postmortes

18:47

@s.harp I'm fine with that definition of higher mathematics, but this is definitely the lower end of higher mathematics -- I meant barely as in "just scraping in" :) I do agree with you that this question has potential, but I don't think it's fulfilled it. Your answer, however, is quite nice and it would be a shame to lose it

amWhy

@s.harp But you answered the question. Just be honest from the get go. You have invested interest in the question's reopening. Yet it is not a good question, nor did you, before answering, insist the asker provide more context, or otherwise improve the question. Only after it was appropriately closed, did you come running here.

Teresa Lisbon

@s.harp Would it? We ask to add context because we want to know where the question came from and why it was interesting. I don't see how context addition makes it less interesting. If the OP has no idea about the answer, they must at least know where the question came from, right? One of these can be mentioned : source of question , motivation for question, attempt(basic examples...). These are important to me : I find the book and hunt it down and read it up and use its notation ...

... to answer the question. That's my dedication. I know answerers don't necessarily need to be that dedicated, but specifying a source goes a long way to help. Examples don't help, ok fine. How can the source not help? Even if the source is not known, ask the user to mention their level : are they reading from any books? Are they using any PDFs for help? Anything will do. PSQs will not do, and that is a PSQ as it stands, "this is the definition : "this is a map : why is it onto?"

s.harp

uhh, I think its obvious to anybody clicking the link that I answered the question - I have a vested interest in the question because I spent time on it and dont see the closure as reasonable. I dont think there is anything to even be dishonest about here.
aside from that very many questions in eg the tag on c-star-algebras have a similar format, aesthetic standards about questions that are needed in high volume tags dont need to apply everywhere

Xander Henderson

@s.harp Mathematics doesn't happen in a vacuum. Every question has some context. Why is the question interesting and novel? Where does it come from? What context does one need in order to understand why it is interesting.

SmokeDetector

[ SmokeDetector | MS ] Few unique characters in answer, repeating words in answer (174): How to check if a set of vectors is a basis by user923471 on math.SE

amWhy

18:56

@s.harp That wasn't included in your initial request, but you did say: "it's not my question or anything"... Only after being asked to include a link, and only if users chased that link, would they know you were the answerer.

Xander Henderson

@s.harp The culture of this room is that we expect folk to disclose affiliations with questions. Not that there is anything wrong with asking for action on a question which you have answered, but it is important to be upfront about it.

3

Teresa Lisbon

Here are the newest C* algebra questions and to be fair, there are not many questions that lack context. Most of them are pretty well explained.

About 30% of all posts, however, are borderline closable , to be honest.

rschwieb

psq math.stackexchange.com/q/4127216/29335

Teresa Lisbon

That's the scale of the task that faces us, although to be honest it is possible that in higher tags, questions which don't have context actually get ignored for missing vital details. In this case, a couple of problematic PSQ-type questions actually don't have any answer.

Teresa Lisbon

19:19

I don't feel good deleting the answer here, what can I do about this!?!

PSQ?

FYI : A user whose posts I flagged a couple of days ago and a few days before that as well, seems to have self-deleted their account. The flagged posts contained offence that wasn't directed at me but at someone else. For me, I don't know if the moderators did something but it's nice to know!

amWhy

@TeresaLisbon You cannot alone delete the answer. It has three upvotes. I've already warned the answerer, and I've already been warned that linking to the EoQS more than once is harassment. flag it?? But the question, though in "picture form" question certainly shows motivation for why they are asking.

Teresa Lisbon

@amWhy I actually don't want to do anything. This is one of those questions where I think the answer is genuinely very very informative and canonical in nature. I want this to stay, to be honest, because there is an attempt , if on paper, and apart from the fact that everything is in an image, it's exactly what we want from a question.

amWhy

@TeresaLisbon Good question to also consider posting in the mods' office chat.

@TeresaLisbon I agree!

Teresa Lisbon

@amWhy Can I disclose this user's identity, or would there still be a problem? What do you think? And yeah, we'll give that question a pass, to be fair.

amWhy

@TeresaLisbon Probably best not to do so publicly. But I think you can check your flag history on you profile page. On the upperish right-hand side you'll see a list of links- click "helpful flags": it will list comment flags, pending flags, and handled flags.

Teresa Lisbon

19:34

@amWhy Great point, thanks for that. I'll do this.

PSQ

PSQ I left a comment here, nothing confrontational : "I request you to read the following guidelines that I attach here[...]".

s.harp

ok so i got banned from this chat for using an the "s-word" to highlight incredulity, but the message portraying me as dishonest and a child is completely fine - I dont feel fairly treated. It was a mistake to ask for advice.
This is the first negative interaction I have had with either the mods or the community, its surprisng how much this has soured me despite being on the site for i dont know how many years now..

Teresa Lisbon

PSQ

@s.harp I gave you many, many tips on how you can improve the question in extended further comments, which you have not replied to. I was not rude to you : apparently this is a negative interaction for you, if only you were in my shoes, getting negative comments day by day by day, only for holding the site guidelines a little dear. I am now hurt because you can use my tips to help open the question, but the effort I took to come up with it won't be used by you. Or will it?

PSQ could be duplicate as well.

It seems to have four reopen votes already.

That's not right.

s.harp

19:57

@TeresaLisbon I read your remarks, personally I do not agree that such things are necessary to make a good question and feel that they may make a question worse, I would have replied but I was banned from the chat

I think a question with nothing more than the question is fine if the question is interesting, I understand others have other opinions

If I look through random questions in the tag you linked above I find that most of the "context" added doesnt really help the question, but makes it harder to get to what its actually about

Teresa Lisbon

@s.harp Certainly we have other opinions, there's plenty covered on this in meta, for example. The question has now reopened, your vote was the last one, but I'm surprised that one user who voted to close actually voted to reopen despite the change in the question not having been done by the user, and the only thing that was done was improving readability, which is important but not enough.

@s.harp About how context helps, you can read here. This is what the guidelines say. A definition was given in the post, but apart from that nothing has been given.

s.harp

@TeresaLisbon Sorry, what I was trying to say is that I understand now that these criteria can be applied to close questions. I know my personal opinion of their domain of applicability has no real importance so I wont repeat that again

Teresa Lisbon

@s.harp Fair enough. According to the recently published EoQS post on meta, there is a particular focus on cracking down of low quality questions , in particular preventing answers to these. I encourage you to read the chat and see the variety of opinions expressed. You will slowly see that the views that are being expressed come from experiences of regular confrontation with such answerers.

What can I do to ease your experience? I can : give you suggestions on how to avoid answering questions which can be particularly troublesome, and also give you suggestions on how you can prompt users to improve their questions if you find that you want to answer them but they are clearly low quality. These two things will be enough to improve your user experience on the site, and I say this ...

... as someone who is unhappy with your responses here, but I see the underlying conflict and the possibility that you will be ready to at least see the other side of things, and of course find ways to steer clear of any low quality questions, though pointing them out will do us an even bigger favour.

s.harp

20:16

@TeresaLisbon I read that post, but I feel the problems discussed arise in a part of the site I dont see, like calclus or high-school algebra questions. I once posted something in meta regarding questions with answers being closed - one upvoted comment was something along the lines of "questions in this category is not where the problems are coming from" (paraphrased) see garry myersons comment here math.meta.stackexchange.com/questions/30908

The Amplitwist

@TheAmplitwist I've gone ahead and flagged some of those posts that I found asking, "How do I find a rational between another rational and $\sqrt{2}$?" as a duplicate of Need help with proof for Dedekind cuts on $\mathbb{Q}^+$. If the outcomes from the review queue again turn out to be inconclusive, then I'll post the links here for feedback.

Teresa Lisbon

@s.harp Yes, you are right : indeed, Willie Wong too states in part of his "how to ask a good question" that "two experts on the subject can clearly understand where they are coming from", and I also mentioned earlier that high level questions are less frequented and , if any context is missing then comments are more of a necessity to clear the confusion. It is true that high level questions aren't the focus , but they don't escape either, and I personally think :

as I write this, that this lowers the bar for high level questions, that's something I don't want to see happen because the bad habits are unfortunately the ones that spread easily. It is possible to be contextual anywhere, even when talking about Mongolian art in the Mughal era. I don't want to see certain kinds of questions preferred over others for that reason, I think others here will agree.

2

BUT : I completely agree with the fact that high level questions don't cause us as much of an issue as low-level questions. They do cause an issue, like the question you posted, but like I mentioned we can work on suggested work arounds that can make sure you make the most of the site. Nobody likes negative interactions and cynicism, but a small bit of it was warranted when the question posted was answered by you.

amWhy

@TeresaLisbon Indeed, but as you argued, they are not all qualified for an automatic "pass" on evaluation of quality.

Teresa Lisbon

@amWhy Without a shred of doubt. We don't give an automatic pass.

amWhy

@TeresaLisbon I answered after your first sentence, which you went on to clarify.

Also, as someone already said, the question answered, that's in question, is not at all high level.

Teresa Lisbon

20:30

@amWhy Ah yeah, that's a point as well, since the adjoint map and reflexivity are usually introduced in a first course in functional analysis. That aside, I mentioned this on EoQS as well, I just want enough context to make sure the user is not being dishonest and not making me do their work without having done some of it themselves. Use the comments to know what they know about the problem so far , and then assist them. It's a simple formula.

Why would I stick to such a simple formula? I had three friends who went about the right way on this site. One of them is now at Chicago, one is at Michigan and the third is in EPFL. I myself have a top 10 rank in a national math entrance exam. If you use the site properly anything can happen.

amWhy

@TeresaLisbon You've done a greeeeaaaaat job here. I guess I'm still wondering what lead s.harp to think that the question was high level.

Teresa Lisbon

Although they moved to MO or something later , I believe. It's a natural transition. I can't see myself being that active on MO, if anything I want MSE to be entertaining MO type questions with gusto as well!

amWhy

@TeresaLisbon And, with much deserved credit, @Pedro was an exemplar of asking high quality questions on this site, before and while he was an undergrad. And has gone on to do quite well. I truly wish we had more students who emulated his example!!

Teresa Lisbon

@amWhy I'll bring you some success stories as I go along : there's plenty to be cheerful about as well, it seems. This person should inspire everybody.

PSQ so back to the dredge then!

amWhy

@TeresaLisbon Awesome! Indeed, inspiring!

Teresa Lisbon

20:41

PSQ

@amWhy Yes. I had recommended this person to a user I know who wanted to ask good questions on the site. This person is a really cultured human being, highly refined in interaction, improves their question if required. I hope they go on to do well in life. Oh check your inbox as well!

Yeah I'm done for the day!

ನನಗೆ ತುಂಬಾ ನಿದ್ರಾ ಬರ್ತಾಇದಿನಿ , ಎಲ್ಲರಿಗೆ ನಂದು ಹಾರ್ದಿಕ ಸಂದೇಶಗಳು ಸ್ವೀಕೃತವಾಗಿಧೆ! ಗುಡ್ ನೈಟ್!

amWhy

@TeresaLisbon unwind, and sleep well. I just responded to a post in my inbox!

amWhy

21:21

→ 2 messages moved to Trash

José Carlos Santos

Is this question a PSQ. I think so.

amWhy

@TheAmplitwist, @TheSimpliFire, @s.harp, @ElliotYu, @PedroTamaroff, @Peter, @KReiser, @RRL, @soupless ... wander on over to the Cafe and Tavern on math.se when you can, for the new WORD SEARCH CHALLENGE!!

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