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04:18

0

Q: A post-answer modification to a question be put under a heading "Post Script"

After an OP has asked a question, he could modify the question. In some cases, I find, after the question has been answered, the question is modified by the OP in the light of the answer. After the question is so modified, the answer (which prompted the OP to modify the question) becomes unmean...

Damkerng T.

11:55

Hi, @Rathony!

Rathony

@DamkerngT. Hi, nice to see you here

Ϻ.Λ.Ʀ.

@DamkerngT. \o

Hullo to you too @Rathony

Rathony

@Ϻ.Λ.Ʀ. How are you. Nice to see you, too.

I have a terrific news to you.

Ϻ.Λ.Ʀ.

Holy crud

They sometimes drop like flies

Damkerng T.

Sorry about your suspension. I've seen several nice answers of yours.

Rathony

12:00

Don't feel sorry about it.

I deserve it.

Damkerng T.

Well, if you say so! I don't know much about the background anyway.

Rathony

Neither do I.

Damkerng T.

Oh!?

Rathony

I didn't even read the crap.

Maybe related with some comments I made about the question.

Damkerng T.

nods -- Could be.

Rathony

12:02

I am not proud of it, but I don't think I did something wrong.

Ϻ.Λ.Ʀ.

Nov 8 '15 at 20:12, by StoneyB

@Ϻ.Λ.Ʀ. Go read Lenin first! :)

Damkerng T.

I think we all can have different opinions. Just be nice (as they say around SE!), and we should be fine. (I didn't really read your comments, though. I guess many of them were gone, so I don't really know.)

As for me, I just hope that we'll be a bit more lenient with new users.

Rathony

Yeap.

Ϻ.Λ.Ʀ.

As for me, I just hope that we be a bit more careful towards our answers.

Rathony

I read your post on ELL Meta.

Ϻ.Λ.Ʀ.

12:05

I got a bad answer to my question. :?

Damkerng T.

@Ϻ.Λ.Ʀ. That, too!

@Rathony Ah, thanks!

Ϻ.Λ.Ʀ.

It's gonna get upvoted too. :(

Rathony

I wanted upvote it with an answer, but sorry. :-)

Ϻ.Λ.Ʀ.

0

A: What's with "star as interesting" and "unstar as interesting"?

To answer your questions: Why would I star and unstar a chat message as interesting? Because in this particular case, the trait of "interesting" is being used as a quality that can be given and taken from an otherwise neutral state. A message without a star isn't necessarily uninteres...

Rathony

I saw the question.

Ϻ.Λ.Ʀ.

12:05

It's just a repeat of what's already said in the comments.

Rathony

It belongs to ELU.

Ϻ.Λ.Ʀ.

Who? The "unstar as interesting"?

Well, that seems to be the mini-consensus.

Damkerng T.

@Ϻ.Λ.Ʀ. Ahh

Ϻ.Λ.Ʀ.

It seems anything requiring some grammatical analysis doesn't belong on ELL.

Rathony

But there could be no other answers than those commented to your question.

Many of CopperKettle's questions belong to ELU.

Ϻ.Λ.Ʀ.

12:08

@Rathony Well, Snail says no.

Damkerng T.

They're fine with me on both sites, but I'm not a very strict person. :D

Ϻ.Λ.Ʀ.

@Rathony Why do you say that?

I find it interesting and important.

It seems that for the majority, it is basic vs. advanced questions– the distinction between ELL and ELU.

Damkerng T.

I think ELL is more about 'what' or 'how', and EL&U is more about 'why' and those esoteric things.

Rathony

I meant those comments had most of the points

Ϻ.Λ.Ʀ.

Despite mods and active meta users running around shouting "YOU ARE MISSING THE POINT"

Rathony

12:10

@DamkerngT. You are right. But some grey areas.

Ϻ.Λ.Ʀ.

There are always gray areas.

The thing is how much?

How much of the site topic is gray?

Damkerng T.

@Ϻ.Λ.Ʀ. Especially when both sites have the word "English" in their full names.

Rathony

@Ϻ.Λ.Ʀ. I think about 50 to 60% of the questions posted on ELU belong to ELL

Questions on ELL, I am not sure. I am not that regular on ELL

Damkerng T.

nods -- probably more

Ϻ.Λ.Ʀ.

@Rathony Yes.

Rathony

12:14

@DamkerngT. I need to be careful. I am on suspension, you know.

Ϻ.Λ.Ʀ.

@Rathony 50–60% of the questions posted here belong to Yahoo Answers.

Damkerng T.

Rog!

Rathony

I can't say over 80%.

@Ϻ.Λ.Ʀ. Exactly. And those who keep asking Yahoo questions should be suspended.

Ϻ.Λ.Ʀ.

@Rathony Well, suspensions because of LQ posts tend to happen, but because some regular goes angry. That doesn't happen on ELL.

Rathony

@DamkerngT. We should not be that lenient to old users.

Ϻ.Λ.Ʀ.

12:16

It's like . . . I dunno . . . we're overdosing the poor learner with antibiotics.

Damkerng T.

nods -- New users need guidance, experienced users need discipline.

Ϻ.Λ.Ʀ.

Half or more of ELL is caring mothers who think their children can't possibly do anything wrong.

Hell, we have someone running on meta calling closing a disservice to the learner.

In such atmosphere, quality cannot resist long.

Rathony

I was so angry to see two questions from one of old users, one of which was almost 100% identical to the one that he asked last time.

Damkerng T.

@Ϻ.Λ.Ʀ. ELL is more or less special, because the medium is their problems.

@Rathony Ahh... not sure which user, or which question. I guess the questions have already been closed, perhaps?

Ϻ.Λ.Ʀ.

@DamkerngT. In such poisonous — poisonous to the quality of the site — climate, someone like me who just read about how to keep an SE from becoming a Yahoo forum finds their voice fade fast.

Damkerng T.

12:19

@Ϻ.Λ.Ʀ. Don't give up! Just guide them.

Rathony

@DamkerngT. The one I am talking about is deleted. Go + ing, Go to infinitive

Ϻ.Λ.Ʀ.

And once again, we're beating a dead horse here.

@DamkerngT. I can't guide people who think know more than me.

Damkerng T.

@Ϻ.Λ.Ʀ. nods -- That's true, too.

Ϻ.Λ.Ʀ.

I don't say I do know more than them, but a feeling of omniscient-ness blinds everyone to new ideas.

So I read much meta, lemme help; dammit

Rathony

@Ϻ.Λ.Ʀ. Why do you think we are beating a dead horse? Because the quality is not improving?

Ϻ.Λ.Ʀ.

12:22

@Rathony Because only a handful of veterans do understand there exists a problem. And even less care to take some action against it.

Rathony

What kind of actions for example?

Ϻ.Λ.Ʀ.

And because discussions like this come out every now and then.

Rathony

Banning Rathony from ELL permanently?

Damkerng T.

@Ϻ.Λ.Ʀ. The most important tip I've gotten in my adulthood was from one of my old bosses. After a long appraisal he gave me in private, he gave me one tip, he paused for an effect, and he simply said one word, carefully: "Listen". (It's only one syllable in my first language, so it's quite succinct.) -- Took me years to get it completely.

Ϻ.Λ.Ʀ.

@Rathony Like many things, don't get me started.

Rathony

12:24

Is there relevant Meta post? I can still read it.

:-)

Ϻ.Λ.Ʀ.

We have bad tags, bad titles, bad unedited content and thus searching is broken and thus half the duplicates go unnoticed.

Damkerng T.

@Rathony Can you read posts on the main site? I thought you could still access the main site, in a read-only manner.

Rathony

Edit is a serious problem. And we should have some standards on editing.

Yeap. I can only read on main site and ELL meta.

Damkerng T.

nods

Ϻ.Λ.Ʀ.

So I'm heading to ELL today, and seeing the nth "is this sentence grammatically corect PLZ HALP" that gets upvoted and answered.

Rathony

12:25

I left a comment yesterday. "Whoever upvoted this question is doing a disservice to this community."

This comment should be used more frequently.

Ϻ.Λ.Ʀ.

Another big thing we could do is to stop the damn rep farmers from answering every single ~~crap~~ bad question they see.

Closing is meant to stop the question from getting answered and yeah, some discouragement and stuff.

Rathony

The problem (answering crap) is not happening as often on EL&U.

Ϻ.Λ.Ʀ.

What good is closing for when the question gets answered?

Damkerng T.

Rep is not evil. It's just the root of all evil around here.

Rathony

Exactly.

Ϻ.Λ.Ʀ.

12:27

@Rathony Yeah, because not many ELU answerers see it a duty to answer what. ever. the poor helpless learner asks.

@DamkerngT. The knife analogy

Rathony

Mazura has a good point here. meta.english.stackexchange.com/questions/7576/…

Ϻ.Λ.Ʀ.

@Rathony Upvoted seeing the first sentence after the "TL;DR".

Rathony

Almost all ELL questions get upvoted within 5 or 10 minutes after being posted.

That's wrong

We should warn them not to upvote every question.

Ϻ.Λ.Ʀ.

@Rathony Yet at the same time, we have a problem of lack of upvotes on good stuff,

so that's a Catch-22 for now.

Rathony

Yeap.

But it is better to have not many un-upvoted questions than crap with a few upvotes.

Ϻ.Λ.Ʀ.

12:30

Partly blame-able for what kind of audience the main user base of the site consists of.

Damkerng T.

Not sure if it's true. I'm usually late on new questions, and it's still(?) often that my upvote is the first one on new questions.

Rathony

@DamkerngT. I felt the upvote has been cast for "Thank you for posting this crap".

Ϻ.Λ.Ʀ.

@DamkerngT. Question votes are much, much, much less important than answer upvotes.

Damkerng T.

Heh!

@Ϻ.Λ.Ʀ. nods -- can't agree more.

Ϻ.Λ.Ʀ.

Ah come on guys, we have a troll that has almost as much rep as me.

So we do agree that they come in.

Rathony

12:33

@Ϻ.Λ.Ʀ. I am not sure who you are talking about, but I think I could guess. :-)

Ϻ.Λ.Ʀ.

The trick, my friends, is the use of "Usage of" in the title, and [grammar] in the tags.

Damkerng T.

I just noticed that I can't see rep points in this chat room!

Rathony

I think the issue is how to find a duplicate question faster.

Damkerng T.

@Rathony We think the same!

Ϻ.Λ.Ʀ.

@Rathony Hint: Nickname made by hypocoristic suffix -ie from the most abundant food of caveman

Rathony

12:35

@DamkerngT. And we need to educate those who answer low quality questions.

They are doing a disservice to this community.

Damkerng T.

nods

Ϻ.Λ.Ʀ.

@Rathony Well, it's all about search. If the info is out there and I can't reach it, it doesn't matter if it's there or not.

Rathony

And the edit that changes only a few typos should be banned.

I feel like ELL is just an editing site.

Ϻ.Λ.Ʀ.

@Rathony There's a 6-char limit.

Damkerng T.

I'm fine with such edits, actually.

Rathony

12:37

I know. There is a limit.

I should have said 6-char edit should be banned. :-)

Damkerng T.

(given that it's in good faith)

Ϻ.Λ.Ʀ.

@Rathony Really? I think of it as a get-your-question-answered-in-less-than-an-hour-no-matter-what-it-is site, pretty much like other forums. At least that's what it is right now.

Rathony

@DamkerngT. Yeap. Can't agree with you more.

@Ϻ.Λ.Ʀ. That's moderators' job, I think.

Ϻ.Λ.Ʀ.

So @Rathony IMO the thing that tends to suspend you is that you want people to be perfect while they're not, and yell at them when they're not; so things get south.

Things can go well if you just omit the yelling part.

Rathony

ELU's moderators and some dedicated members are good at stopping people from answering an off-topic question. english.stackexchange.com/questions/301750/…

The question was answered by a 4K user, but I asked him to delete the answer.

Ϻ.Λ.Ʀ.

12:41

@Rathony That big a site, and you close a question in four hours?

Rathony

@Ϻ.Λ.Ʀ. Can you live without breathing? :-)

Ϻ.Λ.Ʀ.

You should seriously consider lowering that time.

We close homework dumps at Chem in 40 minutes.

@Rathony Yes; I'm not alive. No molecule is alive except DNA.

Rathony

@Ϻ.Λ.Ʀ. Closing on ELU is getting better after a few dedicated users crossed 3K mark.

@Ϻ.Λ.Ʀ. You know RegDight? When (s)he was active, crap was closed within 5 minutes.

ELL can never do that.

1

Q: The difference between " I ate at 7:00 AM" and " I ate from 7:00 AM"?

What's the difference between: I ate at 7:00 AM. and I ate from 7:00 AM.

prepositions time

See? This question? It got upvoted.

It is the dupe.

The OP should be suspended.

Kept asking about 7:00 am and 7:30 am.

Ϻ.Λ.Ʀ.

@Rathony Reg is a cool guy. Is he not active anymore?

Rathony

He is cool.

He is gone. I don't know why.

Ϻ.Λ.Ʀ.

12:46

Might be 'cause the chat drama.

Rathony

He is now seen once in two weeks or something.

I suspect something might have happened.

Ϻ.Λ.Ʀ.

@Rathony Whoa there; you can't chop people's head off since they passed a traffic light

Rathony

@DamkerngT. How many close-votes were cast on the question? I can't see it because of suspension.

Damkerng T.

@Rathony Oh, that series is still ongoing!?

@Rathony None.

Ϻ.Λ.Ʀ.

@DamkerngT. Still ongoing right now, or at 7:00 p.m.?

Rathony

12:48

Isn't it general reference?

Damkerng T.

Hmm... it's probably not an exact duplicate.

Ϻ.Λ.Ʀ.

It's general crap.

Rathony

Yeap, but at and from are general reference.

Damkerng T.

I think it's not a general reference, in the sense that it's in dictionaries.

Rathony

Whoever upvoted it should be suspended.

Ϻ.Λ.Ʀ.

12:49

@Rathony Whoever chats on 13:13 UTC should be suspended, m'kay?

OK, this might be a problem.

Rathony

@Ϻ.Λ.Ʀ. That's why I am suspended.

Ϻ.Λ.Ʀ.

All we see from "Details, please" is an honorable mention every now and then.

Maybe we should put some strict guidelines.

But I'm not sure if people will follow me.

Esp. when one of the mods is talking about "learning", and the others aren't even around to talk about anything.

Rathony

As long as you could convince them, why not?

Ϻ.Λ.Ʀ.

@Rathony You chatted on 13:13? Shame on you

Damkerng T.

Hmm... I think it's a good case study here, that 'at/from 7:00' question.

Ϻ.Λ.Ʀ.

12:51

@Rathony Well, it sometimes seems like talking to a wall.

Rathony

@Ϻ.Λ.Ʀ. We have only one active moderator on ELU.

Damkerng T.

Is it a good question or a bad question? And why?

Ϻ.Λ.Ʀ.

@Rathony And many users who care about moderation.

Rathony

Yes, that many are sustaining ELU

Ϻ.Λ.Ʀ.

@DamkerngT. Bad question; 'cause the OP didn't tell us their real concern and we have to take wild guesses.

Rathony

12:52

ELL needs that many.

@DamkerngT. Whoever doesn't understand the preposition at and from don't belong to ELL.

Ϻ.Λ.Ʀ.

ELL can go on with one @Stoney; the problem is how many people like to cooperate.

Nov 8 '15 at 19:59, by StoneyB

Meta.ell has always been apathetic. Very few people care at all about most of the issues raised there; and since issues which do get people excited tend to arouse more heat than light, I think most people prefer to let sleeping dogs lie.

Damkerng T.

@Rathony Hah!

Rathony

I mean it is in the dictionary.

Ϻ.Λ.Ʀ.

And I'm actually successfully quoting Stoney without looking fan-boyish.

Rathony

GENERAL REFERENCE.

Damkerng T.

12:54

@Ϻ.Λ.Ʀ. What if writing up the concern in the question is beyond them?

Rathony

If you guys make a guide book, this question should be quoted as an example for gen. ref.

Ϻ.Λ.Ʀ.

@DamkerngT. Then why did they ask it in the first place dammit?

Rathony

@DamkerngT. Look at the answer. What is it new compared with dictionary?

Ϻ.Λ.Ʀ.

@Rathony People define GR here, then exclude almost everything from being GR.

Damkerng T.

@Ϻ.Λ.Ʀ. Because asking such a vague and terse question is in their capability, but writing up a long essay is beyond them?

Rathony

12:55

@DamkerngT. Nope. Questions on on and about are tricky.

Ϻ.Λ.Ʀ.

@DamkerngT. Do any good questions on ELL look like a long essay?

Rathony

Questions on at and from are not tricky.

Ϻ.Λ.Ʀ.

We're by default telling the OP "it's okay not to try, sweetie".

Rathony

I mean we have an experience of learning the language.

Ϻ.Λ.Ʀ.

0

Q: Should I use these phrases in the same meaning?

Should I use these phrases in the same meaning:"the benefits of parents" and "the benefits of being parents"? Thanks in advance.

usage

Bad question again.

Damkerng T.

12:56

@Ϻ.Λ.Ʀ. I was exaggerating, but trying to tell us anything more than what they had typed could as well be like writing an essay for them, couldn't it?

Rathony

@DamkerngT. What I meant was if you can't understand the difference between at and from by looking up the dictionary, the OP doesn't belong here.

Damkerng T.

@Rathony Hmm... I wonder if it's the same in other language stacks.

Ϻ.Λ.Ʀ.

@DamkerngT. I'm not expecting something publishable in Oxford, I'm just expecting some spit from the OP's mouth so we hear what they think.

Damkerng T.

Imagine that you have to learn a language that you've never heard of before. After learning it for a few months, how well would you think you can do in that language?

Rathony

The bigger problem is nobody is posting any comment to this kind of question.

Ϻ.Λ.Ʀ.

12:58

. . . which really helps in helping us help them, no?

@DamkerngT. If you can do well enough to inquire about a single part of a sentence, IOW word choice, then you can present what ideas you had on it; even if you do it terribly.

And caring editors are for those times.

Damkerng T.

At some point, a learner (of English as a second language) has to learn how to use at or from properly. I bet that most of such learners who had learned that didn't learn it from a dictionary.

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