A spammy question just popped up.

Spammy or not, I just removed the PII in it.

Thank you!

IIRC, however, there is no need to delete PII if the user posted their own. (I should double-check that)

It needs to be deleted and redacted by a mod if it's for someone else.

Hey all, this is your sort-of weekly reminder that some stuff has accumulated in the review queues if you feel up to doing some reviews :)

cleared?

I am curious as to whether anyone has ideas on how to increase participation in CSE. It seemed to peak a while back and then go down to a persistent low level. Other SE sites saw a similar result: a few core members stick around and there is not much change. I have seen the same thing with Meetup: groups form, falter and disappear. Even long-standing large groups have had a decline in participation. Any ideas why or what to do about it?

@ScottRowe In theory as time passes and we slowly accumulate more questions, more people will find those questions via google. Then, once they find the site, they can ask questions and write answers which would start a sort-of loop.

"In theory, there is no difference between theory and practice. In practice, there is." - Yogi Berra. I don't know of any other way than Meetup to meet people in person. Church, I suppose, but I am not really inclined to try it. Meantime, I wish to interact with someone, somewhere. Many people have this wish, but it doesn't seem to be working out in the modern world, even with all this technology. Perhaps the fault lies not in our servers, but in ourselves?

@thesecretmaster I guess I figure that I have a limited time on this planet and so I would rather have a less optimal interaction today than a better one eventually. I could start today with more interaction that is less optimal, but refine it over time, instead of hoping to hold out until perfection arrives someday. Apparently I have a minority opinion on this approach.

@ScottRowe I almost never use meetups to meet people, but I do organise conferences, training for schools, universities and professionals, and I speak at around 1 conference a month. I meet far more people in the industry than I can ever keep up with.

I find if you want something, then making it happen yourself is the only 100% successful way

@ScottRowe Of the 6 sites I moderate, only one has done this. one of the others rose and then flattened out for the last couple of years. The others have a fairly continuous upward growth.

@ScottRowe what timescale are you tracking this on

a couple of my sites are very seasonal - and I gues CSE should be as well, tracking semesters/terms?

Outdoors tracks weather and holidays, Security tracks major incidents, new tech, software updates etc

@RoryAlsop Which site flattened out?

This one seems to have finally found a persistent pace, but it's very low activity. If we got back to one more quick answerer than we currently have, we'd see the big boosts in traffic from HNQs again, which make it feel like things are happening.

@RoryAlsop I have created or co-led several Meetup groups in the past 5 years. Only other Organizers were consistently active. The group I started over a year ago has gained about 1 member per day on average, but I have only seen about 20 of them at my bi-weekly meetings, some of them only once. I would like to have some friends. It seems like a growing issue in the US, but people don't come to events that are offered. What are they waiting for?