Math Meta Chat - 2018-05-01

2:58 AM

@user21820 I am pinging you here because I don't want the discussion to be in CRUDE room since it is off-topic there. It is not clear from your comment in the room if you don't want to discuss at all, or simply on the meta chat. If you don't want to discuss, please disregard this next comment.

From your comment there, I think you are implying that we should be more complacent or even forgiving. That is not at all what I am saying. I am saying that we should be objective. A "fair trial" is not a forgiving trial. It is just not succumbing to personal impressions/bias in the judgement of something.

On the last comment, I meant to say "I think you are implying that I said we should be (...)"

Martin Sleziak

3:29 AM

@AloizioMacedo Probably you are aware of that, but moderators can set up private rooms that only diamond users and invited users can see.

I saw that on a few occasions some mods (especially quid) were willing to discuss stuff in such room.

Just in case that you wish to discuss some stuff you mentioned recently on meta with quid and if it is sensitive information which should not be discussed publicly, you could ask quid (probably in the Mods' Office) whether they have some time and would be willing to create room for your discussion.

So far I have only one such discussion: chat.stackexchange.com/transcript/message/41240493#41240493

Aloizio Macedo

3:45 AM

@MartinSleziak Thanks! That is very useful to know (I was not aware of that).

Martin Sleziak

Just to clarify - I've mentioned this because I saw your exchange with quid in some recent comments on meta.

Aloizio Macedo

Yes, I understood that it is unrelated to my previous comment.

Martin Sleziak

Maybe I should have added that people who request private chat with a mod should keep in mind that moderators are quite busy (here on site and probably often in real life too).

But that is probably self-evident.

user131753

3:58 AM

@AloizioMacedo: May I add that instead of discussing issues only with a moderator, you also have the option to discuss with multiple moderators and with both of them privately. In a previous case, I did that. Although to maintain transparency, I let both the moderators know about my interaction with the other moderator.

user131753

@MartinSleziak Would it not be better if the casting of close votes/upvotes/downvotes/delete votes were to remain completely anonymous and not be the topic/subject a dedicated chat room?

Martin Sleziak

@user170039 By anonymous you mean not knowing who voted to delete?

user131753

@MartinSleziak Precisely.

Martin Sleziak

I do not care that much about users who voted to delete (or close).

user131753

@MartinSleziak I see.

Martin Sleziak

4:08 AM

But the information that some question was closed or deleted is useful, since then other users can review this action and if they think that this was incorrect they can vote to reopen/undeleted or in some cases discuss it on meta or in chat.

This is precisely the reason why deleted posts are shown in mod tools. I have also left a few related comments in my recent meta question: Are there some tools to follow deletions on this site?

@user170039 So in the messages you replied to when I used the word transparency, I mainly meant that the information which posts were deleted/closed is available. (And if somebody has time and is willing to that, they can check those questions and judge for themself.)

The question whether close/delete voters should be displayed or not is a separate question. (However, they are only displayed after a question has been closed/deleted. And sometimes a user voluntarily mentions in chat that they voted to close/deleted a question - since that's the user's own decision, I do not see a problem with that.)

user131753

@MartinSleziak I think I was not clear enough. So let me repeat. I am not talking about displaying the information that some question was closed or deleted to the community in general. My point is that if a question is bad enough to close/delete (by community consensus, of course), it will pop up in the review queue. What is the necessity for having a dedicated room for this when often their actions seem like abusing their privileges by organizing a voting-ring.

Martin Sleziak

Doesn't the room description give, at least partially, an answer to your question.

Or maybe it is expressed more aptly in reopen request thread.

user131753

@MartinSleziak How so?

Martin Sleziak

Basically the same objection is valid for this thread - it is not needed, since there are review queues.

You are right that there are review queues and they could serve this purpose in the case of close votes.

There is not review queue for deleted questions - and in mod tools you typically see only very recent deletions. (Usually less than one day old.)

But there are limitations to review queues and mod tools.

You see there listed all close votes and some delete votes.

But you cannot comment on them or discuss why they should or should not be closed/deleted.

Moreover, if somethings is mentioned in chat/reopen request thread, it's likely that more people will notice it.

The description of CRUDE in the List of chatrooms says: "Sometimes the review queues and other tools are not sufficient or specific actions need more discussion."

I guess this is quite a concise way to explain purpose of the room. (And this also applies to the reopen request thread.)

BTW I have just checked moderator tools and among deleted questions I see only questions deleted by roomba (there are four exceptions to this). The situation looks like this almost every day if you look there soon after the daily script was run. So it's unlikely to see very old deletions there.

user131753

4:57 AM

@MartinSleziak The description is fine, but can you point out to me some discussions regarding reopening/undeleting/editing questions other than closing/deleting them, conducted during the last month (or last two months)?

user131753

I am not a very active member there. But most of the time I go there, I find messages like, "Delete votes needed" or "Close votes needed", which looks to me nothing but a plea for, well, you-know-what.

Martin Sleziak

Ok, i'll do my best. Certainly this is not an exhaustive list, just a random picks. (I am most likely to remember the ones I was a part of.)

April 22: A discussion related to duplicate closure and merging of a specific question: chat.stackexchange.com/transcript/message/44156310#44156310

user131753

@MartinSleziak In which you were not a part of.

Martin Sleziak

That's unfair. You keep adding restrictions which makes this rather difficult to find.

user131753

@MartinSleziak You may take you time if it is difficult to find.

Martin Sleziak

5:01 AM

After all, I am rather nosy. It is difficult to find any discussion on meta and chat where I did not chime in.

user131753

I will also be happy if anyone else gives me such a list of such posts (not less than 10).

Aloizio Macedo

After being a little more active in the CRUDE room for a while, I would prefer that the CRUDE room be used to handle controversial posts, and to suggest discussion on those cases. This seems to be more sensible, since it would be complementary to the close-queue, and not redundant with respect to it. As is used today, it is mostly an organized quick-closure room for low-quality posts. I have my ethical objections to that, (...)

(...) since the design of the close queue seems to be such that this should not be encouraged. However, since they mostly seem to close questions which are "clearly" (at least for most of the community, including me in most cases) low-quality and quite effectively, it seems that the community gives them some leeway. I would appreciate, though, that people understood that there are ethical problems in place, and good intentions are not sufficient reason for anything.

Martin Sleziak

@user170039 In order to not disturb the flow of discussion here, I'll try to compile such a list elsewhere. I will include the ones I was part in. I will clearly mark whether I was part of the discussion and whether I initiated the discussion.

BTW it seems that asking for examples of posts of some type in CRUDE is a favorite topic of yours. This is perhaps second or third request from you of this kind I saw. :-)

user131753

@MartinSleziak Yes. Because they are so difficult to find.

Martin Sleziak

Maybe not difficult, but it is time consuming.

user131753

5:07 AM

@AloizioMacedo: Fully agreed.

user131753

In fact, I must say that those people in the CRUDE room do an incredibly good job removing psq's.

user131753

Anyway thanks to you both for the discussion.

Martin Sleziak

5:39 AM

@MartinSleziak I have posted some examples requested by user170039 in another room. They are already aware of this - they responded in that room. I am posting this here in case it is interesting for other users visiting this room.

Aloizio Macedo

5:59 AM

@MartinSleziak Completely unrelated to the previous discussions in this chat: I saw your profile, and didn't know about the Hanlon's razor! What a lovely razor! : ) I frequently have this discussion IRL with friends and particularly my girlfriend, since she often believes that people are motivated by malice.

Martin Sleziak

I should probably update a few things there when I have a bit of time. (For example, the first bullet point links to an abandoned project.)

Just to make this accessible in an easier way to others who never heard of this.

Hanlon's razor: "Never attribute to malice that which is adequately explained by stupidity."

Martin Sleziak

6:19 AM

I definitely hope that at least some users will treat me with this in mind.

Martin Sleziak

6:37 AM

@AloizioMacedo and @user170039 I have mentioned this discussion also in CRUDE - people who visit that room often might have a few comments on this: chat.stackexchange.com/transcript/message/44321917#44321917 Although I suppose you would probably notice this (you visit that room too).

@AloizioMacedo I will just point out that some of those argument could also be arguments against the existence of reopen request thread. (I know that this is a bit of a stretch. But here you can also say that this is already dealt with in review queues and so the thread is redundant. And that it goes, to some extent, against the way the reopen review queue is designed.)

Aloizio Macedo

@MartinSleziak That is a bit of a stretch, but I understand the argument. However, as I understand, the reopen thread is exactly for controversial posts which the queue doesn't handle very well (correct me if I am wrong).

Martin Sleziak

Perhaps my analogy is a bit misleading, but I mainly wanted to make the point the not everything which is done in CRUDE would also work through reviews without any chat involvement. And that this is probably a good thing that we have something additional to the review queues.

John Ma

@user170039 I don't really know how such a list would be useful. It is clear most of the activities in CRUDE is about closure/deletion.

Aloizio Macedo

@MartinSleziak Yes, I agree. Those things which would not work through reviews are things which I deem worthy of a special chat for.

John Ma

@user170039 Actually I find the usage "close/delete votes needed" the most neutral one to use (that's why I am using it all the time). I tried not to provide any extra judgement to the linked questions.

Martin Sleziak

6:51 AM

@AloizioMacedo It is a bit unclear what is the purpose of reopen/undelete request thread, namely whether it is more for discussion about controversial posts or for about clear-cut cases.

The post explicitly says: "Please do not use this thread to engage in debates on contentious matters (e.g. reasons for closure). That should be done in a separate linked thread. " So based on this it should be used if you think that it is a clear-cut-case and it was just missed by the reviewers.

OTOH many users have different views on what is clear-cut case and what is controversial. Moreover, if we abide the rule to post contentious cases elsewhere, maybe half of those 250 answers on the most recent thread would be posted as questions and meta would become almost unusable.

Aloizio Macedo

@JohnMa For what it's worth, I appreciate that behaviour very much, despite my previous comment about the purpose of the room. The reason being that people may not agree with me and think that redundance is good, for example, particularly when the inflow of low quality questions is great. But, if that's the case, your behaviour is the most appropriate imho.

@MartinSleziak I don't quite understand the excision of debates from that thread. Actually, I think it is just a "formal" rule to avoid heated debates.

Martin Sleziak

Well, I understand that if the discussion about some question would become very long, it is much more sensible to have it questions, since it is easier to follow the discussion if the most relevant stuff is in separate answers and not in comments.

Still, if a discussion on some answer posted in the reopen request thread becomes too long, some of the participants can always suggest to start a new discussion in a separated question. So this is probably not a real problem.

@quid If you decide to post the new reopen request thread, see Aloizio Macedo's message above. Perhaps this could be another reasonable suggestion how to slightly improve the introduction (and make the rules saying when to post in that thread a bit clearer).

Aloizio Macedo

7:11 AM

I think that, ideally, controversial reopening of threads should also be handled in the CRUDE room, and not in a meta post. The question/answer system of SE does not seem proper for the purposes of that post (well, I personally find it very unintuitive how to effectively use the REOPEN thread, be it to follow its activities or to effectively know how it should be used) This could also improve the flow and diversification in the room.

(Ideally, but not practically, for reasons of how the room seems to be perceived by the community, as can be seen in meta posts).

user131753

1:10 PM

@JohnMa You may also consider using "What do you think about X?".

quid

1:57 PM

@AloizioMacedo I think it is a bit anachronistic. The description of the thread predates the queues. At least at that time it made more sense to have basically just a simple list of question somebody thinks should be reopened. I agree that by now another formulation would be more adequate.

I think the idea was that it should be possible to draw attention to the idea of reopening without being obliged to enter a debate.

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