English Language & Usage: Multi-Layered Discourse Room

Dori

2:00 AM

@RebeccaChernoff I don't count, because I'd seen it before ;-)

Rebecca Chernoff

hrmph

JSBangs

@RebeccaChernoff i got a 502 proxy error trying to open it

MrHen

To be clear, I agree with you two. I am just pushing back a little because something seems odd to me if I start flagging half of the comments I see

Robusto

@RebeccaChernoff — You had to bring Agile into this, didn't you? Still working on that buzz-kill merit badge, yeah? ^_^

Rebecca Chernoff

@Robusto o: ?

Dori

2:00 AM

@JSBangs It worked for me just now

MrHen

@RebeccaChernoff I'll file it away for later, but I already agree with the point.

Robusto

@RebeccaChernoff My company uses Rally. I hate it like poison.

Rebecca Chernoff

@MrHen well it certainly makes a point, doesn't it?

JSBangs

@Dori yeah, i just tried and it's working now

MrHen

@RebeccaChernoff Sure. I am essentially try to get from you two what I need to survive if I start getting picky

Because I already feel like the strict one

JSBangs

2:02 AM

@MrHen do you really flag that many? i very rarely flag comments, mostly because i expect comments to be a little less serious than the rest of the site, and i thought that was ok

Rebecca Chernoff

If the site needs cleaning up, clean it up. That's a community effort. Doesn't rely on the mods. (Though sure, deleting comments is mod only...but still)

MrHen

@JSBangs No, but I want to

@RebeccaChernoff Yeah, but the work wears me out

It gets annoying to be the only close vote on a crap question and watch it gather upvotes

I could be in the minority, which is why I ask chat or meta.

Rebecca Chernoff

MrHen

And the answer I always get is, "Meh."

JSBangs

@MrHen bring it up in chat. whenever i see a bad question, i'll post it to chat and beg people to close it

MrHen

2:03 AM

@JSBangs Yeah. I get people saying, "Meh."

Rebecca Chernoff

@Shog9, I think @MrHen needs a posse.

Martha

Gah, stupid false flag alert again.

MrHen

I mean, this is what I do here

Shog9

@RebeccaChernoff He does. He also needs support from the mods.

JSBangs

@RebeccaChernoff my personal site cleanup goal is to be very free with the downvotes. let my disapproval be known and embolden others

Robusto

2:04 AM

SE sites set up a kind of cognitive dissonance. Everyone knows the system is predicated on votes, and that's supposed to elicit the best answers and questions, but we all know that the most highly voted answers and questions are the ones that work the audience for nudges of recognition.

While journeyman answers get short shrift.

MrHen

@RebeccaChernoff Heh.

Shog9

@JSBangs This is where a lot of the stuff on SO got hashed-out early on... (well, IRC, but...) It's much easier to discuss without strong emotion in real-time than it is in comments / meta.

Rebecca Chernoff

Also note efforts like Programmers.SE Summer Cleaning

MrHen

Reg and I did something similar to that a while ago

Shog9

@Robusto This knowledge should inspire righteous anger within you at the sight of a question that exists only as fodder for pandering

Robusto

2:06 AM

In fact, these sites look like Whack-A-Meme sometimes.

Martha

Speaking of cleanup, could somebody please cast the coup-de-grace on this question?

-2

Q: Internationally understood alternative to "unavailable"

I would like to present an error message to viewers of my website when a video is blocked in their country due to legal requirements. Currently I have the following: This video is unavailable in your country. I feel that many non-English speakers will not understand "unavailable". Do you kn...

latin

JSBangs

@RebeccaChernoff just for the record, we had a Great Retagging a while back that got rid of some really crappy tags that were in our top 10. i personally retagged several hundred questions by hand

Rebecca Chernoff

that's awesome!

MrHen

So, anyway, to summarize my frustration: (a) users who just upvote because something makes them feel fuzzy (b) meta's sluggishness in admitting something is a problem and (c) things with an unknown topicality are left alone and never resolved

@JSBangs Yeah, that was awesome

Robusto

@JSBangs — Props.

MrHen

2:08 AM

@Martha Voted.

Dori

@JSBangs I'd still love to see an end to these being separate tags: taboo, vulgar, offensive, expletives, obscenity, euphemisms, pejorative, swearing, and insults

Robusto

@Martha — I was first into the breach on that one.

Martha

@Robusto Yes, so I see.

Robusto

@Dori — bad-words

Rebecca Chernoff

On ^^^ question, a quick comment "This is a translation question which does not fit our faq." would be a helpful addition. I leave it as a community exercise if you agree. (:

Dori

2:10 AM

@Robusto So long as it's instead of and not in addition to

JSBangs

@Dori hah, yeah, that's on the todo list

Robusto

I think we should have a "close this question" reason called "@MrHen disapproves" ... ;^)

MrHen

@Robusto I swear; I'd use it.

Martha

@RebeccaChernoff Good idea, comment added.

MrHen

"Crap"

Robusto

2:11 AM

@Dori — But of course.

MrHen

2

Q: Pioneers Often Die with Arrows in their Backs

What's the meaning of Pioneers Often Die with Arrows in their Backs I mean i can roughly gauge it to be the first to move dies, but why arrows in the backs ?

meaning common-expression

Robusto

@MrHen — I would too!

MrHen

See... this is a good example of a close call

There is sort of an interesting question here, but as asked it just doesn't... help

JSBangs

definitely very marginal

MrHen

We just have tons of questions in this awkward range

Martha

2:12 AM

@MrHen It also has several answers, one of them accepted, and I'm not sure any of them are correct.

MrHen

And it has 2 upvotes...

Dori

@MrHen And that is also an example of a user who has recently been suspended on SO, MSO, and SU for low quality posts

Rebecca Chernoff

@Robusto nah. This one would be better:

considering a new "Honey badger don't give a s**t" close reason for Stack Exchange. Only partially kidding.

Tweeted by codinghorror on June 26, 2011 at 11:56 PM

q:

MrHen

@Dori Heh, really? Interesting.

Robusto

@MrHen — See, now nobody came even close to the answer on that one. Pioneers die with arrows in their backs because they are fleeing the frontier. That is, they have gone a mile too far and into danger, and die rushing back to safety. It's a cautionary expression meant to discourage people from being on the bleeding edge.

Martha

2:14 AM

Ok, I have to go now. Please don't burn the place down in my absence.

Dori

@MrHen And for sock puppetry. And for being a… well, you fill in the blank

Robusto

@Martha — Killjoy.

Rebecca Chernoff

@Martha I make no guarantees.

Martha

@Robusto I live to serve. Or serve to live. Or something.

Robusto

@Martha — Or live to live. And isn't that a depressing thought?

Martha

2:16 AM

ANYway. Szevasztok!

JSBangs

real quick question for the room: what is the preferred cover term for " taboo, vulgar, offensive, expletives, obscenity, euphemisms, pejorative, swearing, and insults"

Dori

My preference: deleteable

MrHen

@JSBangs I like taboo

Etiquette?

JSBangs

@MrHen i was leaning towards vulgarity. but taboo is the most popular one in the set right now

MrHen

manners?

JSBangs

2:19 AM

part of the problem is that taboo and obscenity are slightly different things, and the pedant in me wants to keep them separate

Robusto

I think the closest thing to an umbrella term we have there is offensive.

JSBangs

@MrHen no, we already have politeness, which is not the same thing

MrHen

@JSBangs Could politeness get absorbed into the same tag?

JSBangs

@Robusto that's good

Rebecca Chernoff

seems like a great topic for a meta post

JSBangs

2:20 AM

@MrHen definitely not. politeness/rudeness is not the same thing as offensiveness

Rebecca Chernoff

get a decision, and then act on it too (:

MrHen

1

Q: the usage of "otherwise"

In this article, I don't quite understand the following sentence: Instead of bothering to sort out that little difficulty, let's see why it is in fact enough to let B be the set of all bilinear functions to R, otherwise known as bilinear forms. I looked up into the dictionary, but none of t...

vocabulary

Here is another Yoichi style question

@JSBangs Right, so a hypernym for politeness and offensiveness, perhaps?

0

Q: You are in Jonathan's circles "too" or "as well" or "also"

I just read on Google+ that: You are in Jonathan's circles too But I always thought that you couldn't use too there. Am I wrong? (because Google can't be wrong, right?)

grammar adverbs grammatical-structure

Robusto

Apr 30 at 0:25, by Robusto

I wish you could edit the close message to say "Nuked from orbit by Robusto, RegDwight."

MrHen

Oh, hey, a real question for you guys. If I find an old question that should probably be closed, obviously voting to close it won't do jack. Do I post a link here in chat? Flag it? Both?

JSBangs

@RebeccaChernoff in the past i've been much more likely to ask here on chat and act based on that. is this a problem? most of the regulars are in here most of the time, and i get answers much more quickly this way

@MrHen both

Robusto

2:23 AM

Apr 30 at 0:32, by Robusto

MrHen

@JSBangs Having a record of the conversation is nice. :)

Searching chat for it would be kind of annoying...

JSBangs

anyway, continuing @RebeccaChernoff, am i actually contributing to the problem by eschewing meta and going straight to chat?

Rebecca Chernoff

@JSBangs I get the temptation to do that, but it is a bit of a chicken and egg problem.

If you ignore meta as well, how can you fault anyone else for doing the same?

While the transcripts exist, it isn't as obviously archived and searchable as the meta site is.

Robusto

I find Meta discussions to be distasteful in the extreme.

Rebecca Chernoff

Discussing it in chat is fine, but I would strongly encourage you to then make sure the gist of it is available in a meta post for the community to vet, and even just to see.

MrHen

2:25 AM

@Robusto Why?

JSBangs

i feel sort of the same as @Robusto. plus our meta isn't very active, while our chat is very active

@RebeccaChernoff this is probably a good idea, though

Robusto

@MrHen — Because you never get a second chance to make a first impression, and this was my first impression:

8

Q: Why are comment lists abridged in the middle?

In longish lists of comments the list gets abridged and a "more comments" link shows up at the end, kind of like an ellipsis. Normally, one would expect that such a list would be trimmed at the end, but on English.SE (and possibly on other SE sites) the elisions can occur anywhere in the list. F...

bug feature-request status-bydesign terrible-design

Rebecca Chernoff

Also, the community team closely watches the meta sites across the network. We may pop into chat rooms, but we don't follow them as closely network-wide.

MrHen

I am assuming that I should flag comments such as those on this question:

Rebecca Chernoff

We want to know what's going on too. (:

MrHen

2:26 AM

1

Q: Analysis vs Analyses

The (U.S.) National Institutes of Health website has a webpage that states that it contains "reports, data and analyses of NIH research activities". I feel as though this sounds awkward. Would "reports, data and analysis of NIH research activities" be better phrasing, or is the current one techni...

grammar phrases phrasing

Rebecca Chernoff

Meta posts can also be linked to in those guiding comments I encourage you to make on the main site. q:

MrHen

@Robusto So... you don't like meta because your idea was rejected?

Robusto

Then there was this comment war:

34

Q: Is Python a snake or a programming language? If the latter, why is it choking my dog?

We've been getting a rash of questions asking, essentially, what a programmer should name methods or properties. One such was a request for a word that meant both "add" and "remove" because the programmer wanted to have a method that could add or remove an element. Does this really fall under E...

discussion on-topic-off-topic appropriate-questions

@MrHen — No, because I got bum-rushed and bullied, and I felt then the way @Kosmonaut felt today.

Rebecca Chernoff

@MrHen Definitely at least vote to close it yourself so that it appears on the list that 10k'ers can see in the tools section. Flagging and posting here is also ok.

MrHen

@RebeccaChernoff Mmk.

@Robusto Oof, I agree that that comment war was ridiculous

Robusto

2:29 AM

@RebeccaChernoff — Which brings up ANOTHER question about the "tools" section.

1

Q: Spurious flag notices?

Lately I go to the main page and see a large quantity of flags in the little notification box at the top of the page, like this 53 flags is a lot, right? Like, an emergency maybe? So I click on it and there is one single flagged item: What gives? Is this FAD or a bug of some kind?

bug flagging

Which was the first inkling we had that all was not joy in Mudville.

Rebecca Chernoff

@MrHen yikes, yes you should. that comment chain is ugh.

Robusto

And still I see these spurious flag notices, so the effect is that NOW I don't even bother clicking on them. Fool me once, or twice, or thirty-three times, shame on you. Fool me 150 times, shame on me.

MrHen

@RebeccaChernoff Should I flag the beginning of the chain? Or where things go bad... ?

(This is me learning.)

Rebecca Chernoff

I'm still here, just reading and trying to make sure I answer everything. (:

MrHen

As in, if I flag a comment as too-chatty, is the rest of the chain looked at?

@RebeccaChernoff Thanks, by the way. I'll be sure to keep tagging you on irrelevant remarks such as this ;)

JSBangs

2:32 AM

0

Q: Getting our dirty words into one place

Currently we have tags for all of the following: taboo, vulgar, offensive, expletives, obscenity, euphemisms, pejorative, swearing, and insults This is a bit... excessive. So I'm now accepting suggestions for a word to bundle all of these together and avoid so much duplication. Also mention any...

discussion tags tag-synonyms

Rebecca Chernoff

@Robusto I'm going to hold off on answering this for the moment, simply because I want to look at the code and research my answer first, just fyi. (:

MrHen

Err, I have to head out. Food or something.

Robusto

Sleep or something here.

Laterz.

And thank you all for your support. I will go take my PTSD meds now.

JSBangs

yeah, big thanks to @Rebecca and @Dori for coming by and listening to our grips. i no longer feel like TPTB hate us

Rebecca Chernoff

@MrHen You've got a few options. You could flag the post itself for moderator attention - comments like that could indicate a problem with the post too. You could flag a single comment for mod attention and explain that the comment chain should be looked at. You can flag each comment. You can flag a single comment as too chatty and hope your moderators are good enough that they look at the other comments as well.

Generally when I see a flag, I'll look at the entire page while I'm at it, but that's just me, I can't speak for everyone.

@MrHen sweet. q:

JSBangs

2:38 AM

i'm also out for the night. see y'all in the morning

Rebecca Chernoff

guess the party is over. (;

MrHen

4:42 AM

-1

Q: thrice, twice, once, *zeroce?

In similarity to this question: once, twice, thrice, *frice? What are some words that indicate 'zero times' ?

single-word-requests

Can I get a little help here? Am I wrong in my answer/comments?

OghmaOsiris

4:58 AM

at least your answer is acceptable.

Mr. Disappointment

7:58 AM

@MrHen IMO, you don't need to explicitly specify the -1, although the rest of your comment relies on that in its current form, I would reword it; however, that is me, and it is your privilege to do so, or not.

Mr. Disappointment

8:42 AM

...

7

Q: Getting our dirty words into one place

Currently we have tags for all of the following: taboo, vulgar, offensive, expletives, obscenity, euphemisms, pejorative, swearing, and insults This is a bit... excessive. So I'm now accepting suggestions for a word to bundle all of these together and avoid so much duplication. Also mention any...

discussion tags tag-synonyms

There are passionate discussions going on about how to lead the community, meanwhile, such great examples are being set.

RegDwight

9:31 AM

I just got an email from Kosmonaut. He's out. It is thoroughly written, heartwarming and heartbreaking, and most importantly, spot on. I don't know what to reply or to think or how to go on from here. I just want to cry. TTYL.

10

Jez

9:48 AM

1

Q: Difference between knowledge and know-how

Is there any difference between these two? Do (suppose) technical knowledge and technical know-how convey different meaning?

differences

This is tough. Thinking about it, knowledge and know-how seem the same to me except that know-how is slightly less formal.

Mr. Disappointment

@RegDwight And I don't even know what to say to that, other than it seems Rome can be destroyed in a day.

z7sg

10:06 AM

Never mind about Kosmo, where is my bloody swag? :/

Jez

you have to go to SEN HQ and steal it

Mr. Disappointment

3

Q: What's the connection between "Holy Grail" and the "Killer Rabbit"?

What's the connection between the Holy Grail and the Killer Rabbit? I was reading this article: http://www.jurriaanpersyn.com/archives/2009/02/12/database-sharding-at-netlog-with-mysql-and-php/#databasesetup2 and they are saying If there's a Holy Grail, there's a Killer Rabbit. OK, I can unders...

phrases vocabulary slang common-phrases

This includes references to Monty Python, Monty Python equals fun, therefore, this is off-topic (?)

z7sg

What does that have to do with English?

Mr. Disappointment

@z7sg That aside, and most importantly, seemingly, for the reason I just gave, this is why it must be off-topic ...there are, however, so many reasons.

Thing is, based on the input from the transcript of this room over the previous day, I can legitimately flag nigh every question on the front page.

And mostly as 'General Reference', due to the 'too basic' clause.

z7sg

Clearly the question was created solely to regurgitate a Monty Python joke. It's fine to make Python references in the answers to a legitimate question though.

Mr. Disappointment

10:13 AM

@z7sg You'd think so, right? I wouldn't feel so secure in that belief any more, though.

z7sg

I am a peasant with fewer than 10,000 points, therefore I do not involve myself in mod wars.

Mr. Disappointment

Well, then I'm the equivalent of a homeless bum, with less than 3k here - I don't intend to get caught up in any 'war', but I do care to contribute to the community for the better, if possible. We're still lacking accurate enough definitions for me to conclude exactly what actions might do that (or, we're not, and then by the non-ironed out definitions discussed here, we can close and / or delete most everything.)

z7sg

Although I hate to see Kosmonaut leave as I have a lot of respect for his knowledge and mad skillz.

That to my mind is a far greater loss than allowing a few frivolous questions, whichever side of the argument you might stand on.

Mr. Disappointment

@z7sg Granted, that strikes me sore, too, but I'm not really into mutiny or anything, and intend to do what I can to save this ship (in doing so, we might just be able to get such excellent people back / to stick around.)

Robusto

10:33 AM

@RegDwight — Awww, f*ck. That seriously sucks. Is there no talking him out of it?

Jez

@MrDisappointment I don't have much time so could you give me the gist of the transcript over the previous day?

Rhodri

11:03 AM

@Robusto Ditto. I wish I could help, but I'm still talking myself out of buggering off.

Transcript for

English Language & Usage: Multi-Layer…