There are a significant amount of questions here that do not follow the criteria in the sidebar, especially “1. Open-ended question” and “5. An actual topic of discussion”. It seems some folks want others to do research for them, or to troubleshoot some random issue.
This bugs me. Of course, I can ignore and/or downvote those posts, and I do. However, I’m wondering if anyone else feels the same way. I’m don’t want to stifle content and discussion on such a burgeoning platform, but could we do something about this?
Perhaps we could “tag” posts in some way (I know tags aren’t officially supported yet) or maybe we could redirect folks to a sister community for non-discussion questions. Or something else?
Just throwin’ it out there. If I’m alone in this, I’ll take my lumps and quietly sit back down.
EDIT: Already seeing good points in the replies! makes sense- probably a bit too early to be sticklers about topics.
EDIT 2: Really appreciate the responses and discussion! I appreciate the discourse and also not being downvoted to oblivion 😄
FINAL EDIT: Thanks to all who commented. It’s nice to know I’m not alone, but I do accept what most (including mods) have said- cracking down on the types of questions is not a priority when the community is still growing.
I don’t mind questions being somewhat focused or topical. But the ones I don’t like are “Here is my long-winded opinion on x, what do you think?” or “Here’s a random article or other thing I found on the internet, thoughts?”
If it’s a post asking opinions on a recent event, that’s one thing. But I think the soapboxing should be limited. There’s more that a post should need to actually qualify as a discussion-fueling question than just the fact they ended a sentence with a question mark somewhere in their post.
Thoughts?
I agree regarding soapboxing. I think the posts that barely hide the fact they’re looking for reactions or agreement rather than discussion are probably the most grating and least constructive use of this community.
However, I think it remains to be seen if the community believes it’s something that needs to be addressed, and if so, if the mods are even conducive to changes. I do see the sidebar states “loosely moderated”. I am open to the possibility that I’m just being uptight and may just need to move on 😆