720
votes

From "6 Simple Tips to Get Stackoverflow Reputation Fast" at codexon.com:

  1. Be the First to Answer. Even at the cost of quality.

  2. Use Downvotes and Comments Strategically

  3. Use obnoxious in-your-face formatting and lists.

  4. Be Aware of the 200 rep/day Limit

  5. Edit, But Don’t Edit Too Much

  6. Associate your other accounts

Courtesy of our pal codexon. Agree? Disagree? Walnuts? Cantaloupe?

24
  • 258
    How in the world do you downvote strategically...? Oct 18, 2012 at 15:05
  • 138
    By downvoting other answerers who are competing with your answer. If you do that when you would not have done (had you not answered the question), then that is strategic.
    – Phil H
    Oct 31, 2012 at 11:35
  • 71
    More importantly, down voting answers costs you rep. So using too frequently isn't going to help your score. Jan 21, 2013 at 13:19
  • 109
    Where is the part about using jQuery for the answer?! May 31, 2013 at 1:17
  • 25
    You could always just ask a ridiculous number of questions... meta.stackexchange.com/questions/1326/…
    – apaul
    May 31, 2013 at 5:54
  • 104
    I'm kind of appalled at the existence of this post...
    – jpmc26
    Jul 15, 2013 at 7:21
  • 207
    downvoting only for the sake of for personal rep gain. Now that is anti-community.
    – Tanvimil
    Aug 17, 2013 at 9:58
  • 15
    ALSO Dont Comment on a post which is voted down I mean under 0, It will make them think that you were the downvoter .....
    – UltraDEVV
    Sep 25, 2014 at 16:42
  • 4
    What about: Provide copy and paste solutions to simple, everyday problems in enterprise languages, especially Java [and now Swift]?
    – Carl Smith
    Nov 9, 2014 at 19:28
  • 4
    Can someone please explain #6? Is that the same as merging 2 accounts created inadvertently? It seems like that would rarely happen. If it did, there wouldn't be many points in one of the accounts.
    – Nelu
    Nov 28, 2014 at 1:52
  • 8
    I would down-vote this, but I don`t have enough reputation A far more constructive answer is provided here
    – dmcquiggin
    Apr 5, 2015 at 3:10
  • 12
    @Phil H "downvoting other answerers who are competing with your answer" is very evil May 8, 2015 at 9:54
  • 11
    this have been been posted 6 years ago, but I find disgusting and unethic to "downvote" perfectly valid answers just to get reputation. Oct 15, 2015 at 21:31
  • 9
    These tips are not to be taken seriously, as they are clearly tongue-in-cheek. This is a satirical commentary from someone who is clearly unhappy with the status-quo.
    – Sheamus
    Apr 3, 2016 at 15:58
  • 4
    As a long-time StackOverflow user, I strongly disagree with #1. The whole appeal of StackOverflow is quality answers, not fast answers at the cost of quality! It's actually upsetting to see that as a suggestion at all...
    – CoolBots
    May 12, 2016 at 20:31

37 Answers 37

1233
votes

I don't know about you but here's my strategy.

  1. Post high quality answers. This should be numbered 1 2 and 3. But a good answer will more often than not trump a fast answer. Though there are cases where it does not.

  2. Monitor the frontpage and the new questions list. Learn their cache time and refresh accordingly or use the tag pages (Example) to get live updates on new questions.

  3. Set up a good but short list of Interesting and Ignored tags. For example I have , , , , and as interesting tags. This will help you see questions, which you can answer, quicker.

  4. Avoid Wall-of-Text questions. They take way too much effort for little reward. And usually are syntax errors or bad structure.

  5. Post an answer even if the question already has 1–2 or even 3 answers. In these cases, take your time and answer well. This will usually net you a good sum of rep.

  6. Learn when to edit. Post a short answer at first and then edit. You have <5 minutes to make that answer shine.

  7. Be humble, thorough and fair. There are a lot of smart people out there and many will know much more than you about the subject. Be thorough in the code you post, check it for syntax errors and make sure it fits the question. And if you see that the correct answer is already there, upvote it, that person deserves the rep.

12
  • 140
    I think the list should have one more item: 8. Provide a good and simple code example (and format it correctly)
    – awe
    Jul 22, 2010 at 12:37
  • Now you can edit your questions and answers any time. Jan 22, 2011 at 23:47
  • 26
    9. Demo Link. Add link to a ready to run demo of your code. (codepad.org, jsfiddle.net, ...) Jan 16, 2013 at 10:04
  • 52
    I would add #8 Go Niche. Find something you are good at that is not as popular as [java] or [sql]. Watch that tag every day and answer questions if you can. There are usually fewer people on the tag and you can take more time to answer.
    – Jess
    Apr 10, 2013 at 20:58
  • 4
    Regarding demo links, I totally agree. However, please keep in mind that sometimes those links get broken. That is why I consider good practice to paste that code in your answer here at SO too. Sep 12, 2013 at 4:39
  • 1
    What's a "Wall of Text" question? Very verbose? Or something else?
    – Shiva
    Jan 17, 2014 at 23:44
  • 4
    Wall of text are unformatted big chunks of code, with little to no explanation of what is going on and what the point of the OP is. Also check urban dictionary urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=wall%20of%20text Feb 25, 2014 at 13:25
  • I would like to add some points to your point 5. As you say Post an answer even though the question has 1–2 or even 3 answers, In that case check whether already existing answer have covered all the things.Sometimes more knowledge peoples will post quickly with all the thing need to be know about that point. So in that case dont try to Duplicate it.
    – krishna
    May 26, 2014 at 10:53
  • @JeffAtwood I checked the source, they are clearly strong.
    – kzh
    Oct 3, 2014 at 18:29
  • 6
    "Post a short answer at first and then edit. You have <5 minutes to make that answer shine" This might have been fine 5-6 years ago with a lot less users, now it doesn't help you, or anyone else. You just get downvoted immediately for posting a poor or less than useful answer.
    – James
    Apr 12, 2015 at 17:33
  • @Jess, that doesn't work however if the askers are not reactive and/or there are few people upvoting. That's why IMHO a gold badge for revival/necromancer pattern is needed.
    – Nemo
    May 2, 2015 at 10:31
  • I would like to add "share the love" to the list. If you up-vote someone who is helpful they'll feel more inclined to up-vote others who are helpful in due course. How often do you visit a useful post and then not hit the up-vote? Speaking of which...
    – mark_h
    May 10, 2016 at 18:47
294
votes

To be perfectly honest, I absolutely agree with #3. A bit of formatting

  • Makes the post more readable
  • proves that the user put a bit of effort into it
  • prevents the "Wall of Text crits you" effect
  • stands out
  • allows me to spot important points more easily
  • puts some structure into the posting

And #6 is also a no-brainer. Not because of the reputation but because that gives clickable names when migrating the question.

Point #1 is well discussed, just search for the fastest gun in the west problem. And Point #5 benefits the person who asks the question, because more visibility = more chance for an answer without having to post a bounty.

So only Point #2 is purely evil and should be somehow monitored and actively counterattacked, but I think that's what Jeff & Co. have been doing since almost Day 1.

But overall, I agree with these points, because nicely formatted answers from people with accounts who bump the question once in a while to give it more exposure are a Win for the site.

To further prove my point, here is a picture of a bunny with a pancake on its head:

This is Chewbacca. Chewbacca is a Wookie who lives on Endor.

4
  • 28
    "To further prove my point, here is a picture of a bunny with a pancake on its head." That's hallarois! May 12, 2016 at 1:52
  • 6
    I mis-read that as "a pancake with a bunny on its head".
    – user253751
    Jul 13, 2016 at 8:58
  • 2
    Interesting technique to draw attention
    – tu4n
    Nov 17, 2016 at 22:07
  • 1
    Looks like two pancakes even.
    – Patrick B.
    Apr 25, 2017 at 13:20
143
votes

Is it just me, or would following these tips make you feel dirty too? Is this where the word "rep whore" comes from? Especially

#2 - is highly unfair, gaming the system, and preventing its usefulness.
#1 - is true, it is the old "fastest gun in the west" problem. After the first upvote(s) I can still invest in a great answer (otherwise being pushed down and I lose my first place).
#4-6 - are great.

Am I an idealist? I would like to help and be helped. And still I find myself going after those 12 points to get edit powers at the time of writing. But at what expense? Never gonna do #2!

4
  • 2
    And I wasn't even first to answer ;-) And you noticed: no formating, no stratigical downvoting (I assure), didn't edit the answer so far. But also did not hit the 200 rep/day limit :(
    – malach
    Aug 25, 2009 at 8:40
  • 3
    "highly unfair"? It's mildly manipulative at best. Face it, at best you're only going to affect the ranking significantly if you and someone else posted almost-identical answers and neither one of you edits. I have answers posted late, with few votes for the first day and several down-votes that are still collecting up-votes months later, long after other, formerly high-ranked answers stalled out. IMHO, if you're in it for the game, then accept that you'll be gamed; if you're in it for the answers, then a few bogus votes make no difference.
    – Shog9
    Aug 25, 2009 at 16:15
  • 2
    I look at it as highly unfair in the light that the person is willing to "harm"somebody else in something that is so important to himself. I personally could care less.
    – malach
    Aug 25, 2009 at 21:08
  • To quote a different meta post, "it [the reputation system] really is just a 'necessary evil' to aid the privilege system (and it also is a sort of reward)." Downvoting an answer just to get more rep is gaming the system, but no system is perfect, and SE's community moderated reputation system works much better than countless other forums. I hate that things like "strategic downvoting" exist on this forum, but it happens. Another good quote "Don't use it [reputation] to gauge post quality." True dat! Aug 9, 2013 at 7:39
132
votes

Well, I certainly credit all my success on Stack Overflow to

  1. judicious
  2. use
  3. of
  4. obnoxious
  5. lists...
6
  • 180
    I fixed your post for you Aug 25, 2009 at 8:10
  • 10
    This highlights #3: Jeff, your formatting just earned Shog9 an upvote!
    – malach
    Aug 25, 2009 at 8:36
  • 6
    Also highlights #5! Though not really in the way it was intended...
    – Shog9
    Aug 25, 2009 at 15:17
  • 9
    This answer needs more backticks in order to be useful as an answer to the question.
    – user
    May 19, 2014 at 14:03
  • 27
    Oh, is that where the o in <ol> stands for? Obnoxious list... Feb 12, 2015 at 13:59
  • lol @JustusRomijn I know nothing about code, but it's probably Ordered list. Unless that was a joke... Jun 5, 2017 at 12:43
74
votes

I'd add one more: answer the questions people can understand.

A question like "I'm having a problem with really really really tricky SQL query: I need to count records groupwise" will bring you 10 upvotes in a minute, if you were first to answer.

But one of the answers I'm most proud of took me something like 30 minutes and was accepted with a negative score (someone might have been using downvoting strategically, you know). There are just too many lines to be interesting.

10
  • 48
    My highest-scoring answer on SO was a one-liner straight from the docs..
    – John Fouhy
    Aug 25, 2009 at 8:26
  • 7
    Very true. Some of the most basic C#/Java questions are among those where the most rep is dealt out.
    – Jonik
    Aug 25, 2009 at 8:28
  • 1
    In specific problems are going to gainer less votes/views then a general question. Its just the nature of the beast. Aug 25, 2009 at 15:06
  • 2
    So true. My highest scoring answers are quick-fire copies from the docs. BTW as we're rep farming here, why not link to your poor, unloved, masterwork? I bet it'd get upvotes (I would)
    – MarkJ
    Sep 16, 2009 at 22:10
  • 1
    OK, my mate Google found it and I just have upvoted it. stackoverflow.com/questions/1165878/…
    – MarkJ
    Sep 16, 2009 at 22:15
  • Agreed! The answer that got me the most rep was pointing out that someone used '=' instead of '=='...
    – Eli Sander
    Jul 20, 2012 at 14:35
  • 1
    @JamesMcMahon: This is not necessary a case of specific question. "Why my Java homework doesn't work" can accumulate more point the answer to "How to get code coverage in C++" despite the latter being both harder and non-specific. Aug 30, 2013 at 9:32
  • This is an 1-lined answer with bold and italic and I won't earn any reputation from this.
    – Jamie
    Apr 27, 2014 at 8:43
  • @JohnFouhy, They should deal out rep not just based on upvotes, but on upvotes per view. In other words questions with more views would gain less rep per upvote.
    – Pacerier
    May 5, 2014 at 19:05
  • 1
    This is so true. I had someone say as much on a highly highly technical, very lengthy answer of mine. Really good answers can sometimes get overlooked, and the quickly upvoted answers aren't necessarily that great, because "information can't be that useful if so many people already know it."
    – Wildcard
    Apr 1, 2016 at 21:30
64
votes

I am formatting my answer as a list, but I have a good reason (see number 3 below):

  1. Be the first to answer
    While the fastest gun problem is not new to us, the post was written for an audience not familiar with Stack Overflow, so the OP is right in bringing it up. Being the first to answer is likely to bring you more votes. However, I disagree with his statement that there are many bad/wrong answers on top of the list because of it, my own experience is that quality floats to the top.

  2. Use Downvotes and Comments Strategically
    I don't know, most of the time I can easily see the three top answers on my screen. If a user can read them without scrolling, he/she will be very likely to do so, therefore I don't think this has a big effect. Besides, the vote difference between the first three answers is often more than two votes, so this is likely not to work at all. The systematic downvoting of a specific user's answers, as shown in the screenshot, will definitely be caught by the system.

  3. Use obnoxious in-your-face formatting and lists
    There is a reason why answers with formatting are getting upvoted more often. It is the same reason why the option to use formatting exists: Formatted answers are good answers. The same answer in plain text is not as readable as if it was well formatted, hence the trend for answers with lists and other formatting to float to the top.
    As for answers that start with a bold Yes or No at the top: If the question asks Is X a good thing to do? first giving a clear answer and then elaborating on your reasons is a good practice. These answers are upvoted because they are good answers.

  4. Be Aware of the 200 reputation/day Limit
    The reputation limit was never a problem for me, because I never got near ;-)

  5. Edit, But Don’t Edit Too Much Editing in order to bump up the question on the home page is a strategy that is likely to work. Unfortunately.

  6. Associate your other accounts
    Hey, I did that! And you know what: I got 100 points out of it!!!!!
    Once. Not such a big deal, really.

At the end I am left wondering: Most of us got to a point when we didn't consider our reputation that important any more. For me that was after I passed the 3k threshold on Stack Overflow and was allowed to vote on closing questions. (Yes, most of the people who tell others not worry about their reputation so much, because hey, it ain't that important, you know, have a reputation where it really isn't that important any more.)
Somehow, the OP doesn't seem to fall into that category.

6
  • 38
    This answer sucks, it has no picture in it. Aug 25, 2009 at 9:40
  • I was with you till point 5. Refining and bumping is not only a strategy, it is highly encouraged! For point 6 you get my favourite punctuation mark link: sockenseite.de/__oneclick_uploads/2006/10/ausruf.html Aug 25, 2009 at 9:49
  • 8
    +1 specifically for the point you make in the end: "Most of us got to a point when we didn't consider our rep that important any more." After I was able to retag questions & edit CW posts on SO I was happy with the privileges, and have had no compulsive need to try to accumulate more rep. (Although getting past 2k did make the copy editor in me even happier, and of course upping the rep score always gives you some warm buzz... :-)
    – Jonik
    Aug 25, 2009 at 10:02
  • @John Smithers: Quoting from the linked page: Die Wichtigkeit eines Newspostings im Usenet ist reziprok zur Anzahl der enthaltenenen, kumulierten Ausrufungszeichen. Which is exactly the point I was trying to make ;-)
    – Treb
    Aug 25, 2009 at 11:49
  • @Treb: It still hurt my eyes. And it drags down the whole post. Aug 25, 2009 at 11:56
  • Well, reputation is somewhat important in the begining, especially in cases when you cannot up-vote other people's answers, just because there is limit of let's say 15 reputation to do that. Feb 25, 2014 at 13:29
55
votes

#2 on this list "Use Downvotes and Comments Strategically" makes me rage.

I prefer Jon Skeet's advice on Answering technical questions helpfully.

3
  • 3
    Seeing as he has 229k reputation as of this writing, I would take his advice :-) Oct 20, 2010 at 5:47
  • 3
    +1 Agree - not only is Jon Skeet a SO living legend, he's polite & funny. Nov 2, 2011 at 2:44
  • @AndréCaron And now, seven years later, he's at... Only 940k?! He's been slacking!
    – user248725
    Apr 16, 2017 at 3:48
42
votes

Ways to amass rep that positively impact the site.

There are plenty of vampiric strategies that one can employ. Those that overall don't make the site a better place to be. That don't make it a more effective place to get questions answered. I'll be talking about the ways that make the site work better.

I find that there are two general strategies to getting rep quickly:

Frequently visit "high-churn" tags

These are tags that get a lot of questions. Which means they quickly get a lot of answers. But the former means that, if you visit the site 20 times a day, odds are you will find a few questions that you can answer which have not yet been answered.

Naturally, this requires some significant expertise in high-churn fields, so that you can not simply quickly answer questions, but do so effectively. You can expect to get 2-4 upvotes on these questions, so you don't need more than 4-6 of them daily before you hit the cap. And it doesn't even matter if a couple of others slip in; as long as you're within the first 4 minutes of the question hitting the site, you stand a good chance of getting some upvotes.

Well, assuming your answer is correct.

Have significant expertise in a "low-churn" tag

Maybe this tag only gets 10 questions a day. Maybe only 4 regular contributors even check the tag, let alone know how to answer them.

Being able to serve the under-served parts of SO means that you don't have to visit very often, but it also means you get a lot more accepts, rather than just upvotes. So if you combine these two strategies, the 200 rep barrier becomes less important, since accepted answer rep doesn't count against it.

Indeed, if you happen to have a lot of various obscure knowledge, serving the under-served parts of SO can get you all the rep you need. Plus, you get to help people who might otherwise have not gotten help.

The downside here is that the low-churn tags are also more likely (by volume) to be from new posters who don't know what the accept button is, or don't even have the rep to upvote. However, those few regular contributors to those tags will likely hit you with an upvote when they see your answer.


Other Tactics

There are also other tactics that you can employ in your answer. One that I do as a matter of course that just so happens to fit in is to add useful advice while answering. You should know the general idioms around a particular knowledge base and preach them where possible.

For example, if you're answering a C++ question where someone is gratuitously using new, add a suggestion to your answer that they use a stack variable. If they're talking about writing destructors, bring up the Rule of Three and smart pointers. Experienced C++ programmers will almost always upvote you for that, and you'll be helping someone find programming techniques that they may not have found otherwise.

Overkill is another tactic. If you can't be first, then by God be biggest. Go into massive detail. Lecture the person asking the question.

You can't overkill on most questions. But you don't have to. If you're in a high-churn tag, a good bit of overkill can earn you 100 rep easily. Overkill doesn't work so well in low-churn tags, since overkill relies on many people seeing the sheer massiveness of your answer.

3
  • 13
    Overkill as in "I answered this question 2 years late, so I'll write a lot about it." :) Good answer.
    – CoffeeRain
    Feb 6, 2012 at 21:13
  • 1
    "Being able to serve the under-served parts of SO [...] also means you get a lot more accepts, rather than just upvotes." is just a theoretical thesis. I'm mainly active in two such under-served parts: maven, jenkins. There are 10 accepted in my recent 60 answers and 37 with zero votes. So you apparently get neither of them there. To be honest: This stresses my altruism and makes it less fun to contribute. Sep 5, 2015 at 23:28
  • Most of my reputation goes from overkill answer. But it worked only once in my life, and I write a lot of overkill answers. Dec 18, 2015 at 14:51
27
votes

I know first hand that #3 is a sure easy way to get more attention to your answer (and in turn more upvotes).

I always do my best to distinguish my answer from all the others by using plenty of links, quotes, formatting. Most of the time, this will shoot my question to the top of the list and ensure upvotes a plenty.

Oh, and especially pictures:

http://cache.gawker.com/assets/images/17/2009/07/340x_appletv_boxee.jpg

11
  • 5
    yes but that is not a bad thing, good formatting is a net positive Aug 25, 2009 at 8:15
  • What you say is indeed mostly true. But the last example could be better — you say especially pictures, yet link to an answer with 0 votes ;)
    – Jonik
    Aug 25, 2009 at 8:22
  • 1
    Jeff: Yes, it is a good thing :). Jonik: Yeah, it was a horrible example (It actually used to be -1), but it was taking me too long to find a better answer.
    – Josh Hunt
    Aug 25, 2009 at 8:42
  • 2
    Lousy pictures! Missing freehand circles! Aug 25, 2009 at 8:46
  • Love the fact my answer with equal formatting didn't get any upvotes :P superuser.com/questions/9120/…
    – Ivo Flipse
    Aug 25, 2009 at 10:48
  • Ivo: In this case, i think you could have done without a giant XBox on the page. That only deters voters :P
    – Josh Hunt
    Aug 25, 2009 at 11:45
  • 2
    And the nominations for "Most effective use of an unrelated image" are...
    – Justin
    Jan 18, 2011 at 13:36
  • Links are an important part of formatting. My highest voted answer should be a one-liner, but I added 5 superfluous links and an unnecessary code example. I put the least relevant information first and the most relevant information last. I feel kinda dirty now...
    – Eva
    Mar 5, 2013 at 0:53
  • I think people really like when you put a different link on every word of a phrase. I get hetcha upvotes when I do that.
    – Eva
    Mar 5, 2013 at 0:54
  • This answer is a good example on Graphics. It was not a good answer to the question, but it gained up-votes because of nice images and formatting. Sadly, this entire question was made community wiki, so it lost the rep-potential...
    – awe
    Aug 19, 2013 at 13:02
  • Pictures got me 5k on DIY and a couple of K pm SuperUser... in a few months.... I got bored of downloading pictures....
    – Piotr Kula
    Sep 25, 2013 at 12:20
24
votes

Should we really care about points all the time? I am here for:

  1. Learning: It can be anything like learning new tips, logic, etc.
  2. For getting my answers
  3. and obviously if you want your answer then do some favor for others. Check their questions and try to give them a proper solution for their problem.

Honestly saying, I don't give a damn about my reputation. This is not a college class where you have to score good marks for good grades or something like that.

22
votes

Answer quickly but incorrectly unfortunately works. Sometimes such answers are even hastily marked as best answer.

I suggest sorting answers starting from most recently added, or sort few most recently added above others (this way each answer will be top for at least a moment).

Don't let few up/down votes affect order, at least when question is still new.

SELECT … FROM answers … ORDER BY 
  (CASE WHEN abs(number_of_votes) > threshold THEN number_of_votes ELSE 0 END),
  (date_added > NOW() - interval '10 minutes') DESC,
  …
1
  • 1
    ` SELECT * FROM ( SELECT * FROM answers WHERE number_of_votes > THRESHOLD ORDER BY number_of_votes ) q UNION ALL SELECT * FROM answers WHERE number_of_votes <= THRESHOLD AND date_added > NOW - '10 minutes'::INTERVAL UNION ALL SELECT * FROM answers WHERE number_of_votes <= THRESHOLD AND date_added <= NOW() - '10 minutes'::INTERVAL ` This is more index friendly. Sorry, just couldn't help it :)
    – Quassnoi
    Aug 25, 2009 at 12:41
20
votes

Let me tackle these one at a time.

Be the First to Answer. Even at the cost of quality.

Absolutely true. Like others have said, this is actually a good thing because getting a quick answer to a problem is typically what you want. The only problem is (as noted by codexon) wrong quick answers can get voted up. Or someone posts something that's irrelevant but correct and gets voted up because people don't seem to understand or don't read the OP's requirements.

Use Downvotes and Comments Strategically

I don't really like tactical downvoting. I really think downvoting shouldn't be anonymous for this and other reasons. Or as a compromise, downvotes on questions you also answer shouldn't be anonymous. This also includes putting on a downvote and later taking it off. As others have noted, if you want to rescind a downvote, you can edit the answer (with 3k+ reputation) and you're then allowed to rescind it after the normal time limit.

Use obnoxious in-your-face formatting and lists.

I don't see how "obnoxious" formatting helps. But there's definitely an advantage to using something other than a "blob" of text. You can break that up with headings, lists and/or images. It also helps to put a useful title in a link instead of just a raw URL.

Be Aware of the 200 reputation/day Limit

As I think Jon Skeet wrote, you need to get to the 200 reputation cap limit as soon as possible during the day to increase the window for over-200 reputation gains from accepted answers and bounties. I've made numerous posts against the reputation system working like this. I actually think this disadvantages more casual users. After all Jon Skeet won't spend much time during the day in the soft cap region. I read once he said that sometimes when he gets up in the morning he's already at +200 for the day (which is 6-8 hours in for him in the UK).

Edit, But Don’t Edit Too Much

True again. You don't want to make your posts CW and I have again posted numerous times how I think this owner edit forcing CW is actually a bad thing. It discourages people from maintaining their posts. I've proposed several solutions including edits after 6 not bumping the post but they've all been rejected. I think we should be doing everything we can to encourage people to maintain content they've written and updating it as the facts change.

Associate your other accounts

This is an easy one.

The only thing I'd add is that you want to judiciously bounty hunt and look for new bounties with low upvote answers. You also want to look for bounties that end late in the "reputation day" as around half the time the OP just lets the bounty lapse without selecting an answer and you know when that will be. No point wasting your time with bounties that end at 1 am UTC.

I'm not sure many bounty posters realize that the top answer only gets half the bounty by auto-acceptance. IMHO we need to encourage active selection of an answer by giving the OP a nominal reputation amount (say 10 points) for selecting an answer rather than auto-selecting.

Basically what's been said is correct. A few of the things I consider negative and should be addressed as described above.

2
  • 1
    "As I think Jon Skeet wrote..." Should the reputation system be designed based on the guy with the highest score? How many people hit the rep cap anyway? I hit it the other day -- for the first time in my life, and I'm just outside the top 10%..
    – John Fouhy
    Aug 25, 2009 at 22:30
  • 1
    By definition those at the top have the most experience, which is noteworthy. But I wasn't putting Jon up as an expert in this context, merely attributing the source.
    – cletus
    Aug 26, 2009 at 6:40
17
votes

For an eye-opening read, check out the comments on Reddit. Amusingly enough, someone chose the title of this post as Why Stack Overflow sucks. My favourite from one relix:

I've answered exactly 1 question. It was the only correct answer to that question, but it didn't get any votes and didn't get selected as the answer. Instead, the wrong answer was selected and got all the brownie points.

That was the moment I decided never to waste time on Stack Overflow again. Why even bother.

6
  • 2
    Before I saw that, I thought nothing can beat youtube comments.
    – Quassnoi
    Aug 25, 2009 at 14:48
  • 2
    There are some people that seem to have some pre-existing prejudice to SO that I don't fully understand. Aug 25, 2009 at 15:15
  • 10
    There are some people that have pre-existing prejudice to everything you can name.
    – Quassnoi
    Aug 25, 2009 at 16:07
  • 12
    "I decided never to waste time on StackOverflow again" -> David Verhasselt "Seen 45 mins ago". Tsk.
    – hyperslug
    Aug 26, 2009 at 20:48
  • 2
    @hyperslug, He meant "answering questions".
    – Pacerier
    May 5, 2014 at 19:40
15
votes

I have also written an article on Stack Overflow tips and tricks that can be viewed here:

http://sarfraznawaz.wordpress.com/2010/02/14/stackoverflow-tips-tricks-5/

The main points include:

1. Get 100 Reputation Points Free

2. Add “Interesting” & “Ignored” Tags

3. Install a Greasemonkey Script

4. Be the First to Answer a Question

5. Markdown

6. Don’t Over-Style Your Answers

7. Add Pictures

8. Use Google Effectively

9. Use JS Bin

10. Edit Your Answers Cleverly

11. Keep Your References Open

12. Involve Yourself to Earn Badges

0
14
votes
  1. Be the first to post a good answer. Even at the cost of quality.

    ~ Post a correct and helpful answer. Make it perfect afterwards.

  2. Use Downvotes and Comments Strategically

    ~ This is wasted effort. Making other answers look worse doesn't make yours better.

  3. Use obnoxious in-your-face formatting and lists wisely.

  4. Be aware of the 200 rep/day limit

    ~ Gain the favor of OP. You will get additional rep for your answers being accepted even after you've hit the cap.

  5. Edit, But Don’t Edit Too Much

    ~ Prefer fewer but greater edits over many minor ones. Care about those who are already reading it.

  6. Associate your other accounts - Seriously? ... that desperate?


    + tips from my experience:

  7. Provide additional helpful info related to the matter.

    ~ This might include pointing out good / bad practices, pointing out completely different (better) approaches rather than helping to fix the one included in question etc.

    ~ Impart the knowledge that OP as well as many future visitors will appreciate.

  8. Help others to make their answers better, collaborate. Be generous, kind and humble.

    ~ Others will treat you the same way. Karma is good thing.

0
12
votes

I've seen a user with over 1000 reputation but his writing sounded like a newbie. I looked at his profile and saw 266 questions with lots of upvotes and 11 answers with a total of one upvote.

So the strategy is to ask a LOT of easy questions on popular topics so people can answer and upvote you.

It's freaking sad but at the same time amusing that people are actually mostly hackers. We hack around the system to get what we want. I think that this is very valuable at times but dangerous at other times.

1
12
votes

NOOOOO!!!!! MUST DO DAMAGE CONTROL!!!!!

Seriously though. If you just take some of the "advice" from the linked article as it is, much harm would be done to the ecosystem.

Re: “Be the First to Answer. Even at the cost of quality.”

This is missing a second part: please make sure you improve your answer after quick-posting it.

Re: “Use Downvotes and Comments Strategically.”

Noooo!!!!

Downvote if and only if an answer is bad. Don't "strategically" downvote because the answer is competing with yours. Plus your down-vote gets locked in after 5 minutes, so the damage can't be undone unless you commit further evils.

Don't be afraid to call out on an answer that is plain wrong though, via comments and/or downvotes.

Re: “Use obnoxious in-your-face formatting and lists.”

Well, I won't use the term "obnoxious" ("obnoxious" works pretty well on Meta though)

Just make sure that your post is easy to read. Use proper formatting

  • put code or code-related things in code block or inline code span.
  • use headers if your post is relatively long to organize things
  • use lists when applicable
  • if you feel that some related documentation/reference can provide further details, mention it in your question.
  • if you're quoting text/explanation from a reference or from a post, put it in blockquotes and give credits.
  • for emphasis or highlighting keywords, use italics or bold, but sparingly.

Re: “Be Aware of the 200 rep/day Limit”

  • Fair enough. You don't want to spin your wheels.

Re: “Edit, But Don’t Edit Too Much”

Don't edit at all unless you have something useful to add or something that needs to be changed. Bumping up your answer just for the sake of drawing attention bumps down other questions that might need attention more than you do.

Re: “Associate your other accounts”

  • Fair enough.
2
  • 1
    I think you're missing the tongue-in-cheek nature of this question and its answers... Jul 23, 2013 at 10:09
  • 1
    Nuh uh, I'm just catering towards users who are taking this "thread" seriously. Jul 23, 2013 at 10:11
12
votes

Warning: The following contains absurd levels of snark that might be dangerous to the eyes, hands, or soul of a moderately to severely sane reader. I promise there's a point to this at the end. Maybe.

If someone has beat you to the #1 with a one-liner, follow up with some extreme #3 by repeating their answer:

Jeff's answer is absolutely correct: Walnuts do taste great with cantaloupe.

Here's a code example that explains it a bit more:

public class Walnuts extends Cantaloupe implements DeliciousCombination { }

When writing walnut-related code, follow these steps:

  1. Determine if you need cantaloupes
  2. Determine if you have cantaloupes
  3. Eat the walnuts no matter what

Things to beware about cantaloupes:

  • They are less delicious without walnuts
  • They are much heavier than walnuts
  • Fewer people are allergic to cantaloupes than to walnuts

walnuts.org, the official specification for walnuts, has this mostly unrelated thing to say about them:

California grows more than 99% of the country’s supply
and two-thirds of the world’s walnut trade.

Additional resources about walnuts and cantaloupe recipes:

Wikipedia's page on walnuts, Wikipedia's page on cantaloupe, Wikipedia's page when I clicked random article

[Note/Edit/Update/Addendum/tl;dr/Other Indication of Superfluous Footnote] You should probably get rid of the magic number on line 1000000.

You will get upvoted more than the person who answered first, and you don't even need to know the answer beforehand. As long as you have some experience in the general field and you understand what the answer is saying, you can add completely unnecessary bits and reap the benefits of another person's hard work!

But in all seriousness, I don't think this trick is always bad. You still have to put effort into your code example, lists, quotes, and finding related(ish) links. People upvote because it looks like you put more work into your answer (you might've) and because it's possible your answer is clearer to understand. Though Rule #1 says your answer will probably not get accepted.

5
  • 2
    May I suggest reducing some of the snark in this answer? Your last paragraph makes this a decent answer, in my opinion, but someone may not get that far before dismissing it. Mar 5, 2013 at 2:05
  • 1
    @AndrewBarber You're right. I have this awful habit of burying the lead. Somehow every time I come up with something that I think flows, the most important point is in the last letter of the last word of the last sentence of the overly-long gag. I will try to think of a way to get to the point faster.
    – Eva
    Mar 5, 2013 at 2:18
  • 3
    I need to get a handle on my snark problem. Snarkers Anonymous?
    – Eva
    Mar 5, 2013 at 23:35
  • @Eva Get some friends around to help you with "The Hunting of the Snark"?
    – SlySven
    Jan 8, 2016 at 20:49
  • Was it really suppose to be a joke? I see many users make good use of the ways of the Dark Side.
    – SPArcheon
    Dec 1, 2016 at 19:42
10
votes

Regarding #2, what if you hide votes for the 10 minutes or so?

By "hide", I mean: people can vote, but answers will appear to have 0 score (and time-based sort order) until the 10 minutes are up.

You could even hide timestamps and randomize display order for the initial window, though I'm not sure that would be worth it.

1
  • 5
    You would have to randomize the display order. If you simply had it by time, then people would still do tactic 1.
    – Unknown
    Aug 25, 2009 at 8:34
10
votes

If I can add three more...

  1. The highest concentration of SO fanatics (and by natural association, the FGITW's) is on the west coast of the USA, secondarily NYC. So visit the site when these regions are likely to be asleep and snipe out any questions that would otherwise get nailed in the FGITW rush. For what it's worth, Jon Skeet is in UTC+0.

  2. If you get an accepted answer, go back and look at the tags. Then look at them again. Are they the right tags? Are all the relevant tags present? Also... On the right side of the page will be a list of 'related' questions. Check the tags on those questions to see if any are relevant towards getting your accepted answer better exposed to the community.

  3. Lastly, defensive protection. Look at the original question carefully. Are there any improvements that can be made to prevent its closure as a duplicate? As off topic? Also, try and flesh out your answer before the FGITW's get their first caffeine hit.

I have it in mind that these are legitimate whilst simultaneously serving best community interests.

1
  • hmm nice :) @laxmi
    – lexi
    Oct 14, 2013 at 13:08
8
votes

Jokes aside there is a certain flaw in the way that reputation is earned.

There are additional factors to how much reputation you'll receive by asking a question or answering one that have nothing to do with the "correctness" of the question/answer.

It helps if you answer quickly, I found that if I answer an open question a day or more after it was posted the chances of getting up voted or chosen are close to nil. People almost never up vote a question, I think it got something to do with the fact that it's hard to decide if the question is a "good" question.

And of course users that instead of learning or answering questions try to grab as much reputation as possible, I've noticed people using the same dirty tricks explained in the post (like coping an already posted answer and bumping the other question down).

1
  • I have one exception to this rule. I've answered a simple mysql question that regularly brings in upvotes. Still the first security flawed question is way ahead :) But I agree with what you say. Jul 22, 2013 at 16:14
8
votes

Also, work in popular subject areas. Most people wouldn't recognize Jon Skeet's name if he had the ability to write swift and excellent answers in Lisp, Haskell, and Delphi, but not anything else.

Pick your questions. Only answer questions that are easy to read. If people are turned off from reading the question, they're unlikely to upvote your answer.

7
votes

I think a great way to restrain this behaviour is forcing to leave a comment on downvote. I think that the downvote comment must be anonymous, for not letting people downvote only for revenge.

In this way if the reason of the downvote is not good enough, a moderator (or everyone using the voting system) can eliminate the downvote (and take measure against the user with this bad behaviour if it persist in time).

4
  • @Brad: What did you not understand? Aug 25, 2009 at 18:04
  • The question doesn't ask how to fix the situation. Aug 25, 2009 at 18:07
  • Sorry, but with " Walnuts? Cantaloupe? " you weren't too clear of what you're really asking, basically you're asking for opinions, and that's my opinion. Aug 25, 2009 at 18:11
  • 1
    I love this foolish behaviour, this is a open question (on a meta site) that is barely a question, the OP intention is not clear, but basically it ask for opinion, I gave one, costructive, and I get a downvote... It's just Amazing! XD Aug 25, 2009 at 18:39
7
votes

The choice of question is probably the most important point missing from the list - once you have embellished your post with enough obnoxious formatting, it's all about the number of people who see your question - the more people who see your answer, the more potential votes.

This means that the more popular the question the more upvotes, in particular:

  • Really easy questions tend to do well - lots of people think that they could have a go at answering it, so it gets lots of views.
  • QUESTIONS WITH THE TITLE IN ALL-CAPS also do quite well as some people quite enjoy moaning about / closing rubbish questions.
  • Questions posted by anyone demi-famous (like Jeff or Jon Skeet) always attract massive views.
  • Subjective questions are also great, but you need to get in there early before they become community wiki.

Of course popular questions also means more competition, and so its more important than ever to make sure that you get in early - even so, more popular questions always offer a better vote-to-effort ratio in the long run.

7
votes

For users who don't have a lot of experience in programming and rarely answer questions, try editing posts.

NOTE: Only suggested edits work, so if you have 2,000 or more reputation, you cannot get reputation from this.

Tips on Editing

  • Code Spacing: Some questions may have code that is spaced more than usual. Try to take advantage of this and space out the code so that it is properly spaced neatly. Using an online compiler is helpful.

  • Grammar Correction: Some people (most commonly new users) will post bad grammar. Edit that as soon as possible so that the question is good quality.

  • Grave Accents: Names of methods should use grave accents to open and close.

  • Block quotes: use the > followed by any text to block quote the entire line. This is generally used for errors.

  • Titles: Sometimes the title contains unnecessary words (ie. C# in a question that is tagged C#). Delete those. For unclear titles, they can be fixed.

2
  • 1
    Caution on Editing: If your edit is not upto the mark, then sometime you will receive edit ban
    – krishna
    May 26, 2014 at 11:17
  • 1
    Well usually these editing techniques work out fine and should be acceptable. My edit percentage is still 90%.
    – puretppc
    May 30, 2014 at 20:21
6
votes

I've seen a corollary to #5: If you're the top answerer, periodically edit the question to bring more attention and votes to your post. That way, your own answer never becomes wiki.

For the most part it seems accurate. I'm not sure you could call it gaming since this is already known tacitly condoned.

Reputation is a system that happens to motivate many people well, and it has produced great results. Coming up with strategies to maximize it while not really contributing is unfortunate, but bearable considering the advantages.

2
  • I guess it largely depends on whether each edit is actually warranted and useful; periodically making trivial, non-consequential edits could more readily be considered gaming. (But if someone does a series of thoroughly useful edits, it might be partly gaming, or he might have the purest of intentions - others cannot really know.)
    – Jonik
    Aug 25, 2009 at 9:48
  • Linking to the question from other, related questions can accomplish the same thing. Provided they're worthwhile references / edits, i don't see a problem with either.
    – Shog9
    Aug 25, 2009 at 15:19
6
votes

Most of the answers given here are about how to manipulate things to favor you, get more exposure for your answers, get to easy to answer questions faster and such. But I think an important tip, to maintain the integrity of the forum, is to make sure that you're knowledgeable about the subject matter you want to answer questions on. It does nobody any good if you try to answer questions with BS just so you can be first.

If you're an expert on a particular topic, your well-crafted, timely answers to difficult questions should earn you reputation, not just initially, but over time as well. After enough time, a person like this could eventually get 200 reputation a day just from residual upvotes on past answers, and that to me seems like a good position to be in. You're likely not going to achieve that with an "answer as fast as possible" strategy with low quality answers on low quality questions.

5
votes

Some examples that seem to work for me.




5
votes

1. Be the First to Answer. Even at the cost of quality.

Instead, randomize the order of the answers while the question is new. In addition, hide the up-vote/down-vote count as to not influence the other readers (i.e. lemming effect). Eventually transition the question back to normal view. The rate of activity on the question should determine the length before standard view is enabled.

2
  • 2
    This just optimizes SO for those who want to play games, at the expense of those who actually wish to use it for Q&A.
    – Shog9
    Aug 25, 2009 at 21:20
  • 3
    @Shog9 I disagree: this would reduce the short term benefit of the first answer with some up votes compared to later answers that may have been more thought out and/or referenced.
    – Mark Hurd
    May 31, 2010 at 2:09
4
votes

I know people disagree with #2. I disagree with #1 but I know it sometimes holds true. The others seem somewhat accurate.

2
  • 12
    #2 is the only one I disagree with to the point of considering some algorithmical way of blocking it Aug 25, 2009 at 8:14
  • 1
    #2 just seems like temporary result-manipulating similar to this: meta.stackexchange.com/questions/15746/…. In time the best answers will bubble up.
    – hyperslug
    Aug 25, 2009 at 8:46

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