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I don't see much need for this feature. Unless you love to see every spelling error I correct, every phrase I rewrite to feel less blunt, and every word I change to better convey my idea. You don't see any problem with this, but to me it is not fine.

I suppose the idea came from this paragraph in the linked post.

This metric is based around the number of drafts a user has saved before posting their answer. Stack Exchange systems automatically save a draft copy of a user’s post to a cache location several seconds after they stop typing, with no further user input necessary. In principle, if people are copying and pasting answers out of services like GPT, then they won’t save as many drafts as people who write answers within Stack Exchange. In practice, many users save few drafts routinely (for example, because some users copy and paste the answer in from a separate doc, or because they don’t stop writing until they’re ready to post), so it’s the ratio of large draft saves to small draft saves that actually lets us measure volume in practice.

Since this feature came far before the AI bandwagon, I assume it was implemented to provide the ability to return to your incomplete post if you close the browser or navigate to a different page. I therefore expect that only the last draft is saved at any time.

While the company may have temporarily stored the total number of drafts and some other stats for their study, I sincerely hope they did not try to store the full draft history. Not only would this be super creepy and would probably violate GDPR in a thousand ways (do you really think that you removed the picture with the PII before posting? Tough luck, Stack Exchange saved a copy without telling you!), it would also at least quadruple the database space needed for each single post.

I seriously hope that what you are asking not only will be rejected (volunteers and nonemployee moderators don't have any right to see drafts as far I am concerned), but it is not possible in the first place.

I don't see much need for this feature. Seeing every draft would be worthless. Unless you love to see every spelling error I correct, every phrase I rewrite to feel less blunt, and every word I change to better convey my idea.
Even if we limit this to copy and pasted text, it does not get much better. I expect that on Stack Overflow users will very often copy and paste snippets from their code and then edit out the relevant parts like clients names and such. And under your example those would be saved too.

I suppose the idea came from this paragraph in the linked post.

This metric is based around the number of drafts a user has saved before posting their answer. Stack Exchange systems automatically save a draft copy of a user’s post to a cache location several seconds after they stop typing, with no further user input necessary. In principle, if people are copying and pasting answers out of services like GPT, then they won’t save as many drafts as people who write answers within Stack Exchange. In practice, many users save few drafts routinely (for example, because some users copy and paste the answer in from a separate doc, or because they don’t stop writing until they’re ready to post), so it’s the ratio of large draft saves to small draft saves that actually lets us measure volume in practice.

Since this feature came far before what users call the AI bandwagon, I assume it was implemented to provide the ability to return to your incomplete post if you close the browser or navigate to a different page. I therefore expect that only the last draft is saved at any time, and there is no history of previous draft available in any format.

While the company may have temporarily stored the total number of drafts and some other stats for their study, I sincerely hope they did not try to store the full draft history. Not only would this be super creepy and would probably violate GDPR in a thousand ways (do you really think that you removed the picture with the PII before posting? Tough luck, Stack Exchange saved a copy without telling you!), it would also at least quadruple the database space needed for each single post.

Hopefully this simple example will help. Suppose an user includes by mistake some snippet containing personal/sensitive data in a post. Right now we have a process to ask for removal. But would an user ask to remove something that they don't even know it is stored in the first place? After all they never "posted" it, they just copied some code, pasted in the editor and then edited out the sensitive parts with the expectation that it will not be stored in any format and no one will be able to access the "unsaved" draft. Your proposal is IMHO a violation of trust and probably a violation of local data protection regulations too.

I therefore hope that what you are asking not only will be rejected (volunteers and nonemployee moderators don't have any right to see drafts as far I am concerned), but it is not possible in the first place.

I don't see much need for this feature. Unless you love to see every spelling error I correct, every phrase I rewrite to feel less blunt, and every word I change to better convey my idea. You don't see any problem with this, but to me it is not fine.

I suppose the idea came from this paragraph in the linked post.

This metric is based around the number of drafts a user has saved before posting their answer. Stack Exchange systems automatically save a draft copy of a user’s post to a cache location several seconds after they stop typing, with no further user input necessary. In principle, if people are copying and pasting answers out of services like GPT, then they won’t save as many drafts as people who write answers within Stack Exchange. In practice, many users save few drafts routinely (for example, because some users copy and paste the answer in from a separate doc, or because they don’t stop writing until they’re ready to post), so it’s the ratio of large draft saves to small draft saves that actually lets us measure volume in practice.

Since this feature came far before the AI bandwagon, I assume it was implemented to provide the ability to return to your incomplete post if you close the browser or navigate to a different page. I therefore expect that only the last draft is saved at any time.

While the company may have temporarily stored the total number of drafts and some other stats for their study, I sincerely hope they did not try to store the full draft history. Not only would this be super creepy and would probably violate GDPR in a thousand ways (do you really think that you removed the picture with the PII before posting? Tough luck, Stack Exchange saved a copy without telling you!), it would also at least quadruple the database space needed for each single post.

I seriously hope that what you are asking not only will be rejected (volunteers, no employee moderators don't have any right to see draft as far I am concerned), but it is not possible in the first place.

I don't see much need for this feature. Unless you love to see every spelling error I correct, every phrase I rewrite to feel less blunt, and every word I change to better convey my idea. You don't see any problem with this, but to me it is not fine.

I suppose the idea came from this paragraph in the linked post.

This metric is based around the number of drafts a user has saved before posting their answer. Stack Exchange systems automatically save a draft copy of a user’s post to a cache location several seconds after they stop typing, with no further user input necessary. In principle, if people are copying and pasting answers out of services like GPT, then they won’t save as many drafts as people who write answers within Stack Exchange. In practice, many users save few drafts routinely (for example, because some users copy and paste the answer in from a separate doc, or because they don’t stop writing until they’re ready to post), so it’s the ratio of large draft saves to small draft saves that actually lets us measure volume in practice.

Since this feature came far before the AI bandwagon, I assume it was implemented to provide the ability to return to your incomplete post if you close the browser or navigate to a different page. I therefore expect that only the last draft is saved at any time.

While the company may have temporarily stored the total number of drafts and some other stats for their study, I sincerely hope they did not try to store the full draft history. Not only would this be super creepy and would probably violate GDPR in a thousand ways (do you really think that you removed the picture with the PII before posting? Tough luck, Stack Exchange saved a copy without telling you!), it would also at least quadruple the database space needed for each single post.

I seriously hope that what you are asking not only will be rejected (volunteers and nonemployee moderators don't have any right to see drafts as far I am concerned), but it is not possible in the first place.

I don't see much need for this feature. Unless you love to see every spelling error I correct, every phrase I rewrite to feel less blunt, every word I change to better convey my idea. You see no problem with this, but to me it is not fine.

I suppose the idea came from this paragraph in the linked post.

This metric is based around the number of drafts a user has saved before posting their answer. Stack Exchange systems automatically save a draft copy of a user’s post to a cache location several seconds after they stop typing, with no further user input necessary. In principle, if people are copying and pasting answers out of services like GPT, then they won’t save as many drafts as people who write answers within Stack Exchange. In practice, many users save few drafts routinely (for example, because some users copy and paste the answer in from a separate doc, or because they don’t stop writing until they’re ready to post), so it’s the ratio of large draft saves to small draft saves that actually lets us measure volume in practice.

Since this feature came far before the AI bandwagon I assume it was implemented to provide the ability to return to your incomplete post if you close the browser or navigate to a different page. I therefore expect that only the last draft is saved at any time. While the company may have temporarily stored the total number of draft and some other stats for their study, I sincerely hope they did not try to store the full draft history. Not only this would be super creepy and would probably violate GDPR in a thousand ways (you really think that you removed the picture with the PI before posting? Though luck, Stack saved a copy without telling you!), it would also at least quadruplicate the database space needed for each single post.

I seriously hope that what you are asking not only will be rejected (volunteers, no employee moderators have no right to see draft as far I am concerned) but it is not possible in the first place.

I don't see much need for this feature. Unless you love to see every spelling error I correct, every phrase I rewrite to feel less blunt, and every word I change to better convey my idea. You don't see any problem with this, but to me it is not fine.

I suppose the idea came from this paragraph in the linked post.

This metric is based around the number of drafts a user has saved before posting their answer. Stack Exchange systems automatically save a draft copy of a user’s post to a cache location several seconds after they stop typing, with no further user input necessary. In principle, if people are copying and pasting answers out of services like GPT, then they won’t save as many drafts as people who write answers within Stack Exchange. In practice, many users save few drafts routinely (for example, because some users copy and paste the answer in from a separate doc, or because they don’t stop writing until they’re ready to post), so it’s the ratio of large draft saves to small draft saves that actually lets us measure volume in practice.

Since this feature came far before the AI bandwagon, I assume it was implemented to provide the ability to return to your incomplete post if you close the browser or navigate to a different page. I therefore expect that only the last draft is saved at any time.

While the company may have temporarily stored the total number of drafts and some other stats for their study, I sincerely hope they did not try to store the full draft history. Not only would this be super creepy and would probably violate GDPR in a thousand ways (do you really think that you removed the picture with the PII before posting? Tough luck, Stack Exchange saved a copy without telling you!), it would also at least quadruple the database space needed for each single post.

I seriously hope that what you are asking not only will be rejected (volunteers, no employee moderators don't have any right to see draft as far I am concerned), but it is not possible in the first place.