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I just checked the vandalism flag within the 10k tools and found:

enter image description here

What am I supposed to do about these flags? As far as I can tell, I can't even see the deleted comments, so I have no clue how to proceed with these flags.

The FAQ and other questions talk about deletion of own posts, not comments.

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  • 5
    What constitutes vandalism of own comments? Deleting them? Who cares?
    – Bart
    Feb 19, 2013 at 21:56
  • You could let a mod deal with this, since they can actually see the comments. This seems like a trivial flag, so I would lean towards disagree.
    – user200500
    Feb 19, 2013 at 21:57
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    This looks like one of those things that should just be excluded from the 10k queue. It's not like you can do anything about comment vandalism or multiple deletions
    – ben is uǝq backwards
    Feb 19, 2013 at 22:11
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    I would also be interested in reading an answer to this question.
    – Bill the Lizard
    Feb 19, 2013 at 22:25
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    You mean you don't know @Bill... and you don't know anyone who does know? Just dump it from the mod queue as well then!
    – ben is uǝq backwards
    Feb 19, 2013 at 22:30
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    Complain on Meta until they remove the feature. Unlike vandalism of own posts this is quite useless
    – Ben Brocka
    Feb 19, 2013 at 22:30
  • @benisuǝqbackwards These always confuse me because I skim over the "comment" part of the mod message and expect to see deleted posts. I guess I do know someone who knows what to do with these, though (see Anna Lear's answer below).
    – Bill the Lizard
    Feb 20, 2013 at 1:48

2 Answers 2

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That's a fantastic question... I'm not sure there's much point to this flag myself, nor have I seen it before. (Or at least I don't recall seeing it before.)

Moderators can't restore comments, so there's not much to do about the deletions themselves. The only thing to do that I can think of that could be done in response is checking to see if there are broken comment "threads" left behind as a result and cleaning them up if needed.

Shog9 and I looked at a bunch of deleted comments, users who deleted them, and the circumstances of the deletions (e.g. does deleting a bunch of comments likely point to a rage-quit in progress?), and we're gonna make some changes to how this flag works. It's only going to be raised when a user deletes old upvoted comments on 20 posts, and we're not going to show it in the 10k flag queue.

The guidance of handling it expands a bit: check the threads left behind (within reason, since there will be 20 of them), but also keep an eye out on somebody trying to take their ball and go home by deleting actually valuable and informative comments.

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  • Also, why in the world is the flag for deletion of comments by user 1639625 appearing on Kostek's (user 1778101) question? There were no deleted comments by tobias_k (user 1639625) on that question, just a normal comment. I was really confused by these when I saw them.
    – Brad Larson
    Feb 19, 2013 at 22:54
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    I guess the flag is attached to an existing comment of the user in question, like the vandalism of own post flag is attached to a non-deleted post, @Brad.
    – Daniel Fischer
    Feb 19, 2013 at 23:22
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The second user account 756519 in the screenshot is my user account on SO. Personally, I do not like leaving comments.

This is what I do:

  • I leave a comment to get more information from OP, usually on the questions.

  • If it is a question, I request OP to edit question with additional information but usually most of them are new and they post the code in the comments. I usually request them not to leave comments but not all users listen to what you request them to do.

  • Anyways, once the necessary information is added. I delete my comments so others do not have to scroll down bunch of useless text that had already been added to the question to make it more clear.

  • If someone comments on my answer, I update my answer and leave them a note stating that answer has been updated. Then, I delete my comments.

I never knew that my actions were termed as vandalism. I apologize for that. I feel that comments are noise. That's my personal opinion. I could be definitely wrong. I always feel that the questions or answers should be made more clearer than adding unnecessary comments.

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    No, there's no vandalism, your comment workflow is perfect. The flag says "possible vandalism", it's just a signal that something might be wrong (and it's a stupid flag anyway).
    – yannis
    Feb 19, 2013 at 23:36
  • Incidentally, under the new criteria Anna outlines in her post you would still have triggered this once (back in November when you deleted 23 up-voted comments in one day). But under normal circumstances, cleaning up after yourself shouldn't be restricted or discouraged... So, thanks for being conscientious!
    – Shog9
    Feb 20, 2013 at 1:24
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    That... Was a pretty good illustration of how much you hate comments... ;-)
    – Shog9
    Feb 20, 2013 at 1:42
  • I love this. So much. (Though, on meta comments could have more of a reason for staying around than on SO where the Q and the A are the only things that matter.)
    – J. Steen
    Feb 20, 2013 at 8:42

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