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I've just noticed that a question I spent a great deal of time researching and refining has become a "Community Wiki". Why does this happen? It seems designed to dissuade people from improving their answers :(

Is there anything that can be done with my particular question?

https://stackoverflow.com/a/5797523/199700

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  • "added 32 characters in body; [made Community Wiki by Django Reinhardt editing at least 10 times]" <- Flag for moderator attention and ask to remove the CW status.
    – Daniel Fischer
    Commented Apr 29, 2013 at 15:28
  • @TinSoldiersAndNixonsComin' Thank you!
    – Django Reinhardt
    Commented Apr 29, 2013 at 15:28
  • See this post: What Are Communitity Wiki Posts If a question / answer gets edited a lot then it automatically becomes a CW
    – JonW
    Commented Apr 29, 2013 at 15:28
  • It gets auto wikied after 12 edits. You did 10 edits in the first 36 hours of its existence.
    – Martin Smith
    Commented Apr 29, 2013 at 15:29
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    It is to discourage people from bumping the question/answer to the front page by trivial edits. If you feel that your edits are genuinely improving the question, flag it for moderator attention.
    – Antony
    Commented Apr 29, 2013 at 15:30
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    So. Much. Bold.
    – Richard J. Ross III
    Commented Apr 29, 2013 at 15:35
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    @RichardJ.RossIII Bold means it's important!!
    – Bart
    Commented Apr 29, 2013 at 15:35
  • I'm curious. Would flagging and asking for removal of CW-status be valid for questions with excessive editing, as well?
    – J. Steen
    Commented Apr 29, 2013 at 15:54
  • @J.Steen you can always flag it and ask, but it doesn't mean a mod is going to remove the CW-status. Usually depends on their assessment of the edits and if they were legit edits to fix the post or update the post, vs minor edits to bump the question.
    – psubsee2003
    Commented Apr 29, 2013 at 15:59
  • @psubsee2003 Well. It's quite an old question that I've answered, that turned into CW through excessive editing. I was merely curious and probably won't flag, even if I'm losing out on 300 rep. =)
    – J. Steen
    Commented Apr 29, 2013 at 16:02
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    @Bart I'm someone who tends to edit like crazy -- rather than convert to CW, why doesn't the system just stop bumping the question after 12 edits? Wouldn't that solve everything?
    – Django Reinhardt
    Commented Apr 29, 2013 at 16:04
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    @DjangoReinhardt without bumping, someone could edit some posts as will, and no one will see the edit unless they happen to look at the question. Bumping assures that it will show up on the front page so someone will see it. It's there to prevent people from editing in spam or vandalizing posts.
    – psubsee2003
    Commented Apr 29, 2013 at 16:05
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    @psubsee2003 Questions are bumped to try and prevent spam... REALLY?
    – Django Reinhardt
    Commented Apr 29, 2013 at 16:06
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    @DjangoReinhardt: Well yes, it makes good sense. I could go and find a tag that hasn't had much activity on it for a while and just edit all the questions to say "Visit example.com to get some great deals on new Jordan Shoes!!!" and if these posts didn't get bumped to the front page then this vandalism wouldn't get noticed for quite a while.
    – JonW
    Commented Apr 29, 2013 at 16:25
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    That was me who removed the auto-wiki for you btw.
    – BoltClock's a Unicorn
    Commented Apr 29, 2013 at 16:36

1 Answer 1

Reset to default
4

One reason why a post can turn into community wiki is

The post has been edited ten (10) times by the original owner.

For the others see What are community wiki posts

You can see that in your revision history:

made Community Wiki by Django Reinhardt editing at least 10 times

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  • 2
    Though the text says "at least 10" it didn't actually get wikied until revison 12 in the history
    – Martin Smith
    Commented Apr 29, 2013 at 15:31
  • Note for any new readers stumbling across this old Q&A: the automatic conversion of posts to community wiki due to too many edits, as described here, was removed in 2014. The only ways in which a question or an answer can now become a community wiki are described in the FAQ.
    – Ilmari Karonen
    Commented Aug 19, 2021 at 9:09

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