2

Have I misunderstood the deletion criteria for Area 51? I just ran into my 3 per day limit, and I feel like I've barely begun browsing site proposals. If I have understood correctly, can we have more deletion votes?

For example, aren't unreal and clearly argumentative questions just so completely inappropriate that we shouldn't even be considering them?

Should dupes be deleted, or just comment and get the author to delete? (What if the author disagrees?)


Conversely, should it take more deletion votes to eliminate a question? Specifically, how should deletion votes differ from Mehvotes? Should the votes to delete be determined by the number of yes/no votes? This could prevent a valuable example question from being (irrevocably) deleted.

Presumably, you wouldn't vote either yes or no if you think the question shouldn't have been proposed in the first place, and a high number of votes (especially if it's controversial) should prevent deletion.

4
  • I voted for deletion on all but the "unreal" one (already deleted?)
    – user102937
    Commented Jun 2, 2010 at 20:21
  • I should've saved the question texts to include in this question, but unreal was a nonsensical question (would instantly be closed as NARQ), similarly for S&A, while the dupe was posted by the same person(?!) and just a slight variation on the same theme. (A left a comment with link+explanation on the dupe.)
    – Gnome
    Commented Jun 2, 2010 at 20:24
  • FWIW, the previous revision of the S&A one was very much unreal...
    – Shog9
    Commented Jun 2, 2010 at 20:58
  • Note: This is now irrelevant because the voting system has changed (the "not a good example" vote). Voting to close as too localized.
    – Gnome
    Commented Jun 5, 2010 at 13:00

2 Answers 2

1

Make it 10.....

2
  • 1
    I know you answered in good faith, but just the number without reasoning and just that answer without addressing any of the other concerns (this is also tagged [discussion]) make this not a real answer. (Fix it and I'll reverse my downvote.)
    – Gnome
    Commented Jun 2, 2010 at 21:53
  • +1 for the short answer. Commented Jun 5, 2010 at 0:16
0

Unreal and S&A questions will be asked. I mean, just look at SO - you'd think "programming questions" is pretty straight forward, but plenty of people still show up looking for career advice, social manipulation, or just plain old idle entertainment...

I never would have expected a clearly S&A question soliciting individual opinions on "the worst programming language" to survive, much less thrive... but I would have been wrong.

If I understand correctly, this phase is intended to gauge interest and hone the site's purpose. You might think you can look at a question title and immediately recognize whether or not it would be appropriate or not, but that's why you get to vote along with everyone else. Is this blatantly S&A? Yes. But so is this - and it has 4 "yes" votes.

Better to hash this out in the planning phase than pretend all your eventual users will be as clear-headed as you consider yourself to be... Only to find yourself building an ad-hock bullet list of exclusions later on.

15
  • I should stress the Argumentative part of S&A. It was clearly picking a fight and worded that way. Subjective isn't necessarily a problem for me. "Is link farming effective?" is S without being A.
    – Gnome
    Commented Jun 2, 2010 at 20:29
  • Unreal and argumentative questions will be asked, but they will be closed instantly. Some may be deleted (as spam or offensive) even before they get closed. Do we need to give those questions as examples too?
    – Gnome
    Commented Jun 2, 2010 at 20:32
  • @The Cat: if you consider link farming a "white hat" technique maybe. Otherwise, it violates the very premise of the site! Again, I'm being blatantly inappropriate and it shows, but don't think that'll stop folks from sincerely posting questions that are just as inappropriate, and then complaining bitterly as they're closed/deleted.
    – Shog9
    Commented Jun 2, 2010 at 20:36
  • Going back to SO as an example... Before the site was launched, I didn't expect to see it filled with lengthy discussions, list questions, career questions, etc. - the very idea would have seemed laughable. Hashing that out after the site went live created a lot of unnecessary noise and bad feelings though, as others believed just as strongly that they should be allowed. And "closed instantly" doesn't mean it won't be re-opened...
    – Shog9
    Commented Jun 2, 2010 at 20:39
  • If link farming is black hat, then it's off-topic. It's still not argumentative. I changed S&A to argumentative in my question because, even though I borrowed the close reason's title, it was the argumentative tone that weighted your regex question. Had you asked "Is X or Y better?" I would not have seen it that way.
    – Gnome
    Commented Jun 2, 2010 at 20:46
  • @The Cat: even with that title, it still would have been argumentative. Perhaps not blatantly so, but argumentative none the less - there's simply no way to ask an open-ended question like that without it (see the example in my last comment - question was asked very politely, but fat lot of good it did for the answers...)! Now, something like, "Should I use RE or JQ for selectively removing list items from a HTML page?" could conceivably be answered with a minimal amount of controversy...
    – Shog9
    Commented Jun 2, 2010 at 20:51
  • I agree that "Is X or Y better?" is an extremely poor question, but it's more or less equivalent to the argumentative question except no argumentative tone---and that makes all the difference.
    – Gnome
    Commented Jun 2, 2010 at 21:12
  • @The Cat: ...all the difference to be had. Personally, I still consider "Please, kind sirs, do tell me, should tabs or spaces be used for indentation?" to be an argumentative question - the subject trumps the wording. Argumentative wording just makes it easier to identify...
    – Shog9
    Commented Jun 2, 2010 at 21:21
  • I have hopefully addressed, in the update just now, your concern about some questions getting deleted that shouldn't. -- On an earlier point, one advantage of having the existing sites (esp. SO) is that we have already done that hashing out, and most of those on AFO know the conflict and the results.
    – Gnome
    Commented Jun 2, 2010 at 21:22
  • @The Cat: at some point, I would expect AFO to start bringing in people that aren't already part of S[OFU]. I assume that's the purpose of that nag-box you get when you follow a proposal. But regardless, my point remains: people still ask off-topic, argumentative, pointless crap on SO, and we're hardly of one mind - even on Meta - as to what should be allowed. Even limited to three delete votes, you didn't have any trouble getting rid of both the examples you linked to above - even as the proposal itself struggles to gain any real attention. I don't see the need for more delete votes...
    – Shog9
    Commented Jun 2, 2010 at 21:31
  • The nag-box also gives you a link with a referral code. I haven't seen another way to get that code, but I haven't looked too hard. -- I didn't have trouble because I posted them on Meta when AFO is a hot topic. The others I voted to delete (I didn't vote on all of the above) are probably still there and I could probably find more without too much effort.
    – Gnome
    Commented Jun 2, 2010 at 21:48
  • @The Cat: you should probably link to them then, as your original examples are gone... Still, my point is that the RegEx proposal is getting barely any attention - it's not fair to complain that stuff isn't getting deleted there. Realistically, you probably shouldn't have wasted your delete votes on that proposal at all, as they'd have done more good on a more popular proposal... But that's your choice.
    – Shog9
    Commented Jun 2, 2010 at 21:59
  • I wasn't trying to pick on you specifically, I just had that link handy and it is a good example of an argumentative/S&A question. The two others I voted to delete are gone in browser history. -- Re the regex proprosal: I think it's just a bad proposal. I'm not sure how to say a proposal is bad, except comments (I upvoted what was there) and not following it. Perhaps I shouldn't have used a delete vote there (which I did because I thought the question was bad, not to reflect on the proposal), but it didn't occur to me they were limited to 3 at the time.
    – Gnome
    Commented Jun 2, 2010 at 22:07
  • Ah, see... I indicated my disapproval by posting a bad question... ;-)
    – Shog9
    Commented Jun 2, 2010 at 22:28
  • I just now realized I answered your question about open-ended example questions as one of the very first things I did at AFO: they could be worth posting.
    – Gnome
    Commented Jun 3, 2010 at 0:04

You must log in to answer this question.