Discouraging w3schools as a resource

Question

I want to know how to deal with this.

According to w3fools

We feel, though, that W3Schools is harming the community with inaccurate information. Like any other authoritative educational resource, W3Schools should both hold itself to, and be held to, the highest standards.
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W3Schools.com is not affiliated with the W3C in any way. Members of the W3C have asked W3Schools to explicitly disavow any connection in the past, and they have refused to do so.

So if this is not a good resource should we still allow it here ?

In terms of providing good answers if one were to recommend w3schools and information given there is inaccurate then the OP (who asked for the advice in the first place) would come back with more questions because he/she learnt the wrong principles for web development. Which is good for us as a Q&A more questions (because we rock at Q&A), but bad because the first time around we should not have even recommended w3schools. _{(<--misleading line, I just mean that it is always great to help answer questions, I misstepped what I was trying to convey and created confusion with the previous statement).}

I am sure in the years to come w3schools will have a change of heart and provide proper content, but for now is there anything that can be done to prevent giving out bad resources like w3schools.

Or would this be seen as bias towards what a person can and cannot learn ?

If it is would it not be for the greater good to help a user not go down the path of bad practice ?

Answer 1

So if this is not a good resource should we still allow it here ?

Yes, we should still allow it here.

When you give an answer on Stack Overflow you don't just link out to another site and say "all the answers are over there." You give a complete answer with a link for support. If specific pages on w3schools aren't accurate, just don't link to those specific pages for reference. Any correct information on w3schools (and I don't see a number on w3fools anywhere saying what percent is incorrect) should still serve as a perfectly fine example.

In short, we should be thinking for ourselves when deciding what specific page is a good reference, not relying on a blanket statement made by a 3rd party.

Answer 2

The voting system is specifically in place to handle cases where someone is providing misleading or incorrect answers because they are citing an unreliable resource or otherwise. Down-vote answers you think are not useful. Leave a comment explaining why.

Why isn't this enough?

Answer 3

I agree with you in principle (kind of, but probably not in the way you think), but it just doesn't work in practice. What you're suggesting is that Stack Overflow institute a policy that says, "One may link only to content which we ourselves have deemed appropriate." This is bad. Something like this could very well be the death knell for Stack Overflow as a community.

• Who decides which content is appropriate for linking?
• Who maintains that list?
• What is the governance of that list?
• Is it difficult to add to it?
• Is it difficult to remove from it?

The only way to win is not to play. As @Mark Trapp stated, the voting system takes care of this. I have even linked to W3Schools in answers of my own (many moons ago), and the comments/votes corrected me. The system, as currently designed, self-corrected. It's not perfect, primarily because many questions just don't get enough attention to get a large enough sample of contributors. But it works very well when compared to, well, innumerable other aggregators of developer knowledge.

And another thing...

In terms of providing good answers if one were to recommend w3schools and information given there is inaccurate then the OP (who asked for the advice in the first place) would come back with more questions because he/she learnt the wrong principles for web development. Which is good for us as a Q&A more questions (because we rock at Q&A), but bad because the first time around we should not have even recommended w3schools.

I completely disagree with a point you made here. It is in no way in the best interests of Stack Overflow to provide content that's just bad enough to get people to keep coming back for more.

First of all, coming back for more isn't really a motivation. Sure, we like to foster a community here. But what you imply is a model for roping in customers. We don't have customers. Not like that, anyway. And we don't want to apply a kind of vendor lock-in model to try to retain users.

Second, people most definitely won't keep coming back if they can't get really good information and expertise here. That kind of vendor lock-in model incites content providers (people answering questions) to hold back and not provide top-notch content. This is entirely against what Stack Overflow actually does foster and provide, which is the best content we can manage to provide. (Well, we try anyway.)

It took the site a few years to reach 1M questions. It took us a few months to reach 1.5M questions. By numbers alone, the current model works quite well. We don't need tricky marketing tactics to compete with anybody.

Answer 4

So if this is not a good resource should we still allow it here ?

It should not be banned.

Downvotes reglement such postings quite well. But that has recently become a bit of an inside joke, and usually quite an unpleasant surprise for the unsuspecting noob.

Ideally there should be a soft ban, an alert() when posting answers with w3schools links. Practically that's not a big enough issue to warrant UI garbage or any development time.

Boring old commenting and pointing out the flaws is sufficient. Like Bill-the-Lizard said, there are even some pages on w3schools that are factually correct. It would just be nice if people wouldn't cast that many unwarranted downvotes at once (or without checking if the linked page is really of the harmful kind). Again commenting helps most I'd think.

The only reason to downvote would be if the w3schools link is pretty much the whole answer. Single-line answers (what they mostly are) should be comments in any case. (OTOH few moderators actually react to flagging regarding that, so..?)