Maybe people just got better
The Fall of Stack Overflow
231–240 of 808 posts
Re: The Fall of Stack Overflow
#232I think the problem is google losing the fight with spammers. It's being a while for me that I have to put "stackoverflow" in the search query to avoid sites with scraped content
I think we're rapidly approaching a point where any content that come with ads is suspect. The fact that only Wikipedia has managed to largely escape deterioration (or as some call it, "enshitification") is testament to this. A search engine that can selectively search non-sponsored content or soft-paywalled content would be potentially quite popular. However, monetising such a service without ads will be a challenge.
Re: The Fall of Stack Overflow
#233This is 100% because of ChatGPT but the problem is that ChatGPT got all its information from StackOverflow... That means fewer people contributing to SO which means ChatGPT will deteriorate and people won't know why.
Re: The Fall of Stack Overflow
#234Earlier quoted context omitted.
here’s a classic SO thread: OP: “how can I accomplish X doing Y?” top voted response: “I wouldnt do X by Y. Instead, I’d consider Z. It’ll do everything X by Y would do, plus these other things.” buried sub comment to top voted response: “that’s not what he asked, to do X by Y (exact solution provided)” then 10 comments blasting the guy who actually answered the question for not doing it the way the top voted answer…
The thing is that oftentimes people who want to do 'X by Y' are actually asking how to accomplish Q. They think 'X by Y' is the solution and get hit by a roadblock, not knowing that it will not help them and they are wasting time. This is called the XY problem and is extremely common on tech related forums and mailing lists. * https://xyproblem.info/
My assumption whenever I see that behaviour in a response is that the responder simply does not know the answer to the question asked.
It’s fine, I think, to answer a question and then suggest a better method. It’s presumptuous in the extreme to dismiss a question with some pseudoacademic neologism.
Re: The Fall of Stack Overflow
#235Every time I posted on SO(or other SE sites) I always have to clarify my question with something like "I know it's probably not good idea to do A, and I understand B could be a better solution, but in my specific situation I really want to do A." Then people will still try to close my question because it's a duplicate of B.
I've literally included the search terms I used to ensure it wasn't a duplicate. Other times ice explained why this is clearly not a duplicate . Nope. Closed for being a duplicate.
Re: The Fall of Stack Overflow
#236I think the problem is google losing the fight with spammers. It's being a while for me that I have to put "stackoverflow" in the search query to avoid sites with scraped content
Could it be that Google prefers their own AI-provided answers over SO?
Those answers are >50% total junk though.
Re: The Fall of Stack Overflow
#237The absolute "best" answers are snarky that this problem is not applicable because they would be Facebook in scale or something if they had this problem. The person answering like that can do this because they've got lots of "Karma" and get tons of upvotes because other people want to feel superior to the one asking the questions. And the question or answer doesn't get removed, even when reported.
Stopped being active then. That was a few years ago.
Re: The Fall of Stack Overflow
#238Maybe people just got better
Thanks, I needed a laugh with my morning coffee.
Re: The Fall of Stack Overflow
#239they moderated themselves out of relevancy
Re: The Fall of Stack Overflow
#240I left SO because I was downvoted to oblivion for an answer that took me 2 minutes to write - but I had answered a similar question several years before (which I actually didn't remember). Searching for my own answer would have taken way more time than it took to write a new one.
When I pointed out that it's not the responsibility of the one answering to search for dupes, but for the one asking, I was told that I should still invest the time or otherwise don't answer at all.