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Rev

9

-1 for who don't know how to use their votes properly. I'm fairly certain I know how to use my votes, thank you. That I chose to use a few on a question that will likely end up being closed is my business. That question added a bit of interesting reading to what's normally a dreary morning spent waiting for the coffee to get my brain up to speed, and that's good enough for me, and 107 other users.
– Adam Rackis
Commented Jul 24, 2013 at 16:16
25

@AdamRackis: There's no way that question is worth that many upvotes.
– user102937
Commented Jul 24, 2013 at 16:18
7

@Robert, probably true by most sensible criteria. But so long as SE let's users vote on questions as they choose, then interesting ones like this will always get more votes than they "deserve." People need to stop complaining about vote inflation in cases like this: it's baked right into the system
– Adam Rackis
Commented Jul 24, 2013 at 16:19
7

it's baked alright.
– Old Checkmark
Commented Jul 24, 2013 at 16:21
17

@AdamRackis You're entitled to use your votes however you see fit, but that doesn't mean voting choices can't be criticised. The goal is to index stuff by its value with regards to the site scope, not to index stuff by how entertaining one personally found it (although again, you're entirely free to vote as you see fit).
– user200500
Commented Jul 24, 2013 at 16:23
4

@Asad - that's a fair criticism. If this question somehow doesn't get closed, I wish the system had a way to de-list edge case questions like this from the "top lists" for the reason you state.
– Adam Rackis
Commented Jul 24, 2013 at 16:31
1

@dystroy: A banner was applied to the socks question at one point: «Welcome, Redditors! We're looking for answers that provide serious, practical solutions to the problem stated. If you'd prefer to post a joke or launch a tangential discussion, please do so on the corresponding Reddit thread.», although it was mostly addressed at answerers (there are many deleted answers at that question).
– jscs
Commented Jul 24, 2013 at 18:52
1

@RexKerr: Nevertheless, the question is structured in such a way that the number of possibly correct algorithms is unbounded. To answer your question, we don't generally evaluate the answers to determine a question's veracity for closing purposes.
– user102937
Commented Jul 24, 2013 at 19:49
2

@RobertHarvey - Does that mean that sorting questions are off-topic because there are exponentially many possible O(n log n) sorting algorithms in the length of the list? I don't think it matters if theoretically there are a large number of possible algorithms; Kolmogorov complexity is going to sink almost all of those as unworkable. A much more telling criticism is that this problem can be equally well solved by a "business method"--Stack Overflow is not for social solutions to technical problems. (Those should go on e.g. Workplace.)
– Rex Kerr
Commented Jul 24, 2013 at 19:54
1

@RexKerr: That's a straw-man. While there might be many possible sorting algorithms, it is likely that there are only one or two that satisfy an OP's particular requirements.
– user102937
Commented Jul 24, 2013 at 19:58
3

@RobertHarvey - If you exclude the social engineering solutions, that is also true here. There are really only two classes of solution here (as far as I know): biased lotteries and random streams with filters. Within each of these solutions, there are very few that aren't absurdly over-complicated given the tools that programmers commonly have in hand. There are lots of solutions that don't work, but not so many that meet the three stated criteria.
– Rex Kerr
Commented Jul 24, 2013 at 20:11
10

Ugh. This attitude limits Stack Overflow to a debugging service. That's hundreds of thousands of people's effort to build a useful resource on programming problems down the drain. Why bother with a questions and answers site? A forum would be better suited for a debugging service.
– Gilles 'SO- stop being evil'
Commented Jul 24, 2013 at 20:28
3

I dare say I'm with @Gilles on this one. For all I know, more than half of my contributions to the site (in terms of questions and answers) should have been closed instead simply because the questions aren't looking to solve a problem with existing code. I always refer to this question on the types of questions I find myself asking and answering most often.
– BoltClock's a Unicorn
Commented Jul 25, 2013 at 3:42
8

To be fair, this stupid meta thread attracted a lot more whining, flailing, and dire warnings of Stack Overflow's imminent demise under a deluge of "bike shed" questions than the "croissant question" ever did. If people had just let this silly question have its 15 minutes of fame, most of us probably would never have ever seen it, let alone cared.
– Adam Rackis
Commented Jul 25, 2013 at 19:22
2

sort of ironic to see objections against too much attention to the meta question which is, in turn, related to questions receiving too much attention from collider
– gnat
Commented Jul 30, 2013 at 15:53

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