Timeline for What data about meta has eluded Stack Exchange until recently?
Current License: CC BY-SA 4.0
27 events
| when toggle format | what | by | license | comment | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Feb 21, 2020 at 1:32 | comment | added | DVK | I'll second a couple of above comments. Check against past data - I'm among the (probably large, and may be less vocal) group of people who fully or partially checked out of activity on main site(s) a while back, not just since September, but for similar reasons. I deliberately nearly stopped contributing to SO and later dramatically scaled down entire SE. And I'm probably one of top 1% of users or close to that band, by contributions. | |
| Feb 18, 2020 at 20:18 | comment | added | V2Blast | Thanks for communicating with us, Tim - your and Yaakov's answers clarify something that had been unclear until now. | |
| Feb 18, 2020 at 16:01 | comment | added | Sébastien Renauld | @TimPost That dataset was really, really good. We need more of those - thanks to you and Yaakov (who I've already thanked on another channel) for this! | |
| Feb 18, 2020 at 4:01 | comment | added | user50049 | One of our devs (actually, the one that had the eureka moment) will be chiming in soon folks. I don't have an ETA because they've got to take a lot of internal stuff and get it ready for display (although, not much of it is really all that seekrit, it's just hard to explain without some context). Anyway, they said they'd drop a line soon to get specific where I just wasn't sure enough about what I interpreted to really say. So there should be another answer soon. Hang tight :) | |
| Feb 17, 2020 at 21:56 | comment | added | NoDataDumpNoContribution | @user56reinstatemonica8 "We want to see incomplete ideas early like this, because that's the point it's possible to help improve them, before they're set in stone." Without details we hardly can improve anything. We don't know really what eluded them. I like this post, but I'm also convinced that it's not overly helpful. | |
| Feb 17, 2020 at 21:50 | comment | added | user56reinstatemonica8 | @SébastienRenauld but this post isn't "legalese/marketese language", it's sharing what can be shared from incomplete work in progress, which is a good thing and one of many things that has been desperately lacking recently. We want to see incomplete ideas early like this, because that's the point it's possible to help improve them, before they're set in stone. I understand the frustration and feel the same way, but please don't poison the well by lashing out at baby-steps in the right direction. | |
| Feb 17, 2020 at 21:48 | comment | added | NoDataDumpNoContribution | Seems like being active on a main site may result in being at least passively present on meta. | |
| Feb 17, 2020 at 20:27 | comment | added | Stevoisiak | Thank you for your answer. The communication is greatly appreciated. | |
| Feb 17, 2020 at 20:00 | comment | added | Tensibai | @Luuklag well, I reserve any judgment, but as is it sounds a "we should say something, whatever it is", and I'm tired of things looking good and never followed. At this point I fail to see any benefit, if it isn't followed by something concrete at the end of the month it'll just be worse. At this point a "we know we messed up, we're reviewing our position, more details to come at <date>" would be a far better approach, here there's nothing, no date, no idea what 'data' approach has been taken that had eluded them in the last 3 years (and that's not a critique of those who did the reports). | |
| Feb 17, 2020 at 19:45 | comment | added | John Omielan | @TimPost Thank you for your answer. One of the things that I, and others here, have been complaining about is that there's not enough communication from company staff to us. Although I would've preferred more specific & conclusive info, I appreciate that you made the effort to communicate to us what you currently know as best as you could. I trust that you, or somebody else, will continue to keep us informed with the best data available at the time. | |
| Feb 17, 2020 at 19:36 | comment | added | Luuklag | @Tensibai because they want to be up-front and proactive. They are up to something but want to understand exactly what that implies before writing down details, in order to be sure they are right. That's what I would do. Would you rather have no blog post at all about this? | |
| Feb 17, 2020 at 19:31 | comment | added | Culyx | It might be light on details, but it IS an answer; and the tone while vague seems to be "meta might have more impact than we initially thought". | |
| Feb 17, 2020 at 19:28 | comment | added | Bryan Krause | @Luuklag Agreed. Also, to me this reads as a completely appropriate response to looking at complexities in data of this type, and reflects a much more reasonable approach than throwing out some numbers to say: "oh, before we thought X% of users were on meta; now we realize its Y%" - that approach itself is the wrong one so I think it's misguided to demand more specifics when more specifics are not useful. Thanks Tim. | |
| Feb 17, 2020 at 19:27 | comment | added | Tensibai | @Luuklag the question this answer address is alrezdy raised by evasive wording of a blog post... That's cool to see more communication, but if it's for something which sounds like a marketing speech that's not what we're expecting. 5 why's step 1: why leaving the blog post unclear about the 'revelation' SE had? | |
| Feb 17, 2020 at 19:16 | comment | added | Luuklag | People, it's all about perspective here. Some of you claim Tim is being evasive, as he isn't sharing much facts. On the other hand Tim thought, let's be pro-active and show what we DO have right now, instead of waiting 6-8 time units untill things are set in stone. Lets just remember we can't have it both ways... | |
| Feb 17, 2020 at 19:15 | comment | added | Shog9 | Well, it was intuitive enough that I depended on it to do my job for 9 years, @anonymous. But different people have different intuitions... That's always the danger with data: if you're not careful, you cherry-pick the facts that reinforce your existing biases instead of looking for that which might explain what has been observed, or reveal what is unseen. | |
| Feb 17, 2020 at 19:11 | comment | added | Tensibai | @Tim then it does worry me a bit more, sadly, as it gives me a feeling the evasive tone has become a norm :/ Let's see how things evolve then. | |
| Feb 17, 2020 at 19:07 | comment | added | user50049 | @Tensibai I did not ask for approval of this post or show it to anyone prior to writing it. | |
| Feb 17, 2020 at 19:07 | comment | added | GhostCat | Folks that are heavily invested in Meta might not always show the same behaviors in how they use it ... until lately, I intended to do both. It is up to SE Inc. to convince that I want to seriously contribute to any main ever again ... | |
| Feb 17, 2020 at 19:06 | comment | added | user50049 | @Mithical Most reporting is quarterly and under perfectly normal circumstances, quarterly would make a lot of sense when we set meta engagement goals going forward. The last six months do skew things pretty considerably, but not so much that your previous activity would have made you less visible when all of 2019 is examined. If anything, you'd just fall in all categories, which isn't uncommon with a lot of folks that stayed logged in but didn't do much else pretty suddenly. It'll be months before that data normalizes again no matter what. | |
| Feb 17, 2020 at 19:05 | comment | added | Tensibai | @Tim with all due respect, this get a mitigated reception because it's as evasive as a lot of thing we did read from SE lately. I appreciate the effort, but I'm convinced between what you'd write and what is here on sight there's been veto on some paragraphs and push on some wordings... Feel free to prove me wrong, but the problem nowadays is not data, you have years already Analysed here ad nauseam, it's personal interaction and trust. "I want to believe" but it's hard... | |
| Feb 17, 2020 at 19:02 | comment | added | Sébastien Renauld | @TimPost Then we understand each other. I'm pretty sure I'm not the only one out there who'd appreciate concrete, real, fact-based communication as opposed the to evasive/legalese/marketese language that have soured communication channels for months. | |
| Feb 17, 2020 at 18:57 | comment | added | user50049 | @SébastienRenauld I appreciate your position. It's not my intent to be evasive, but to give you what I have, even if it's not much. That's better than deliberately not answering until "everything is clear" (which objectively might never happen), and answering is better than crickets. If I had more solid info I'd provide it (and I imagine it will be provided once we're more sure of a bunch of things). | |
| Feb 17, 2020 at 18:52 | comment | added | Sébastien Renauld | Downvoted - not really an answer, or at the very least an extremely evasive one. | |
| Feb 17, 2020 at 18:49 | comment | added | Shog9 | Tl; Dr: the town council meetings are boring and poorly-attended, but turns out the entire Chamber of Commerce membership reads the minutes. | |
| Feb 17, 2020 at 18:37 | comment | added | Mithical | "...There are groups of a few hundred people on both MSE and MSO that essentially show the kind of engagement that we'd normally see on the main site, without much activity on the main site..." - How are you defining "main site" the second time here? Just SO? Or any site on the network? Also, what time frame for engagement are you taking into account? If I've largely paused activity on main sites for a few months yet still partake in meta, in what category would I fall? | |
| Feb 17, 2020 at 18:31 | history | answered | user50049 | CC BY-SA 4.0 |