Return to Answer

It's nice to see something written, but I have a serious question that I think needs to be addressed and would be a good place for a new Head of Product and Community to start:

I've been on the Stack Overflow network from all the way back when it was in private beta and have watched things evolve over the years as things scaled. While there were growing pains, the community had sorted out a fairly decent way of moderating things. While people are correct in that it was somewhat off putting to newcomers and a better way of integrating them into the community was need, the system also managed to keep high quality information on the internet as well.

Reflecting back upon the past six months to a year I get the impression that Stack Exchange, Inc started trying to dictate to the community how to operate. As I write this I even see a "Teresa Dietrich is a new contributor. Be nice, and check out our Code of Conduct." banner despite the fact that I have over 10,000 reputation and in theory should be an established member of the community. While a minor quibble, it it something that gives an impression that professional adults don't always care for.¹

Beyond the impression of trying to tell the community how to operate, I've also gotten the impression that Stack Exchange, Inc (SEI) just doesn't care. I seem to recall a comment by the Director of Public Q&A about Meta users being irrelevant because they could "fit in a New York City apartment" which not only contributes to the impression that SEI doesn't care, but that as an organization you are fairly condescending as well. Exacerbating this impression are comments a Community Evangelist² made about a "eureka moment" regarding Meta... when a Stack Overflow Meta user pointed out the role that Meta plays (with data) back in July 2019 almost six months before SEI had the same eureka moment. For extra irony the analysis links back to the question that has the user analysis as an answer without mentioning it. In the academic circles I travel in, a peer reviewer would rip someone apart for plagiarism for doing that.³

Perhaps more importantly, the direction the company has gone has lead me to recommend against using Stack Overflow for Teams or posting to the Developer Jobs site.⁴

It's nice to see something written, but I have a serious question that I think needs to be addressed and would be a good starting point for a new Head of Product and Community:

I've been on the Stack Overflow network from all the way back when it was in private beta and have watched things evolve over the years as things scaled. While there were growing pains, the community had sorted out a fairly decent way of moderating things. While people are correct in that it was somewhat off-putting to newcomers and a better way of integrating them into the community was needed, the system also managed to keep high-quality information on the internet as well.

Reflecting back upon the past six months to a year, I get the impression that Stack Exchange, Inc. started trying to dictate to the community how to operate. As I write this, I even see a "Teresa Dietrich is a new contributor. Be nice, and check out our Code of Conduct." banner despite the fact that I have over 10,000 reputation and, in theory, should be an established member of the community. While a minor quibble, it it something that gives an impression that professional adults don't always care for.¹

Beyond the impression of trying to tell the community how to operate, I've also gotten the impression that Stack Exchange, Inc. (SEI) just doesn't care. I seem to recall a comment by the Director of Public Q&A about Meta users being irrelevant because they could "fit in a New York City apartment" which not only contributes to the impression that SEI doesn't care, but that as an organization you are fairly condescending as well. Exacerbating this impression are comments a Community Evangelist² made about a "eureka moment" regarding Meta... when a Stack Overflow Meta user pointed out the role that Meta plays (with data) back in July 2019 almost six months before SEI had the same eureka moment. For extra irony the analysis links back to the question that has the user analysis as an answer without mentioning it. In the academic circles I travel in, a peer reviewer would rip someone apart for plagiarism for doing that.³

Perhaps more importantly, the direction the company has gone, has lead me to recommend against using Stack Overflow for Teams or posting to the Developer Jobs site.⁴

Beyond the impression of trying to tell the community how to operate, I've also gotten the impression that Stack Exchange, Inc (SEI) just doesn't care. I seem to recall a comment by the Director of Public Q&A about Meta users being irrelevant because they could "fit in a New York City apartment" which not only contributes to the impression that SEI doesn't care, but that as an organization you are fairly condescending as well. Exacerbating this impression are comments a Community Evangelist² made about a "eureka moment" regarding Meta... when a Stack Overflow Meta user pointed out the role that Meta plays (with data) back in July 2019 almost six months before SEI had the same eureka moment. For extra irony the analysis links back to the question that has the user analysis as an answer without mentioning it. In the academic circles I travel in, a peer reviewer would rip someone out for plagiarism for doing that.³

Beyond the impression of trying to tell the community how to operate, I've also gotten the impression that Stack Exchange, Inc (SEI) just doesn't care. I seem to recall a comment by the Director of Public Q&A about Meta users being irrelevant because they could "fit in a New York City apartment" which not only contributes to the impression that SEI doesn't care, but that as an organization you are fairly condescending as well. Exacerbating this impression are comments a Community Evangelist² made about a "eureka moment" regarding Meta... when a Stack Overflow Meta user pointed out the role that Meta plays (with data) back in July 2019 almost six months before SEI had the same eureka moment. For extra irony the analysis links back to the question that has the user analysis as an answer without mentioning it. In the academic circles I travel in, a peer reviewer would rip someone apart for plagiarism for doing that.³

Beyond the impression of trying to tell the community how to operate, I've also gotten the impression that Stack Exchange, Inc (SEI) just doesn't care. I seem to recall a comment by the Director of Public Q&A about Meta users being irrelevant because they could "fit in a New York City apartment" which not only contributes to the impression that SEI doesn't care, but that as an organization you are fairly condescending as well. Exacerbating this impression is comments a Community Evangelist² about an "eureka moment" regarding Meta... when a Stack Overflow Meta user pointed out the role that Meta plays (with data) back in July 2019 almost six months before SEI had the same eureka moment. For extra irony the analysis links back to the question that has the user analysis as an answer without mentioning it. In the academic circles I travel in, a peer reviewer would rip someone out for plagiarism for doing that.³

Beyond the impression of trying to tell the community how to operate, I've also gotten the impression that Stack Exchange, Inc (SEI) just doesn't care. I seem to recall a comment by the Director of Public Q&A about Meta users being irrelevant because they could "fit in a New York City apartment" which not only contributes to the impression that SEI doesn't care, but that as an organization you are fairly condescending as well. Exacerbating this impression are comments a Community Evangelist² made about a "eureka moment" regarding Meta... when a Stack Overflow Meta user pointed out the role that Meta plays (with data) back in July 2019 almost six months before SEI had the same eureka moment. For extra irony the analysis links back to the question that has the user analysis as an answer without mentioning it. In the academic circles I travel in, a peer reviewer would rip someone out for plagiarism for doing that.³