Answerers jumping the gun

April 21, 2006 5:31 PM

While it's very nice to, for once, see an answer-poster own up to

"Crap. I posted my brilliant secret before reading the whole post. Really sorry.
I guess I got caught up a, "Holy crap I can contribute trip". Really, really sorry, and I have nothing useful to say.
Dammit."

there are another 10⁶ times that I've seen answerers who never realized that the [mi] should have forestalled their answers.
Any ideas? Perhaps, including a "Did you read the [more inside] at the top of the page?" reminder?
posted by Aknaton to Etiquette/Policy at 5:31 PM (15 comments total)

At this rate, we're going to have to wade through six or seven pages of reminders to be nice and stay on topic and read the FAQ and not self-link and make sure to spellcheck and read the [mi] and put the cat out and....

Answers that don't take the [more inside] into account should be flagged as seems appropriate; as we've seen, they're already shouted down by ten or eleven subsequent posters, all of whom have read the [mi] but seem to have missed the nine or ten people before them who already rapped the offender's knuckles.

I agree that it's a common slip-up, but I don't know if yet another boilerplate sentence is the solution.
posted by Zozo at 5:38 PM on April 21, 2006

There should also be a reminder when submitting to MeTa to link to the thread(s) you're referring to.
posted by nomad at 6:03 PM on April 21, 2006

There should also be a reminder when submitting to MeTa to link to the thread(s) you're referring to.

All 10⁶ of them?
posted by stefanie at 6:25 PM on April 21, 2006

There should also be a reminder when submitting to MeTa to link to the thread(s) you're referring to.

Do you really need to see some of the million examples where this has happened? Or did you just want to see the one, magic, special case where the answerer figured out they'd behaved stupidly? 'Cause if the latter, I quite intentionally didn't link, since they've done penance enough.

On preview: thank you, stefanie.
posted by Aknaton at 6:27 PM on April 21, 2006

The more reminders you have, the less they function. Think about EULAs. If the EULA is one line long, people will read the EULA before clicking the "Yes, I have read and understood the terms and conditions". If it is 10 pages, people will not read the EULA, yet will click the "Yes, I have read and understood the terms and conditions" anyway.

As Zozo said, "I agree that it's a common slip-up, but I don't know if yet another boilerplate sentence is the solution."
posted by Bugbread at 6:37 PM on April 21, 2006

People notice a reminder precisely once (if that), and then never see it again, even if it's right in front of them all the damn time.
posted by stavrosthewonderchicken at 6:50 PM on April 21, 2006

There will always be people who miss questions on the SAT because they didn't read the directions, no matter how many times the proctor repeats himself. You can't solve some problems.
posted by cribcage at 6:54 PM on April 21, 2006

I think the "post a link to what you're discussing" comment meant they wanted to see the good example, not the million counter-examples.
posted by allen.spaulding at 7:07 PM on April 21, 2006

How about summarily executing repeat offenders?
posted by keswick at 7:08 PM on April 21, 2006

I think all Metafilter users should be polled on their favourite Metafiltarian, and only the top 12 Metafilter users be allowed to post to the front page.
posted by fire&wings at 7:25 PM on April 21, 2006

It might be more helpful to have the text of the question itself, including the [more inside] text, repeated in a small font to the right of the posting form. Not only would it serve as a reminder to read the whole question, but it would be quite convenient to be able to refer to or quote the question without having to scroll back up.
posted by staggernation at 9:12 PM on April 21, 2006

There's a whole page of text there, and a user isn't reading it. Do you think if we put more text there that reminded them to read the actual content, they'd read the reminder?

Some people get carried away. Such is life.
posted by blacklite at 10:05 PM on April 21, 2006

These features... they creep.

Can't we just talk about cool stuff on the internets?
posted by cedar at 10:18 PM on April 21, 2006

I think stavros hit it. I wish I knew a better answer than that, especially since I've been guilty myself of thinking reminders everywhere are the way to go, but he's totally right. it's more like a "no sitting on library steps" sign than a "men's room" sign. If they're not looking for the information it provides, then they'll only notice it the once.
posted by shmegegge at 12:56 AM on April 22, 2006

Aknaton writes "Or did you just want to see the one, magic, special case where the answerer figured out they'd behaved stupidly?"

It's nice, but it's not that magical. I've seen it a number of times where the poster realized that they did not give the question enough of look-see and posted in error. The sentiment is nice, but believing that this has been the only time this has happened is wrong. People are posting answers, for free, and usually out of the goodness of their hearts. Putting-up further roadblocks to that function will only make would-be posters back away from the keyboard.

Now you could argue that value, but for every 10 bad answers you could afford to lose, they'll be one that would have redeemed them all.
posted by purephase at 7:13 AM on April 22, 2006