Well, the question says it all. To add to the question:

Should there be no mercy shown to the first time users at all? Most people have their first question downvoted on this site. The trend is common across all the Stack Exchange sites.

Can not there be a system where if a user asks a question that should belong to another Stack Exchange site, it is moved to another site without penalising the user?

Having your question closed is one thing, but taking away the ability to ask questions is very wrong according to me.


See, this is exactly the problem. I use Stack Overflow quite regularly, and I was expecting downvotes to a question like this. May be it is not without reasons. This is possibly a duplicate. But if I were a new guy and this happened to me I might just decide to never come back to the site. And if I were a really good programmer with a lot of knowledge the site might have lost a valuable member.

The fact that the users are presented text telling them how the site works and checkbox that says I have read this stuff. This is like the End User License Agreement that no one reads. People are in a hurry most of the time.

Update 2

What is the logic on meta for downvoting? I can come up with two reasons

  1. The question has been asked already. The question is not a duplicate of the other question. Really. The other question is 'why has stack overflow become negative off late?' I agree that the other question's answers might answer my question as well. But my question and the other question are different. Clearly there is no reason to downvote and close this question. An answer with a link to the other question should have been the way to go if this was a duplicate question.

  2. Stack Overflow users aggressively discourage discussions when they see opinions that are different from their own. This seems to be the case here. I asked this question with getting some discussion done on my opinion. I am okay if the community disagrees with me. But downvoting and silencing any further discussion by closing the question is sad IMHO.

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    No mercy! It won't help for the long term development of SO. – πάντα ῥεῖ Nov 18 '14 at 11:41
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    But if no new people come in, there might not be a long term for SO – Ranjith Ramachandra Nov 18 '14 at 11:41
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    We need to triage from the beginning though. – πάντα ῥεῖ Nov 18 '14 at 11:42
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    related: meta.stackoverflow.com/questions/268006/… – bummi Nov 18 '14 at 11:42
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    @shortfellow "But if no new people come in ..." There's a big enough percentage surviving the process, having proven to show enough intelligence how to ask or answer here. These are the few SE is interested in participating. – πάντα ῥεῖ Nov 18 '14 at 11:52
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    It's not just SO (which I know it's not a forum btw) but look at every forum you've ever seen or been a part of back to time immemorial. There is always a sticky at the top of telling new users to read about the rules and etiquette of a site before posting. Always. To read them demonstrates a respect for the existing users of a site/Q&A/forum and is considered good manners. It is a tradition we should maintain here. – McNab Nov 18 '14 at 11:56
  • There are contrasting opinions on the matter though. For example. michael.richter.name/blogs/… – Ranjith Ramachandra Nov 18 '14 at 11:59
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    Stack Overflow is not the site for people in a hurry. – Martijn Pieters Nov 18 '14 at 12:24
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    ha, see this answer - specifically this: "I'm gracing you with an answer to your question (or edits, comments, etc) because I want to - not because you need an answer." – user2140173 Nov 18 '14 at 13:05
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    I just came to your house five minutes ago. How dare you beat me for taking a crap on your kitchen table! Do you expect me to ask if that kind of behavior is acceptable here? I think you should be kind to new visitors to your house. Kicking my ass out of your house for shitting up your dining room is very wrong according to me. – user1228 Nov 18 '14 at 15:13
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    "An answer with a link to the other question should have been the way to go if this was a duplicate question." ... You have been here for two years, and you don't know that's how duplicates work? You don't answer with a link to the duplicate, you vote to close as duplicate. As for the downvotes, on Meta, downvotes signal disagreement. New users are shown the tour when they sign up, they are given the chance to read the rules. If they ignore them, we have every right to moderate their questions as we would any others. – Kendra Nov 18 '14 at 15:39
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    (Note that downvotes for disagreement are supposed to only be on feature-request posts, but most people use it for pretty much any post here. I personally downvoted due to your two "update" sections, which should not be a part of your question and are mainly just commentary on the votes.) – Kendra Nov 18 '14 at 15:42
  • Sure @Kendra. I get the logic of you downvoting me. But what about others?About your first comment, my question is a not a duplicate of the other question to start with. It has answer in the other questiom but its not a duplicate of that question – Ranjith Ramachandra Nov 18 '14 at 15:54
  • @shortfellow I wasn't saying it was. I was addressing that particular statement of your question, which was completely wrong and against policy. I personally don't feel that your question is a duplicate, but that particular statement from your question quoted in my first comment was wrong whether the question is a duplicate or not. – Kendra Nov 18 '14 at 16:18
  • @Kendra thanks for clearing that up. Glad at least one person doesn't think it is a duplicate. I agree that i do not really know how system works and shouldn't have ranted about downvotes. – Ranjith Ramachandra Nov 18 '14 at 16:26

Why is it so unreasonable to expect people to find out how a site works before they start posting?

New users (at least on Stack Overflow) get an interstitial page explaining what the site is about and how it works, and even have a checkbox to check at the bottom to say that they have read it and agree to it.

So - given these, do you still think they are not given a chance?

Additionally, question ban don't happen due to one bad question. They occur after a pattern of bad posts has been detected. If your first and second questions get shot down, wouldn't you slow down and try to figure out what's going wrong?

  • I disagree about one question ban. I got banned for one question only on programmers.stackexchange.com. It attracted too many downvotes. – Ranjith Ramachandra Nov 18 '14 at 12:03
  • Here is the link to the only question I asked programmers.stackexchange.com/questions/206157/… – Ranjith Ramachandra Nov 18 '14 at 12:07
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    @shortfellow - you were blocked for three bad questions. It was under the old scheme where all questions no matter how old were counted. Under the new scheme where there is a rolling window you are not blocked. – ChrisF Nov 18 '14 at 12:09
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  • Okay. I thought it was only one question. I had even forgotten that I had asked questions there because all the previous ones were deleted. My bad. And just checked I can ask questions again on that site. – Ranjith Ramachandra Nov 18 '14 at 12:14
  • However I still feel the site is very unwelcoming to new users. – Ranjith Ramachandra Nov 18 '14 at 12:18
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    @shortfellow - The site is very unwelcoming the users who will not learn - to users who don't make the effort to find out how it works. This is by design. – Oded Nov 18 '14 at 12:22
  • It is really confusing to delete questions and still count them. One or the other should be done, but not both! – JosephDoggie Nov 18 '14 at 13:45
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    @JosephDoggie - here is a use case. Someone posts a bad question. It gets downvoted and deleted (perhaps they get an answer too). They come again and do the same. And again. And again. And again. That OK with you? – Oded Nov 18 '14 at 13:47
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    yeah; but perhaps the deleted question still should be easily visible to the poster (but not the rest of the world) so they know what's going on, especially the first few times .... – JosephDoggie Nov 18 '14 at 18:24

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