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Comment by jsmeaton | Hacker News Reader

> as far as some of the treatment I've seen and read about on SO, this is downright courteous

> so literally what the fuck did she want

Help? Perhaps it was their first time writing a program, and they can't interpret error messages. This is exactly the kind of elitist behaviour people are discussing - and if you're unable to see how the answer might keep people away, then you have no business trying to help new users.

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I think you're giving too much weight to the questioner's feelings, and none to the answerer's. Sure, the questioner might feel unwelcome when answers are curt and elitist. But also, the answerers might feel unwelcome when the questioners don't put in at least some effort in their question. Why do you privilege the questioners over the answerers? As a worst case scenario, how do you plan to supply unpaid volunteers who are willing to spend x10 the effort for each questioner? Many of the policies under fire here came out from people criticizing SO for having too many "spam" questions and not retaining experts' interest.

Here's a discussion to the same effect: https://twitter.com/robconery/status/974678531832610816?lang...

The answerer can choose not to engage and move on. That's where the difference is. The answerer is choosing to use language that is unwelcoming. The questioner does not know they are doing anything wrong.

I'm not suggesting the fix is to simply be nicer. There needs to be better incentives and tools to manage poor quality questions.

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