AskMeFi comment deleted?

March 11, 2007 3:15 PM

I've never posted a thread on MetaTalk before, so don't really know if this is the right way to go about it, but a comment of mine in the recent discussion on AskMeFi about plagiarism was deleted for reasons I can't really deduce. I did call out a few academics who were harping in the thread with their noses turned up but I wasn't calling names or slinging insults, so I'm a bit confused as to why my post was deleted. And it certainly added to the conversation as it was quoted and responded to by another poster who disagreed with me. Any admin help here?
posted by cklennon to etiquette/policy at 3:15 PM (20 comments total)

Were you answering the question? The comment is deleted and gone forever so it's unlikely that we'll be able to deduce the answers, or that an admin will remember your comment. The long and the short of it is to not make a big deal out of it and let it go.
posted by onalark at 3:18 PM on March 11, 2007

Well, there's this comment from cortex, the new modernator:

[A bunch of personal-relationship back-and-forth pruned. Please stick to the question.]
posted by cortex at 9:07 AM PST on March 9
posted by rossination at 3:36 PM on March 11, 2007

I did call out a few academics who were harping in the thread with their noses turned up

Even that might've been your problem. That sentence should read, "I did answer the question." It's easy to get to thinking about AskMe in terms of Discussion and Conversation, but it's really, very strictly, and only about Answering Questions.
posted by carsonb at 3:36 PM on March 11, 2007

Yes, it's likely that a moderator found your comment not helpful to the original questioner. Comments that don't answer the question are often deleted.
posted by Kirth Gerson at 3:37 PM on March 11, 2007

Sounds like "converstation [that] was quoted and responded to by another poster" = "personal back-and-forth", perhaps? I'm not sure; I haven't seen the deleted comments in question. Just speculating.
posted by rossination at 3:38 PM on March 11, 2007

That thread was getting to be a mess; there was a lot of hypothetical discussion of both (a) whether or not the asker should dump Mrs. Anon and/or (b) whether or not plagiarism is bad; neither of those had anything to do with the question asked.

I left this comment afterward in hope of signaling that clean-up had occurred and preventing any resumption of the off-track stuff. Anonymous has somewhere between little and zero opportunity to even reply to any speculation, which makes it worse when these things turn into debate club.

A response specifically to a derail in askme is likely to be deleted along with the derail if someone comes in to clean up.
posted by cortex at 3:38 PM on March 11, 2007

the recent discussion on AskMeFi

Going by the above phrase and the quoted bit of your comment which remains in the thread, I'd guess it was deleted because you are under a misapprehension. There are no discussions on AskMeFi. There are questions and answers.
posted by IshmaelGraves at 3:39 PM on March 11, 2007

Long live the modernator!
posted by rossination at 3:46 PM on March 11, 2007

Happens to the best of us.
posted by klangklangston at 4:26 PM on March 11, 2007

And also me.
posted by klangklangston at 4:26 PM on March 11, 2007

This city is made of light.
posted by Burhanistan at 4:28 PM on March 11, 2007

What was your comment?
posted by caddis at 5:01 PM on March 11, 2007

And here's a hint- if you can't remember, it probably wasn't that great to begin with.
posted by ThePinkSuperhero at 5:06 PM on March 11, 2007 [1 favorite]

As others have already said, ask.me isn't about adding to the discussion, it's about answering the question.

As further clarification, something like "I disagree with your answer because of x, y and z, and here is the correct answer: l, m, n and p." is fine. But something like "I don't like your answer because of a, b and c" isn't fine and should be taken to metatalk or emailed directly to the other commenter. Leaving that in thread isn't helpful to the original poster and is a derail.

It feels like a fine line when you have something you specifically want to say. But if you think about giving a direct answer to the question vs. not, it's not really a fine line at all. And if you really take exception to what someone else is saying but don't want to derail, then metatalk is a totally appropriate place for it.
posted by shelleycat at 6:16 PM on March 11, 2007

But something like "I don't like your answer because of a, b and c" isn't fine

Huh? That kind of stuff has always been fine in AskMe.
posted by mediareport at 7:10 PM on March 11, 2007

Not if that's all you post. Nothing about why the other answer is wrong, nothing about what the correct answer might be, just a call out of another answer being bad. Because that's not really helpful to the poster at all, just flaming another commenter.
posted by shelleycat at 7:35 PM on March 11, 2007

Nothing about why the other answer is wrong

I kinda figured that was included in the "because of a, b and c" part.
posted by mediareport at 7:59 PM on March 11, 2007

mediareport, not in the context of cklennon's question, from my inferece he/she posted a comment that was deriding the attitudes behind other's answers, and not critiquing them for how well they helped anonymous find a solution
posted by onalark at 8:04 PM on March 11, 2007

on postview: 'inference', not inference
posted by onalark at 8:04 PM on March 11, 2007

Nah, I used different letters for that part because they're not the reasons given in the first example, but a different subset of stuff like "I don't like your attitude" or "What do you know?". That's why I put 'I dont' like your answer" as opposed to "Your answer is wrong:". Once you get into personal opinions rather than useful questions it becomes a derail.

I realise I'm not being very clear with my clarification and just repeated myself in the second reply. I'm supposed to be unplugging my computer and packing it away but am having a hard time doing so...
posted by shelleycat at 8:09 PM on March 11, 2007