How do we engage more people to contribute on meta, to create a wider mandate for our policies?

Question

Today (15-3-2018), there was a discussion in chat, starting about here, about the state of IPS and its moderation. (Moderation here means any moderation, not just diamond mods stuff)

It is no secret that we struggle with our answers. Unexplained answers, frame challenges, non-IPS solutions, and so forth. This is a difficult thing to moderate, since there is a lot of subjectivity on this site. Answers, with their point of views, can be compelling and agreeable, but still be incomplete. In order to prevent this subjectivity from being too dominant, we expect a lot from our answers.

While it is nice and all to have a list of things we expect from answers written down somewhere, acting on it is not as easy. Often NAA/VLQ flags come back disputed, because users reviewed them as 'looks OK'. There seems to be a mismatch between what is discussed on meta, and what is enacted on main.

What causes this?

There are multiple possible explanations. First of all, the flag was wrong. That's possible, but let's just assume that if we apply the policy to the post, the flag is helpful.

To me there are really two options:

1. The reviewer is not aware of the policy on meta.
2. The reviewer disagrees with the policy on meta.

Both of these are problematic. The former is problematic because it means that a significant portion of the reviewing community is not aware of what is discussed and decided on meta. I say significant, because of the frequency and consistency that these flags come back disputed. Or the frequency that problematic questions get reopened.

The latter is problematic, because if a significant portion of the reviewing community disagrees on the policy, why is it still policy? Why is that opinion not reflected on meta?

Meta community versus Main community

Both of these boil down to one thing: participation on meta. To me, there seems to be a significant disconnect between the IPS community on meta, and the IPS community on main. There are users that have enough reputation to moderate, that do moderate, but that do not participate on meta, and as such are disconnected from the policy and the ideas behind those policies, causing the moderating that they do to be not in line with what policy would expect. This is counterproductive.

From what I can see there is a group of about 10 users active on meta and in chat, that has an idea of how to moderate IPS, in terms of scope, expectations from answers and comments. These ideas then get discussed on meta, shaped into a nice bit of policy, and subsequently enforced.

And this is where the ship strands. For the enforcement, we are reliant on flags and votes. The moderators have said multiple times that these forms of moderation are up to the community to work out and to apply. And that is fine, the community has the tools to work with them.

So where does it go wrong?

The point where this idea fails is that if there is a small group of users trying to flag and VTC, all the while they are outnumbered by other users that fall in the two groups I described above, this is doomed to fail. Closed questions get reopened, NAA/VLQ flags get disputed, and so forth. This does not help the site, because the moderating is a gigantic tug of war, going back and forth on these issues, and it also doesn't help the community. The 'meta'-users eventually get demotivated. This is something that is happening as we speak. Users get tired of having raise every issue on meta, begging for people to adhere to policy.

What can we do about it?

HDE226868 rightfully said:

I hope we can all understand that the building of this community is a long-term process.

This is true, of course it is. Shog9 has a similar story about the early years of StackOverflow.

But we need to start somewhere, and I think that we need a plan. Because right now, this site is split into two communities. There is the meta group, trying to define standards of moderation for this site and then there is the main group, blissfully unaware of these efforts. And while the building of a community takes time, while finetuning the moderation standards for this site takes time, to me it seems there is a clear place to start.

Getting more users to meta

The last few months have shown that the efforts of defining policy are largely ineffective if there is not a wide mandate for this policy. If only a small portion of the moderating users is aware of and agrees with the policy, it cannot be enforced. The policy needs support.

So how do we get this support? I think the place to start is to build a community, one community. We need to engage more of the users to contribute on meta. We need these discussions to happen. Maybe we even need to disagree. I don't mind being wrong. I'd rather be disagreed with in a meta discussion about moderation than after getting a flag disputed because someone disagreed with what we thought to have established.

So how do we tackle this problem? How do we get more users to share their opinion on meta? How do we make sure more people are at very least aware about what has been decided on meta? How do we turn these two communities into one?

Answer 1

When commenting about something, topicality, answer style, or what have you, start linking to the relevant meta discussion. It's the easiest way to nudge people towards the discussions on meta.

Be warned... This doesn't always work out the way you want or expect it to. Inviting people to the discussion isn't just inviting them to read what was already discussed. They'll likely have something to say about it.

Answer 2

Well, this is against my better judgment, but here goes.

The first thing to do is make Meta more stable. That means crack down on rudeness and nastiness in here. There is one user who has ended up rage-deleting many of his posts out of frustration. I can empathize.

There is no rep penalty for down-voting in Meta, but there are more drive-by downvotes in this meta than I have seen elsewhere. Here, at least, comments should be included when there is a down-vote. So, if people are down-voting without comment, stop. All it does is make the person who went to the trouble of posting something to say "why do I even bother" and then stop participating.

Which brings me to the next point. BE NICE IN THE COMMENTS ON META and do so even more than on the regular site. People who post in meta do so out of either frustration or a sincere desire to built this site.

This is not the place to antagonize people

and, now for some general points

• on the main site, refer people to Meta in the comments
• if a Q or A is borderline, link to meta in the comments
• Invite to chat when possible, link to meta.

To combat the overriding of flags, flag for moderator attention until the tone for the stack is set.

Answer 3

Honestly, I think people are intimidated.

BEFORE ANYONE GETS ANGRY, I am not accusing anyone. I am not saying the moderators are intimidating new users. No one is causing anything, so please don't rip my face off.

I've been here for a while now. I've always had a lot of positive feedback on my answers. I've always felt like I am a good member of this site. BUT...

Whenever I see a link to "Discussion has been moved to meta", 75% of the times, I don't bother clicking it. 25% of the times, I click it, read it, close it.

The reason I don't reply or participate is this: Intimidation.

The users who are big on IPS.SE - HDE, Catija, TinkeringBell, Spagirl, Shog9, Monica, apaul - to name a few, they almost always seem to be in the middle of a discussion. I've tried going into some of the chat rooms and I always see what is being talked about, and get scared and close the window.

Not at all anyone's fault, but to me, it feels very much like I felt when I was in middle school (and high school and college, sadly). "Oh these guys are friends are talking to each other about something, I don't want to be that weirdo who sticks his nose in". I just stay away for that reason. The users that are very active on meta discussions are well established. The other well established users joke around with each other in the chat rooms. I always feel like I don't belong there and that I am just a random weird alien trying to "fit in".

While I agree that apaul's answer that the meta discussion links should be posted on comments to nudge people to meta, I don't think anyone is ever going to participate in the discussion as it is because no one is waiting for anyone. A meta discussion feels very much like the main site itself - "Oh there is already 5 answers to this question, why bother answering on top of all this, no one cares anyway".

This is genuinely just my problem and I am not pointing fingers at anyone. I feel like this might be a widely faced problem by all users.

Also, "more welcoming" was one of the other answers I read here and that brings me to this:

I posted this question in meta

It got downvoted 4 times. The top answer was upvoted 8 times. The question is DEFINITELY not a question that should not be on meta. Not everyone knows why such a thing would happen on SE and that is a very genuine curiosity-related question about why it was not OK so I could learn. I was not angry, I was not pointing fingers, I was not blaming anyone, I was not accusing anyone, and I was definitely not ranting. But still, it got downvoted.

I've had a lot of questions since, but never bothered posting them because of fear of getting downvoted like that. I get that some questions do not belong in meta even, but if not in meta, WHERE?

This is just my opinion. And when I say this, please trust me: I DO NOT CARE that my question got downvoted and I DO NOT CARE that the other big guys talk to each other a lot, it is COMPLETELY MY PROBLEM. Just pointing out that it might not just be my problem.

Answer 4

One of the things that discourages me from participation on any site in SE, be it main or meta, is when I find that a very small handful of people are responsible for 95% of content and decisions. It makes it seem like my contribution wont really matter because one super-contributor is going to steamroll me.

It is especially discouraging when the majority of decisions being made on meta are by moderators. To me, this makes it seem less like a community site, and more of a benevolent oligarchy. Granted, mods will generally be more active on meta as they should be, but I think it would be nice to see new voices rise to the top more often.

My solution is that if meta users want to see increased participation, they should step aside and let other people post more often. By that, I mean literally not answering or commenting as frequently. This should help in a few ways:

• People like me will feel like our voices will be heard if we speak up.
• Seeing a question with 0 answers (and perhaps a few upvotes) makes me (and probably others) far more willing to pop in and see if I can answer.
• When someone gives a well received answer, it has a galvanizing effect that will encourage them to return and contribute more often.
• Reading through older meta posts will not feel like reading through the memoirs of one individual, it will feel more organic and communal.

I understand this is a little paradoxical and perhaps circular - to increase participation we must decrease participation by some - but for some people I think it will absolutely encourage participation.

Answer 5

You're going about this all backwards.

The thing about Meta is, it really sucks as a top-down policy machine for pretty much exactly the reasons you describe: Only a small percentage of users ever use it (or are even aware of it, really), and they're ultimately outnumbered by the unwashed masses pouring into the site. This really isn't going to change; your user base is just going to keep on increasing, but the percentage who end up becoming active Meta users is going to stay roughly the same.

Meta needs to be reflecting the opinions of the community, not dictating them. And what you're doing here, intentional or not, is attracting people to the site who don't really share your goals and then trying to make them adhere to policies they neither know nor understand: This is a race you're just never going to win.

There's always going to be new users coming in with zero knowledge of the site or what you're trying to accomplish here, and ultimately they're going to be learning the ropes by watching the other users. If you don't want a "blind leading the blind" scenario, it's important not only that enough of these "other users" are actually established users who know what they're doing, but that these established users are highly visible in doing it.

Flagging and deleting weak answers is exactly the opposite of that. It might be important in terms of keeping the site clean, but is effectively worthless for guiding new users on how to use the site properly (except possibly the poor guys who actually noticed their stuff get deleted), and really should be used as a last resort rather than a first one.

Good questions and answers, constructive criticism and editing, voting in general really, these are what the new users will be seeing and learning from, not a bunch of Meta discussion and behind-the-scenes flagging.

Rather than worrying about getting more of your "Main Community" into Meta or getting them to fall in line, you the "Meta Community" should focus more on setting a good example — constructive and visible — for them to follow. This will not only improve the site over-all and make it more clear what you as a site are trying to accomplish, but will be more likely to attract like-minded users who will naturally be drawn to Meta participation anyway.

In other words, good activity attracts good activity. Targetting bad activity is important but only makes the site, for lack of a better term, "less bad": You can't let that get in the way of making the site "more good" with positive contributions. Spending too much energy on the former just means you won't have any left to do a good job on the latter.

And the more outnumbered your established users are, the more actively constructive and visible they need to be. Like I mentioned before, deleting a bad post will help maybe that one poster learn how the site works, but once it's deleted it's invisible to new users, as are the lessons it imparted. On the other hand, constructive behaviour that stays visible can potentially be seen by hundreds of users who visit the site and view that post, and positive contributions accumulate over time in a way that deleting posts never will. This distinction is crucial, especially when you're attracting new users as fast as this site does.

It's an uphill battle, yes, and I'm not saying it'll be quick or easy, but it's really about the only way to pull this off without everybody just burning out and giving up halfway through.

Answer 6

I have a few points in lose order:

• This and many other meta questions are very long. Who wants to study long questions?
• Some answers (also here) are long without any formatting. Who want to study long answers like that?
• Some people, like me, got lots of reputation with only few answers or questions. I won't complain. But in a way I think the reputation system here works "incorrect" compared to i.e. Stack Overflow. I did a lot more work there and I don't even have 25% of the reputation from here there.
• It seems some moderators here (mis)use their power to delete answers which they personally don't like. That does not help this site.
• Rules should make sense. A sample are legal laws. Most people know very few laws but most people know what is right and what is wrong. This should work similarly here. Some questions and answer don't fit 100% but they still give good advise. Why don't we keep them (even if they are not according to the rules)?
• Last but not least: I think it should be fun and informative to use this site. Few people want to participate in long dry discussions for nothing. People will participate if they want to participate. Most people are not motivated by setting and enforcing "dry" rules.

Answer 7

How can we bring more users to meta?

There is rather a domain difference because meta is not primarily about IPS, but about the IPS.SE website. Users who are interested in interpersonal skills are active on the main site. Users who are interested in moderation help out with the review queues. Users who are interested in IPS, moderation and discussing the site itself, including policy, are active on main, reviews and meta (also, but not always, on chat.) Thus the small group you call "meta users" are a subset of the "main group".

A crude way to encourage more non-meta users towards meta participation would be to award reputation points but this is not the SE policy. How else to motivate users to discuss the site itself?

Maybe we could announce regular unofficial "new meta user of the week" award for the highest participating "new meta user" which needs to be defined. In addition, if the community agrees, although this is not strictly necessary, a deserving answer on the main site by the "new meta user of the month" could be rewarded with a 100 point bounty. These recognitions could be announced on the main site in some way by a moderator, possibly with a link to your excellently detailed question on this meta page, to create awareness and motivation about participation on meta.

Update in response to OP's comment:

What I mean is that as it stands there are users voting and reviewing, without being aware what IPS considers good or bad answers and questions. Preferably we would want users to be aware of that before they start moderating.

__ the logical step would be to find out why many of them are not participating on meta, though they should be? I hope some of them would enlighten us by posting an answer here.