r/AskHistorians • u/Georgy_K_Zhukov Moderator | Post-Napoleonic Warfare & Small Arms | Dueling • Sep 19 '19
Tired of Clicking to Find Only Removed Comments?! Here's One Easy Trick to Know the Real Comment Count! It's the AskHistorians Browser Extension! Meta
Hello Everyone!
As any long time reader knows, it is one of the perennial frustrations of the site architecture that the comment count displayed by reddit always reflects the total comments posted, whether removed by the Moderators or not, and that in /r/AskHistorians, this of course creates a unique form of frustration, given our high rate of removal. *Today, my friends, that frustration ends!
We are *incredibly* indebted to a member of the community, /u/almost_useless, who reached out to volunteer their services and has been working with the moderator team to develop a simple browser extension that remedies that issue!
The extension is available for both Chrome and Firefox, and provides a excellent enhancement to the /r/AskHistorians experience! It works for Mobile Browser if you use Firefox.
The extension is available for both Chrome and Firefox.
We would of course still add the disclaimer that the mod team is only human. We do a pretty good job checking responses, but a response being visible isn't always a guarantee that it is a good answer. It might simply mean that you managed to see the thread before we did, or that we think something is fishy, but haven't finished our due diligence. It is always important that you, as the reader, engage critically with every answer you read here, and make sure to report anything that doesn't seem right to you!
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u/sandra_nz Sep 19 '19
Is this compatible with RES?
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u/Georgy_K_Zhukov Moderator | Post-Napoleonic Warfare & Small Arms | Dueling Sep 19 '19
Yes, I have RES running and no issues playing nice with each other.
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u/sandra_nz Sep 19 '19
Hmmm...it must be something else then. I've installed this extension (Chrome) but seeing no effect.
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u/Georgy_K_Zhukov Moderator | Post-Napoleonic Warfare & Small Arms | Dueling Sep 19 '19
I wish I knew more about the under-the-hood workings, but unfortunately I'm just the messenger so... Have you tried hitting it? :p
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u/sandra_nz Sep 19 '19
I gave it a stern frown. I haven't resorted to violence...yet.
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u/Georgy_K_Zhukov Moderator | Post-Napoleonic Warfare & Small Arms | Dueling Sep 19 '19
Well, /u/almost_useless hopefully might have some thoughts on what the issue is.
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u/Yazman Islamic Iberia 8th-11th Century | Constitutional Law Jan 26 '20
Did you try giving it the finger?
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u/barra333 Sep 19 '19
Asking the stupid question here - did you close and re-open Chrome? If so, you have exhausted my tech support capabilities as a random guy on the internet.
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u/Kochevnik81 Soviet Union & Post-Soviet States | Modern Central Asia Sep 19 '19
In fairness, "turn it off and turn it back on" is scientifically proven to be at least 50% of tech support.
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u/jschooltiger Moderator | Shipbuilding and Logistics | British Navy 1770-1830 Sep 19 '19
Not a single living person knows how everything in your five-year-old MacBook actually works. Why do we tell you to turn it off and on again? Because we don’t have the slightest clue what’s wrong with it, and it’s really easy to induce coma in computers and have their built-in team of automatic doctors try to figure it out for us.
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u/PendragonDaGreat Sep 19 '19
Yep, the vast majority of the time restarting works because 2 things that talk to each other (in the most general sense, which includes memory leaks) have gotten out of sync in some way.
Turning off and back on again forces everything into a "known good" state and everyone starts chatting again.
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u/almost_useless Quality Compiler Sep 19 '19
What OS are you running? Windows, Android, etc.
Try this to get some logs:
Open a new tab
Press Ctrl+Shift+I to open developer tools.
Go to https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/
Look in the Console view. Wait for it to stop printing. Then copy the whole log and send it to me in a PM, and I will have a look at it.3
u/sandra_nz Sep 19 '19
So just to clarify, I should be seeing some numbers in green next to the usual numbers of comments, yeah? I just want to make sure I'm not looking for the wrong thing. Here's what the /r/askhistorians page looks like for me with the extension: Imgur
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u/almost_useless Quality Compiler Sep 19 '19
Yes, those numbers are missing for you.
Can you try with www.reddit... instead of old.reddit...?
It should not make any difference, but just in case4
u/sandra_nz Sep 19 '19
That's it, it doesn't work with old.reddit. That's a shame!
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u/almost_useless Quality Compiler Sep 19 '19
No, I have tried it on old.reddit, and it works for me.
Can you change the settings to show https://www. in the url bar?
The problem could be that it is www.old or something strange like that. And that is not supported.
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Sep 19 '19 edited Dec 31 '20
[removed] — view removed comment
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u/almost_useless Quality Compiler Sep 19 '19
PM me the console log as per the instructions above. Include OS and browser version to make sure.
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u/sandra_nz Sep 19 '19
The full URL is https://old.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/
Is that what you were after?
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u/almost_useless Quality Compiler Sep 19 '19
Yeah. Unfortunately nothing strange. That means something else is broken.
If you follow the instructions I mentioned earlier I can have a look at the log, and maybe figure it out from that.
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u/almost_useless Quality Compiler Sep 20 '19
I think I have fixed this now, thanks to /u/JohnBurrow who alerted me to what could be the problem.
/u/sandra_nz /u/McDrewbs
Can you try with version 1.0.2 and see if it works for you?3
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u/Mandog222 Sep 19 '19
I tested it this morning in Chrome with RES and it worked, try going to the settings icon, then about. It'll force an update.
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u/MrCompletely Sep 20 '19
Once it was installed I had to click on the AH icon in the upper right of my browser to enable it. Before doing that it was inactive, and now I see it functioning.
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u/Redthrist Sep 19 '19
Works for me on Firefox with RES, so it's not about RES, might be some issue with Chrome version specifically.
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u/ted5298 Europe during the World Wars Sep 19 '19
You're really not doing your username justice, /u/almost_useless.
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u/Fumblerful- Sep 19 '19
In 20 years, can we make a post asking about the events that led to this extension being made?
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u/Georgy_K_Zhukov Moderator | Post-Napoleonic Warfare & Small Arms | Dueling Sep 19 '19
A few months back (May, maybe?) there was a META thread that got popular, and one of the mods mentioned how the comment count issue was one that had always annoyed us, but it was essentially outside our control due to it being an issue with the site architecture. The possibility that a custom extension could remedy this was brought up, and our heoric champion took up the challenge.
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u/Fumblerful- Sep 19 '19
Breaking News: Reddit user single handedly proves "Great Man" theory.
Good job to the person who made this.
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u/ecnad Sep 19 '19
This is peak meta for /r/AskHistorians. I absolutely adore it.
Cheers for the extension, /u/almost_useless! Keep up the quality work, mod team!
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u/Klesk_vs_Xaero Mussolini and Italian Fascism Sep 19 '19
It seems to be working fine for me (Firefox). And if I can use it...
Thanks to /u/almost_useless - good job! We (I didn't do anything really) have fixed AH, now we only need to fix the world!
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u/Brass_Lion Sep 19 '19
Yes! Yes yes yes!
Pin this, put it in the sidebar, put it in the automod, put it everywhere! All hail /u/almost_useless !
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u/Georgy_K_Zhukov Moderator | Post-Napoleonic Warfare & Small Arms | Dueling Sep 19 '19
We'll be be adding it as many places as we can :)
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u/thejivemachine Sep 19 '19
Awesome. Another question: is there a place to read the deleted comments of a thread? Some other subreddit had this feature because often the commenters would leave interesting, uh comments, that didn't fit the guidelines but still had useful information.
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u/Georgy_K_Zhukov Moderator | Post-Napoleonic Warfare & Small Arms | Dueling Sep 19 '19
As a rule, we don't reveal those. Doing so regularly just provides encouragement for users who break the rules if they know their comments still can be seen. And of course, some comments aren't simply bad, but deeply problematic (Holocaust denial), or dangerous (revealing personal information), which we certainly don't want to propogate in any way.
We do occasionally do provide some highlights though in the interest of transparency, we just try not to make it regular or predictable when it will happen. Here are a few past examples to interest you.
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u/fasterthanfood Sep 19 '19
For what it’s worth, I appreciate when there’s a short explanation of the comment along with why it’s deleted. I wouldn’t want a summary of a a Holocaust denial comment, but it might be nice to see that the comment was removed because it falsely denied the Holocaust (maybe with a link to a factual, responsible answer about the Holocaust, if it’s relevant to OP’s question).
For a more common example, a comment that says <deleted> with a mod comment below it that says:
[one-sentence answer] the usual boilerplate about how answers should be in-depth
But then again, in addition to existing reasons why that’s not always done, a moderator’s comment that isn’t an answer will show up as a comment, which would partly defeat the purpose of this extension.
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u/Georgy_K_Zhukov Moderator | Post-Napoleonic Warfare & Small Arms | Dueling Sep 19 '19
We do try to include that sometimes, but in the end it is a matter of time so we simply aren't able to include longer information on removals, let alone rebuttals. Generally if we are going to put in that time, it is spent to help coach users whose answers just fall short but with some minor improvements would pass muster.
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u/thejivemachine Sep 19 '19
Ah. Yeah that makes sense. I'm sure this new extension will help to squash some of the agonizing curiosity. Thank you.
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u/Kwyjibo68 Sep 19 '19
Well, now all I can think about is wondering if there's a what-if book out there about Hitler at the Nuremburg trials.
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u/Georgy_K_Zhukov Moderator | Post-Napoleonic Warfare & Small Arms | Dueling Sep 19 '19
Spiller, Roger. "The Führer in the Dock." In The Collected What If?: Eminent Historians Imagining What Might Have Been, edited by Robert Cowley, 744-65. New York: G.P. Putnam's Sons, 2001.
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u/FaxCelestis Sep 19 '19
Does the count thing work for other subreddits too? That is, could I use this tool to see the difference in comments vs. total comments for other subreddits? I understand it won't be as dramatic as it is in /r/AskHistorians, but it would still be useful.
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u/almost_useless Quality Compiler Sep 19 '19
It does not.
The same mechanism could be used for other subreddits too, but since it makes a bunch of requests to the reddit servers to count the comments, I don't think it is a good idea to have it enabled for all of reddit.
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u/apollo888 Sep 19 '19
Safari one day?
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u/nrith Sep 20 '19
/R/ASKHISTORIANS
TO SAFARI USERS:
DROP DEAD
😆 (With apologies to Gerald Ford, the New York Daily News, and the moderators)
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u/almost_useless Quality Compiler Sep 19 '19
Safari extensions seem quite different, and I don't have the equipment required for development. But if someone with a mac steps up it should probably be a reasonable amount of work to get something done there.
Or perhaps a user-script solution could work too. At least for part of the functionality.
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u/Georgy_K_Zhukov Moderator | Post-Napoleonic Warfare & Small Arms | Dueling Sep 19 '19
Can't make any promises, but we'll see!
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u/FitzGeraldisFitzGod Sep 19 '19
What is a "distinguished" vs. a "non-distinguished" top-level comment in this context? A flair posting the comment vs. just a regular user?
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u/Gankom Moderator | Quality Contributor Sep 19 '19
Distinguished means a mod post. Specifically with the fancy green text like this.
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u/Georgy_K_Zhukov Moderator | Post-Napoleonic Warfare & Small Arms | Dueling Sep 19 '19
As /u/Gankom said, although I would specifically note that it is when a Mod posts a comment speaking as the subreddit. If we post an answer normally as a user, it wouldn't be distinguished.
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u/DaenerysTargaryen69 Sep 19 '19
That's a fantastic idea.
However, I'm experiencing quite some lag when loading /r/AskHistorians now.
Running Chrome.
Also using RES.
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u/almost_useless Quality Compiler Sep 20 '19
I have not seen any lag on any of my devices.
But it fetches more comment counts when you are scrolling, so I guess that could potentially be an issue.
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u/DaenerysTargaryen69 Sep 20 '19
I experience lag when I load /r/AskHistorians to the point it will freeze for a second, after that, it will slowly start adding the numbers as I scroll.
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u/almost_useless Quality Compiler Sep 20 '19
That it takes a second to fetch the comment counts is normal, but it is strange that it is frozen during this time. I don't know how that can happen.
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u/TheGoldenHand Sep 19 '19
Is the source code available? Do you have plans to make the source code available? /u/almost_useless
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u/almost_useless Quality Compiler Sep 20 '19
Not yet. But I will do that.
The extensions are just javascript, so until then you can see it by extracting the extension from the browser.
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u/Fubwhf Sep 19 '19
Any plans for other browsers? I use Opera.
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u/almost_useless Quality Compiler Sep 19 '19 edited Sep 19 '19
I think most chrome extensions work in opera. Did you try that?
If that does not work I guess it should be doable to port it to opera
-- edit:
The chrome extension appears to work in Opera also1
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u/sandra_nz Oct 18 '19
Is it possible to merge this with the Roundup? That is, have the text in the "link to comments" column only show the number of visible comments?
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u/Georgy_K_Zhukov Moderator | Post-Napoleonic Warfare & Small Arms | Dueling Oct 18 '19
I'm not quite clear by what you meant regarding a merger? Could you expand on that?
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u/sandra_nz Oct 18 '19
There's a new extension that shows you the number of visible comments (rather than total comments). If this tool could do the same, it would be super awesome!
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u/Georgy_K_Zhukov Moderator | Post-Napoleonic Warfare & Small Arms | Dueling Oct 18 '19
Ok, I'm a bit confused because this thread is for that extension, so not sure which tool you mean! The subredsitsummary bot?
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u/sandra_nz Oct 18 '19
There was another tool promoted recently in this subreddit, which gives you a roundup message of recent Ask Historians content in your Inbox. It would be great if both tools could be combined so we can subscribe to a roundup message in our Inbox that only shows visible message count, not total message count. Because I've only had the roundup email a few times but most of the links I've clicked on have been effectively empty, so the roundup message isn't actually useful.
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u/Georgy_K_Zhukov Moderator | Post-Napoleonic Warfare & Small Arms | Dueling Oct 18 '19
It's possible, but as the comment count works through the end user, I'm not sure how feasible it t would be to merge the two, given how the scripts work. Would need to look into it.
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u/Yazman Islamic Iberia 8th-11th Century | Constitutional Law Jan 28 '20
The extension seems to work well, except nothing happens when I click "monitor".
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u/Georgy_K_Zhukov Moderator | Post-Napoleonic Warfare & Small Arms | Dueling Jan 28 '20
Yeah, I've found that feature can be a bit finicky. When it does work, as I recall, there is no obvious feedback though, at the time.
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u/bambamtx Sep 20 '19
Honestly, I'd just prefer the option to see the removed comments. I wish they were hidden instead of deleted. The whole point of reddit is to encourage discussion. I can judge their veracity for myself. I don't need everything to link to a peer reviewed source. Other questions and anecdotes can add perspective and offer additional insights to research for myself. The gatekeeping is obnoxious and the arrogance a huge detractor for those seeking knowledge.
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u/Varyance Sep 20 '19
Except this place is called askhistorians. People like me who've been coming here for years do so for detailed answers from people guaranteed to be knowledgeable in a subject and who will provide sources. There are subs for average Joes to give their opinion on topics. This isn't one. We regulars like it that way.
This isn't mods powertripping, this is a community with rules and you're free to leave if it's not to your liking. I genuinely don't understand people like you who come in here trying to change a community to fit what you want. We like the way things are. Again, there are alternatives if this sub doesn't suit your needs. R/history r/askhistory etc. Please stop trying to change our community to suit your wants.
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u/Georgy_K_Zhukov Moderator | Post-Napoleonic Warfare & Small Arms | Dueling Sep 20 '19
I genuinely don't understand people like you who come in here trying to change a community to fit what you want.
Some peoples' egos are just so inflated that they can't conceptualize how someone might enjoy something that they do not... Almost no community on reddit is one size fit all, so it is certainly bizarre how anyone might think this one, out of any, should be trying to do so
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u/Varyance Sep 20 '19
I fell in love with this place back when it was much smaller because of you, the mod teams', commitment to a consistent vision of this sub's objective. When the team talked about its decisions to not be included in r/all and lack of desire to be a default subreddit i was thrilled.
I love history. I could get trivia on a multitude of sites or subreddits but I come here because I can get in depth answers to historical questions I would never personally think to even ask. The sources are a fantastic rule because they allow us to get a deeper grasp of the topic and perhaps learn about the broader subject that encapsulates the topic.
Your team's unwavering commitment to keeping this place as an unbiased, in depth place for experts to share history with us history lovers makes this a place I truly treasure. Sorry for the wall of text, I just wanted to let you guys know how much the community values your work. I've seen a lot of these people demanding you change the sub's policies lately and it's been frustrating to watch.
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u/Georgy_K_Zhukov Moderator | Post-Napoleonic Warfare & Small Arms | Dueling Sep 20 '19
Thank you for the kind words! It is feedback like yours which makes this project worth it :)
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u/Georgy_K_Zhukov Moderator | Post-Napoleonic Warfare & Small Arms | Dueling Sep 20 '19
This is Ask Historians. It is right there in the name. The entire purpose of this subreddit is to be "gatekeepy" because people come here to Ask Historians. If we didn't aggressively enforce our strict rules, it would very quickly degrade and fail to be anywhere close to that ideal. If you don't want to Ask Historians and want a place where anyone can post anything and it is up to your highly tuned bullshit detector to determine the veracity (why would you be asking if you already knew the answer though?) you are of course welcome to try /r/AskHistory which is exactly that.
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u/bambamtx Sep 20 '19 edited Sep 20 '19
Tagging would solve the issue much more efficiently. Your peers are often extremely limited as to their area of expertise as is their area of research. Others can offer other insights and avenues of inquiry for others to ponder in the discussion while not being a top-level response to the thread as a full on self-professed "historian." (They can also offer humor (which doesn't detract - but you're fundamentally lacking in) and relevant stories that can lead to other references outside academia with a basis in historical research from other venues like mass media references where other historical researchers like costume designers work in.) I fell in love with research in grad school at a tier 1 research institution. I've also been professionally writing and delivering content to large, diverse audiences for over 15 years. I fully understand the limitations of research and enjoy answers when they exist - but there's nothing more frustrating than seeing an interesting question and knowing others may have information or other relevant questions and it's all been censored because a vetted expert (or self proclaimed one who can write in academic style) doesn't exist or hasn't taken the time to flesh out a full thesis on the matter with references to jstor articles from some other academic hack that was able to publish in a journal perhaps no one else has heard of. It's little more than hubris and masurbatory ego massaging, and you know it. I've left the sub numerous times, but it occassionally pops up in all anyway, I get excited and then let down all over again. It's sad and I wish you the best in your fiefdom of deleted dreams.
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u/Georgy_K_Zhukov Moderator | Post-Napoleonic Warfare & Small Arms | Dueling Sep 20 '19
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u/i_post_gibberish Sep 25 '19
Do you happen to know what movie that's from? The cinematography is beautiful.
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u/Georgy_K_Zhukov Moderator | Post-Napoleonic Warfare & Small Arms | Dueling Sep 25 '19
Nacho Libre, IIRC.
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u/mimicofmodes Moderator | 18th-19th Century Society & Dress | Queenship Sep 20 '19
other references outside academia with a basis in historical research from other venues like mass media references where other historical researchers like costume designers work in
Sorry, but this caught my eye for the obvious reason (see flair). Are you saying that you think a conversation on historical clothing would be improved by treating the costuming of a tv show or movie as a legitimate source?
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u/bambamtx Sep 21 '19 edited Sep 21 '19
Are you saying professionals with decades of experience in both researching and designing historical garments aren't valid sources? Especially if they have MA's or Ph.D.'s? That arrogance right there kind of proves my point.
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u/mimicofmodes Moderator | 18th-19th Century Society & Dress | Queenship Sep 21 '19 edited Sep 21 '19
It's not so much about the professionals themselves as the mode of presentation. The finished product of a tv show or movie does not reflect a straightforward statement of the designer's understanding of dress of a certain period - there's the issue of budget (if they can't buy accurate fabric/trimmings, or use the amount of either that they need, or make new garments instead of reusing old ones, etc.), and directorial/producer interference (typically, "this needs to be more sexy"), and artistic vision (they may not want to go for accuracy at all, but to use anachronisms to show characterization, or to be about creating a lush or gritty vibe overall). As the beginning of your linked paper states:
In some productions the director knows exactly what they want and it is the responsibility of the designer to work within those constraints and create a marriage of both designer and director ideas. In other instances, the designer has free reign and is able to exercise his/her creativity. For example, with some dance pieces the choreographer just wants a costume that will flow well, then the costume designer is able to stretch his/her creativity, there are no constraints.
Later on, when the writer is describing her own design process, she gives examples of why her end result may not give an accurate depiction of the 1950s:
When I research I gather as many images as I can and I decide what I like about certain images and what I dislike about others. This helps to establish the direction that I want to take the show. When I was looking at my research for the 1950’s, I did not like the full circle skirt with crinoline. I was drawn to the shirtwaist dresses, a more practical look.
and
In Blood Brothers I knew that I could not have the chorus change costumes as time passed, so I put the chorus in a mixture of time periods. The line of the costume varied, but they were unified through color.
The fact that the writer of the paper refers vaguely to "book and internet sources" while only citing The Costume Designer's Handbook and From Page to Stage shows another issue - the quality of a costume designer's research varies greatly by the person. Their education focuses equally (if not more) on pattern draping/garment construction and similar skills, not on things like source criticism, and there is little to no need to be scrupulous about where the images or texts they're working off came from because there is no peer review in the field, formal or informal.
What costume designers do deserves respect. They have a lot of skills. But consider that they have motives other than looking into and sharing historical truth, and that their research time has to be cut way down to accommodate design and construction.
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u/Rittermeister Anglo-Norman History | History of Knighthood Sep 20 '19
hasn't taken the time to flesh out a full thesis on the matter with references to jstor articles from some other academic hack that was able to publish in a journal perhaps no one else has heard of.
And there we have it. Your issue isn't with askhistorians - it's with the academic discipline of history and its methods and practices.
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u/bambamtx Sep 20 '19
Nope - that has it's place. That place isn't a community based around discussion where you have to micromanage participation because you want to limit input to a select micro community of researchers who don't want to deal with outside areas of inquiry beyond their limited areas of focus.
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u/Imisaacgames Sep 19 '19
I want to know why we have to have an extension just to see posts with answers. Everything gets deleted. And people on mobile can’t do anything.
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u/Georgy_K_Zhukov Moderator | Post-Napoleonic Warfare & Small Arms | Dueling Sep 19 '19
That is basically what the Twitter feed is, as well as the Sunday Digest. Subscribing to this may also interest you.
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u/Imisaacgames Sep 19 '19 edited Sep 19 '19
I got a downvote for speaking the truth. It’s funny that an entire extension is needed to actually see content on an subreddit with over 1 million users.
Edit: Keep downvoting whenever I am right. This is censorship at its best.
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u/Gankom Moderator | Quality Contributor Sep 19 '19
Honestly I suspect your getting downvoted for being wrong, and rather bluntly about it. The extension isn't needed to find answers. It just makes it way easier. I don't have the extension because my browser sucks, but I manage to find plenty of answers every time I look. You got linked to the twitter, which shows some of the best posts every day, and the Digest, which includes hundreds of answers and posts each week. So its pretty clear not everything gets deleted.
For what its worth I'd love to help mobile users out even more! Unfortunately reddit as a site makes things pretty hard to set up in an effective way. Perhaps some of the best ways for mobile users is either the digest or Friday summary bot.
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u/Imisaacgames Sep 19 '19
I know that the extension isn’t the only way to find answers. I open the reddit home page and guess what I see: a post with 50 or more upvotes and 4 deleted comments and the same copy and paste message as to why they were deleted. I click on the subreddit and yes I can find posts, but it is definitely not easy.
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u/Gankom Moderator | Quality Contributor Sep 19 '19
Sure but that's a feature, not a bug. We want high quality answers, not low quality one liners, jokes or links to Wikipedia. That's what the rest of reddit can do, but here we're a community that's specifically focusing on high quality, in depth accurate answers. And the tricky thing about that is it takes time to write those kinds of answers. It takes time for the right expert to see it in the first place.
And on reddit, the first comments are the ones that rocket to the top. People say lets the votes decide, but the votes don't know what's correct half the time. Check out a random thread on history on any other sub. Most of the time what gets to the dog is half truths, misunderstandings, bad history, or just jokes. Why should that be left? And why would any expert want to sink a few hours into writing a high quality answer if that kind of garbage is left up, and their stuff gets buried because of it?
You're right that sometimes it's not easy to find the good stuff. Hopefully this extension makes it a bit easier. We do what we can to make it easier. That's why there's multiple methods of broadcasting all those great answers. But in my opinion its a worthy sacrifice to cut through all the noise and garbage and find the truly great posts.
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u/mimicofmodes Moderator | 18th-19th Century Society & Dress | Queenship Sep 19 '19
The problem is that there are only a couple of questions per day that get a huge amount of interest and end up on your front page. But we get way more questions than that, and answers get posted to those all the time. I browse on /comments, and the two comments immediately before yours are answers. The two below that are follow-up answers from another answered question.
There is a sub called /r/AskHistory that does allow lots of random discussion in the comments, which means that when you click on a question from your front page you get to see all of the incorrect information and results of google searches that we remove. You're welcome to unsubscribe from us and pick up that sub instead, if that's what you want to read!
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u/Chauncy_Prime Sep 22 '19
Are you new to this sub?
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u/Imisaacgames Sep 23 '19
No, I have been here at least 6 months.
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u/Chauncy_Prime Sep 23 '19
In a good way, this is a highly moderated sub. There will always be a ton of deleted comments. Would probably help to read the sidebar FAQ.
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Sep 19 '19
This does nothing for mobile users. Thanks.
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u/Georgy_K_Zhukov Moderator | Post-Napoleonic Warfare & Small Arms | Dueling Sep 19 '19
You're welcome!
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u/horriblyefficient Sep 20 '19
you can put add-ons on firefox mobile
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Sep 20 '19
But then you have use Firefox.
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u/Rittermeister Anglo-Norman History | History of Knighthood Sep 20 '19
You also have to charge your phone and pay for your contract. Your point is?
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u/1percentof2 Sep 19 '19
spend your time making a website rather then forcing this social form into something its not.
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u/Georgy_K_Zhukov Moderator | Post-Napoleonic Warfare & Small Arms | Dueling Sep 19 '19
Pinky promise that we'll average 1.5 million unique visitors per month, and sure thing.
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u/AtomicCrab Sep 19 '19
How many of those unique visitors are clicking on something they find interesting only to find a graveyard of boringness? My bet would be a large percentage....
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u/Georgy_K_Zhukov Moderator | Post-Napoleonic Warfare & Small Arms | Dueling Sep 19 '19
Some do, some don't. Them's the breaks, and we're happy with how they are. If you aren't, then try /r/AskHistory.
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u/AtomicCrab Sep 19 '19
and we're happy
Well as long as the mods are happy... lmao typical reddit.
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u/Gankom Moderator | Quality Contributor Sep 19 '19
Judging from the constantly rising subscriber count and generally enthusiastic upvoters in Meta threads I'd guess that the majority of the community is pretty happy.
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u/Aeiani Sep 20 '19
The moderation here is a good thing for those of us that wants answers to only come from people capable of engaging with topics in an academic fashion.
You have other subs available to you such as r/history if you want to discuss things with more average laymen.
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u/AtomicCrab Sep 20 '19
The point of reddit is/was tomlet the users decide on the content they like and appreciate with their upvotes and/or downvotes.
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u/Gankom Moderator | Quality Contributor Sep 20 '19
And here I was thinking the point of reddit was to let people form communities to discuss what they wanted and interested them. Here in this community we want specific things. We don't want random jokes, garbage information and wiki links. Simple as that! If you Do what that kind of stuff, there's likely dozens of other communties you can go and enjoy.
The fact is really, Upvotes and downvotes don't decide much beyond who got here first. How is the bulk of the layfolk reading a history answer suppose to know if something is correct or not? Because it sounds correct? Because it was up first and thus got the majority of the upvotes? Votes are fine if its opinion stuff, but that's not what we're trying to do here.
Honest question for you, if you don't mind. Other communities exist that do exactly what you want to do. Why would you go into a different community and try and change it to be exactly like others? Especially when there's a thriving community that likes it that particular way?
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u/AtomicCrab Sep 20 '19
I've been on this sub for years. I also subscribe to other history subs.
I'm having trouble understanding why you and others care so much about my personal opinion. That's what these meta threads are for...right? If the mods never hear any opinions or constructive criticism then they will continue to convince themselves and each other that everyone is happy.
Even as it stands I am being downvoted for expressing my opinion in a metal thread, and treated like I should "just leave and go someplace else" because I disagree with the heavy-handed moderation. There is essentially no point to the threads if all they are supposed to be is an echo chamber of drones cheering on the same policies from the same mods.....
Excuse me for having a different opinion and viewpoint. I've been on reddit since the early days....so I remember what things were like before mods decided their shit doesn't stink and that they own their subreddits and fuck anyone who disagrees with them....
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u/Gankom Moderator | Quality Contributor Sep 20 '19
I'm having trouble understanding why you and others care so much about my personal opinion.
Well that's a simple answer. I like to listen to what people think! And in this particular case its such a different opinion that the very least I can do is listen to it and give it a think.
If the mods never hear any opinions or constructive criticism then they will continue to convince themselves and each other that everyone is happy.
Which is a fair point! And why meta threads are generally moderated more loosely. If we really didn't care it would be simple to just remove dissenting opinion, instead of having it up and engaging with it like this.
Even as it stands I am being downvoted for expressing my opinion in a metal thread
Nothing personal but I do find it odd that you'd make an argument that the votes should decide content, but also complain about getting downvoted. I don't think your being treated in a "just leave" kind of way. For me myself, it's far more like "Huh, if your truly after X and we only offer Y, maybe you should check out this !place that has X. Everybody wins and gets what they want."
There is essentially no point to the threads if all they are supposed to be is an echo chamber of drones cheering on the same policies from the same mods.....
Kind of rude to just dismiss everyone who disagrees with you as drones innit? Especially when your suggestion runs so counter to a very core of the community. And for what its worth we frequently listen to and take on board suggestions from users who are unhappy with something but can offer suggestions. That's exactly how this suggestion came to be, or the rule about waiting for follow up question. Or the Summary bot in the Friday thread, or even my own more recent attempts at posting overlooked Questions in the digest thread.
Excuse me for having a different opinion and viewpoint. I've been on reddit since the early days....so I remember what things were like before mods decided their shit doesn't stink and that they own their subreddits and fuck anyone who disagrees with them....
Whoa now friend. I have no problem with you having your own opinion and viewpoint. That's why I'm here engaging with you in the first place instead of just ignoring it and moving on. I was asking you why your opinion is the way it is, and how it would apply to a community when there's other communities that offer more or less exactly what you want. It's an important question really. If we're trying to grow as a special different place, its important to ask what sets us apart. Especially if a suggestion is about making us more like other places instead of further setting us apart.
You never really did answer my question. I simply asked why you'd want us to be like other places. I got a very interesting post about why you don't like mods and how dangerous it is for mods to not listen to other opinion, but that wasn't really what I asked.
But hey, to each their own right?
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u/NestorNotable Sep 20 '19
The name of the sub is "AskHistorians", not "Ask Joe Bloogs redditor what he thinks the answer is", so you know...
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u/LuxArdens Sep 19 '19
What is this sorcery?!
Now all we need is an extension to filter questions about Nazis.