I had a rather interesting response when offering an answer to this question:
The question has since been "protected" because it has "attracted low-quality answers."
I fail to see how my answer merits that.
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3What proof do you have that you're being discriminated against?– MetaFightApr 10, 2015 at 14:34
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What, bolding the evidence wasn't enough for you to notice it? "However, the question has since been 'protected' because it has 'attracted low-quality answers.'"– JoeApr 10, 2015 at 14:35
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4That protection message is a generic message that can be applied by any 15k rep user. It is typically used for very popular (see Hot Network Questions on the right) questions or very old ones that are receiving newer attention without really adding anything.– user22815Apr 10, 2015 at 14:35
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Neither of which applied.– JoeApr 10, 2015 at 14:36
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This site is moderated by popularity contest?– JoeApr 10, 2015 at 14:37
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Hi Joe, could you calm down instead of biting my head off? I looked for the "protected" label and couldn't see it. As of the time of writing of this comment, the question you referenced is on hold. Your answer hasn't been downvoted either.– MetaFightApr 10, 2015 at 14:37
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4Joe - do you understand the difference between site moderators and community moderation? Site moderators are users with diamonds after their name and have additional privileges on the site. Community moderation is action taken be community members to maintain site quality. I believe what you're asking about came from community moderation not site moderator activity. Please edit your question to clarify which.– user53019Apr 10, 2015 at 14:37
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@MetaFight - The protected label was removed after the question closed.– user53019Apr 10, 2015 at 14:38
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I admit, I didn't understand the difference. I shall edit the question.– JoeApr 10, 2015 at 14:39
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3Currently there are no up or down votes on your answer to the tips question. What are you referring to when you say "I got a downvote; fine, I also got two upvotes."? I don't see the votes you are saying occurred.– user53019Apr 10, 2015 at 14:49
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@GlenH7 OP could mistaken these for down votes on their recent question– gnatApr 10, 2015 at 15:31
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4I will point out that you have gotten some down votes on this question. Meta is different and votes here are more about the tone of the post and agreement / disagreement rather than anything else. These votes do not affect your reputation and just because something has negative votes on meta does not mean that you should delete it (I've got some very down voted meta questions elsewhere - even one that I wrote intending for it to be down voted). Remember, meta votes do not affect rep.– user40980Apr 10, 2015 at 16:03
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4Given that you managed to ask this question on the wrong site, perhaps you should first make an effort to understand how moderation works (in particular, the concept of "protection") before you start claiming discrimination.– Robert HarveyApr 10, 2015 at 16:10
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@gnat, Or perhaps people voted on my answer before the post was protected?– JoeApr 10, 2015 at 22:11
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any votes that could be there, would stay "locked" because you didn't edit it. What I see now in that answer are 0 votes up and down, meaning nobody voted for at least 14 hours. Could you by chance mistake these with votes to your other answer which has got to -3 before being deleted by a moderator?– gnatApr 10, 2015 at 22:24
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3 Answers
When we (users with enough reputation) protect questions, the standard text talks about "low quality answers", and it's a frequent thing that is done with very old questions which are resurrected to the front page either due to a new answer (like yours in this case) or because the question was linked offsite.
These scenarios tend to lead to many low-rep users chiming in with answers that do not add much. Worse, very old questions often aren't seen by their askers, so they can't benefit from your answer (or select it as accepted).
This wasn't any slight against you - there was another more troublesome answer:
Protecting the question doesn't impact your (solid) answer at all.
One important bit to realize about the Stack Exchange format, is that it is Q&A. Questions and answers. Provocation and 'get[ing] people to think' is not what the Q&A format is geared to. Rather, the "you have this problem, this is the solution."
The Stack Exchange format is not that of a forum and has a number if differences. To that, I would suggest that you read On discussions and why they don't make good questions and its related reading section which goes more into that.
The python question was protected because another user posted a rather low quality answer on it that really didn't add anything. It has since been deleted. We have often found that when an old post that should be closed because it is too broad is bumped back up to the front page of activity, that other people will often post answers to it that are similarly low quality (yours was reasonable, but there are problems with the question that would entice other people to add their two bits).
Protecting the question prevents people who aren't familiar with the Q&A model from posting other responses as if this was a forum post, and also gives pause to higher rep users to remind them to post good answers.
The question meanders and covers a lot of ground (hence being closed as "too broad"). As best as I can tell, the question is:
I'd appreciate some tips on how to best approach this code conversion (C to Python), based on your experience.
Your answer starts off well enough talking about general approaches, then dives into memory allocation where it spends most of its space talking about GC, object caches, etc. which were not mentioned in the question as asked.
In other words, it appears that the question itself was poorly worded: you got sucked into answering what is essentially an unanswerable question unless you are writing a whole book on the topic.
I would not take this personally, the real problem is the question: your answer simply brought attention to it.
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"Answer well-asked questions Not all questions can or should be answered here. Save yourself some frustration and avoid trying to answer questions which... ...are unclear or lacking specific details that can uniquely identify the problem..." (How to Answer)– gnatApr 10, 2015 at 15:35