I agree, the quote above could be worded more friendly. One could for example write "Please mind that posting the same question to multiple sites can be perceived as bad etiquette, because efforts may be made to address a problem that has already been solved elsewhere in the meantime."
But I have my doubts whether it makes a big difference. Users displaying this behaviour evidently did not turn to their favourite community for help; instead, they chose a shotgun approach. In moments of great despair, "Whatever sticks" may seem like a legitimate strategy, but it also makes it unlikely that the user is genuinely interested in contributing to the communities later on.
Tolerating cross-posting might discourage established users from putting much effort into answering a newcomer's question in the future. Since most new users - including those that will contribute much more to Biostars in the future - will be initially brought to this site by a pressing question, receiving no/few answers will also not make them feel welcome.
I think, in terms of communicating community rules, the Discourse approach is exemplary: Instead of overwhelming new users with long prose of community guidelines, an interactive bot in conjunction with trust levels step by step introduces new features and sends occasional friendly reminders about desired behaviour.
I have not looked into the source code of Biostars, but it should be possible to define some basic rules that suggest an important feature is unknown or unused. If a user for example never upvotes replies to their questions or marks them as solved, a friendly explanation how to use that feature could be displayed as a notification? (Similar to those badge notifications)
Thanks for making this post. I have certainly been guilty of this and we're all often too quick to judge.
If it's someone's first time and they are unaware of the rules, we should be a bit more gentle. Only after they're informed of proper etiquette and still engage in the same behavior should we express our disapproval.
Owner of biostars wants to keep the barrier for participation low and as a result there is no captcha/verification required to post on biostars. One can create a simple local account or use one of the external site logins (google etc) before posting.
We had discussed adding a click-through/verification like you mention when we were having a problem with bots a couple of years back. At that time Istvan chose to implement a software solution to manage bots rather than adding an extra verification step for sign-ups.
Someone trying to post on Biostars has a pressing question that they are looking to get help for. So to be realistic not many are going to read through "best practices" before mashing the
Acceptbutton.I am not bothered by multiple posts but providing closure to a question is important. If a question gets answered on a different forum then indicating so on biostars is least posters can do.
I think there is a contradiction in keeping the barrier for participation low and the unwritten - but often cited - expectation that everyone should be writing in a professional tone. Chances are solid that first-time users will do something that collides with community guidelines in their very first post. Yet it seems like it is more acceptable to put the burden of correcting behavior on moderators and users than to demand 2 minutes of user's time to educate themselves. I think that at least 5-10% of posts on this forum are behavior-correcting in nature - telling people to upvote, how to format posts, to show some effort, etc. It seems like an awfully high price to pay to lower the registration effort for a bunch of users who will visit the site once or twice. But I defer to Istvan Albert when it comes to business models, because this may be a good model even if it defies my logic.
I think the people who need training are the ones least able to recognize that.
I foresee a lot of potential in AI-based methods to help assist users in asking better questions.
I am keen on exploring ways in which an AI-based agent would proofread a question before the user posts it and then suggest improvements for tone, content, specificity, etc.
The quoted content is mine and I'm probably also the person that you had the bad interaction with when you first became part of biostars. I do have the reputation of being the jerk cop around here.
I think cross-posting is bad practice because it shows a sense of entitlement on the part of the asker. If I were asking on multiple forums, I would at least mention the other posts so it serves as a record. Anyone that puts in enough effort to ask a good question in one forum is a lot closer to the answer than someone copy pasting the same low effort content in multiple places.
In my experience with pointing people to these cross-posts, I've seen people claim that they were unaware and would not repeat that behavior, but only when the language says that it is unequivocally bad. Cajoling into good behavior is largely ignored by most people. But perhaps I need to moderate myself.
Going forward, I'll add a pointer to other posts with a simple "Warning: Please do not ask the same question on multiple sites without cross-linking them" the first time, and reserve this kind of messaging for repeat offenders.
Stealing from the poor is unequivocally bad. Maybe even from the rich :-) Double-posting is not unequivocally bad. How do I know this? If a person double-posts with a disclaimer about double-posting, it becomes acceptable. When there are such swings in what is considered acceptable, that behavior can't be unequivocally bad. This is especially the case because we are not taught in school, or in any other aspect of our education, that double-posting is a bad behavior.
That's a valid point. I will soften my language.
Or is it desperation? I would contend that most users who resort to this are newcomers to the field working in a state of urgency. Often, as a beginner, you don't even know how to describe your problem. It takes experience just to become familiar with the right keywords (e.g., "regex"). Not everyone has the capacity, need, nor luxury to develop these capabilities. I don't think there is any harm in being tolerant of what can be considered poor etiquette should it be unlikely to be the result of bad faith behavior.
I agree with your general meaning, but there are different ways to manifest the newcomer desperation. To me double-posting is acceptable when people want their problem solved quickly. How is everyone supposed to know that posting at two places simultaneously will get the members upset? This is simple ignorance. I have less patience for those who think their problem is the only thing that matters in the world and expect someone to write full code for them. Or those who write a single-sentence posts that require follow-up questions before they can be answered properly. That's entitlement, and it should be something that most people know is unacceptable in any human interaction.