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  1. In this meta post, In this answer, mentioned that : "even though his question wasn't originally phrased this way". I don't know how is my question phrased right now (in community opinion), but anyway even if someone look at revision history, nothing added to the question*. So either my question is not in that group (mentioned in the meta answer) or if it is in that group, it was originally phrased that way. So I want to ask moderators to either delete reference to my question from that meta answer or rephrase the meta answer.

  2. Why there should be a locked posts on meta? That means either we saw every possible thing or we are following some principle Dogmas or admins are knowing everything about it. Is there any other meaning for that?

* One word deleted and Tex format added later, not anything else. The deleted word was irrelevant to origin of question, and was just intro. After I saw some people are stressing on that (which was very irrelevant to origin of question) I deleted it.

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  • $\begingroup$ as part of my mod campaign, advocated at least that post on tcs.se preprint policy be unlocked but there seems little support even for that. as for entire meta section, suggest not taking it too seriously! there is a lot of historical/archived collective handwringing and angst on misc topics, but it doesnt nec. directly influence main site voting... voting is the key dynamic of measuring topic relevance, and old posts get little attn by active members. also, a key dynamic of meta to realize (counterintuitively) is that its not really for negotiating policy esp by lower-rep users.... $\endgroup$
    – vzn
    Commented Mar 31, 2014 at 15:06
  • $\begingroup$ @vzn, I don't think negotiating policies is related to rep in any sense. Here rep means how often you are active (asking and answering not other activities) and how much community trusts you and nothing else. I mean it doesn't show you are specialist in some field or not (many Q&A are for undergrads, there are wrong answers with many upvotes, ...) also low rep doesn't show how logical are your arguments. e.g My question in main site got somehow many upvotes, but doesn't imply that it's really pure scientific question just means some people like it. $\endgroup$
    – Saeed
    Commented Mar 31, 2014 at 15:16
  • $\begingroup$ you are asking to change the site policy that was achieved through long ago consensus/voting. rep is a key measure of site participation. you might notice that most major site policies were enacted by users with high rep and in my long 2+yr experience here, the higher rep users are generally not really interested in negotiating/revisiting/reevaluating any policy with lower rep users, only using meta to emphasize/enforce existing policy. if you think about it, the locked post on so-called "crank friendly topics/preprint policy" is strong evidence of exactly that interpretation of reality. $\endgroup$
    – vzn
    Commented Mar 31, 2014 at 15:20
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    $\begingroup$ @vzn, I'm not sure if you are correct but site policy can change. e.g at the time I asked that question some hi rep users linked me to the corresponding meta post, I found their links irrelevant to my post, but I didn't discuss with them and I simply said I'm not going to remove the question or tolerate the close option. Some days after this, new policy added and as claimed was based on low rep user (me) question. I mean if you really think one side cannot understand the other side, you should definitely stop this kind of co-working, otherwise is just wasting of time for both sides. $\endgroup$
    – Saeed
    Commented Mar 31, 2014 at 15:32
  • $\begingroup$ yes, indeed, can agree on part of that, some waste of time going on here! your question and the crank policy you cite are both three years old, ancient history... so far, am the only person who has voted for your post & now you reflexively reject a potential ally... see also stemreview area51 proposal for reviewing scientific preprints... a "tough sell" to say the least... less than 2dozen volunteers in all of cyberspace after months of promotion & stalled for several months in any member gains... try adding your question there! $\endgroup$
    – vzn
    Commented Mar 31, 2014 at 16:16
  • $\begingroup$ @vzn, I edited the question, whenever you like remove your upvote (and if you like turn it to downvote, if vote was matter for me I shouldn't ask such a sharp questions on meta). I didn't talk about particular locked post, I asked what are reasons to lock a post and I provided some evidences to show that seems is not a good attitude. Finally sometimes I revisit my Q&A specally ones in my master time, so I don't care if is ancient or not. $\endgroup$
    – Saeed
    Commented Mar 31, 2014 at 17:06
  • $\begingroup$ While it is true that your question has not been substantially edited so Josh's answer gets that wrong, IMO your question right now is not a reference request of the type Josh says should be acceptable. It's also not tagged as a ref request. $\endgroup$
    – Sasho Nikolov
    Commented Apr 3, 2014 at 5:37
  • $\begingroup$ @SashoNikolov, OK, then what's a relation of your comment to my meta question? I already said that I don't know what is the opinion of community about my question right now, whatever the opinion of community is, that mentioned answer either should not refer to me or should not say this. If you think my question is not a suitable question for site, then provide a meta post for that, or flag it, this post definitely does not talk about the quality, ... of that post. $\endgroup$
    – Saeed
    Commented Apr 3, 2014 at 10:43
  • $\begingroup$ Finally, voting on meta is for polling, but voting on main site is not related to polling (otherwise show me a reference), if you think the question is really bad and deserves a downvote, then it's well accepted that, it's a constructive attitude to provide a reason to downvote to help to improve the quality. On the other hand if you are just not agree with that question I think it's just illogical behavior to downvote it. (I saw such a behavior at other SE sites very often but in this site I expect to see it as less as possible). $\endgroup$
    – Saeed
    Commented Apr 3, 2014 at 10:48
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    $\begingroup$ What downvote are you talking about? That I downvoted your linked question: yes I did. Why did I not leave a comment: because other comments already express the reason I do not think the question is suitable. In that case I see no need for multiple comments. $\endgroup$
    – Sasho Nikolov
    Commented Apr 3, 2014 at 15:19
  • $\begingroup$ The reason for my comment is that you said this: "Fixing that answer is important to me because of difference between stupidity and wiseness". So I am pointing out that Josh's answer makes your question look wiser than it is, so maybe you should let it be. If you don't want to let it be, go ahead and flag the answer for moderator attention. I see no reason to do this via a meta question (I am not talking about your second question, that one is reasonable). $\endgroup$
    – Sasho Nikolov
    Commented Apr 3, 2014 at 15:26
  • $\begingroup$ @SashoNikolov, About the first part, that's your opinion, but it's not my opinion. I don't think so, I think my question was wise enough in the range of such questions and does not need anyone else's help to make it wiser. May be I'm wrong though, but I think it's not important what my intention is, the main reason that I turn it to the meta question not a simple flag, is, nobody can edit it, even if is wrong, as you are agree the Josh statement (whether it's compliment or not) is not true, so should be edited. Having locked post in this site is somehow insulting even if there are bad users. $\endgroup$
    – Saeed
    Commented Apr 3, 2014 at 15:43
  • $\begingroup$ if its any consolation, possibly all the locked posts on meta were unilaterally locked by a single prior moderator ie "now under new management" $\endgroup$
    – vzn
    Commented Apr 3, 2014 at 20:29
  • $\begingroup$ Pro-term moderators locked policy posts before I become a mod. And this is not a policy post. $\endgroup$
    – Kaveh
    Commented Apr 3, 2014 at 22:31
  • $\begingroup$ @Kaveh, I personally did not intend to say this was your idea, it's clear that group of moderators had meeting then they decide to use lock post, and sure even for particular post they also had meetings (remotely). So this post may be actually asking from all members of moderators. Don't take it personal at all. (I'm sure you don't but I think it's better to not react against personal attacks). $\endgroup$
    – Saeed
    Commented Apr 3, 2014 at 23:05

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  1. It is an answer by a user. It looks like that you are right that the statement is not accurate, still I personally don't think it is a big deal and need to be fixed.

  2. Policy posts are locked after they are adopted/rejected to preserve the discussion and votes at that state.
    Locking doesn't mean those policies cannot be revisited or changed. If you want to revisit an issue about a policy you can start a new discussion by posting a new policy discussion question and then a policy voting question.

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  • $\begingroup$ Thanks for information. But I cannot see why they should be locked, e.g such a simple thing that I mentioned could be fixed simply. Probably locks are because of preventing spams, ... But even if a policy post poisoned with spam, it will be automatically cleaned by community, I mean both by vote casting and then deleting by high rep users. Probably at that time there were not enough high rep users to have this privilege, but right now I think situation is better. $\endgroup$
    – Saeed
    Commented Mar 31, 2014 at 21:49
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    $\begingroup$ @Saeed, it is not because of spam. Policies are like historical documents for governing the site, it is useful to keep the votes and discussions as they were at the time policies were passed/rejected. E.g. we often use these posts as our reference for new users and it is not helpful if every time we do so they can go and down vote or change them. If someone wants to change a policy they should start a new discussion. ps: if fixing the statement in that answer is really important for you then I would suggest that you flag the post and make a polite request to the moderators to fix it. $\endgroup$
    – Kaveh
    Commented Mar 31, 2014 at 22:37
  • $\begingroup$ downvote needs at least 125 rep, is more than 15 rep for upvote, if we add new policy which accepted with possibly 15 rep user, is worse than a downvoting on accepted policy. Also new user may be has better idea than us. If you want prevent fresh user changes, you can simply protect it. Fixing that answer is important to me because of difference between stupidity and wiseness, but I don't see any reason to ask moderators to do this. At SE sites this is not the only site with policy post, e.g this is another one : meta.stackexchange.com/questions/7931/… $\endgroup$
    – Saeed
    Commented Apr 1, 2014 at 8:47
  • $\begingroup$ P.S: Here I asked moderators, but there is a lots of difference between this way and flag, actually I tried to announce two bad attitude in the site. (May be they are not bad and is my fault). $\endgroup$
    – Saeed
    Commented Apr 1, 2014 at 8:51
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    $\begingroup$ @Saeed, other sites are not governed like cstheory, on other sites moderators generally have a greater power to act even if the community does not agrees with it, they don't pass policies like us. We run it more democratically here. By a new user I didn't mean someone who just has visited the site, but users who have not been around enough to know the norms and policies. I think there is a good reason to lock and preserve policy posts as they are passed/rejected and locking doesn't not restrict a new user from starting a new policy discussion. $\endgroup$
    – Kaveh
    Commented Apr 1, 2014 at 8:54
  • $\begingroup$ Do you have any statical analysis for your claim? (I mean statistical analysis which shows that : 1.Why you think new user with your definition has bad influence? and 2.Why you think community will not adjust this influence?) $\endgroup$
    – Saeed
    Commented Apr 1, 2014 at 8:59
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    $\begingroup$ @Saeed, Even a single case is enough (yes, we did have such cases). Voting on policies is allowed for a limited time after they are proposed not forever and it is useful for administrative reasons to preserve them. As I wrote it is not a restriction if someone wants to propose a change to site policies, they just need to start a new discussion. $\endgroup$
    – Kaveh
    Commented Apr 1, 2014 at 9:08
  • $\begingroup$ I did not convince with your argument, I asked for two things: First, if this happened to see bad influence by new users, if there was bad new users doesn't mean they had any influence (e.g one among 10 vote does not count as influence), and the second still is in my previous comment, but your last comment, seems did not answer any of them. $\endgroup$
    – Saeed
    Commented Apr 1, 2014 at 14:03
  • $\begingroup$ disagree the site is "democratically run" & find/interpret much evidence to the contrary but on other hand after long looking around stackexchange dont think its much different from other se sites either, where mods are given huge powers and not much incentive to consensus. also, Saeed did raise an issue on meta exactly as K. states, adding a silly/mostly meaningless/symbolic policy tag to his post will likely have no different/discernable effect ... anyway suggest one of the parties open a chat room for this topic ... oh and did anyone notice no mods have said anything so far $\endgroup$
    – vzn
    Commented Apr 1, 2014 at 17:30
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    $\begingroup$ @Saeed, it is not my intention to convince you. I just wanted explain the reason for lucking policy posts. $\endgroup$
    – Kaveh
    Commented Apr 1, 2014 at 17:48
  • $\begingroup$ OK, I thought you probably want to provide a reasonable arguments, not just saying x is better than y because x is better than y. Anyway thanks for providing basic reasons. $\endgroup$
    – Saeed
    Commented Apr 1, 2014 at 21:03

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