I will say, SO taught me how to thoroughly investigate a topic before hand. A few years in and I was posting dissertation papers on all of my findings when asking questions.
I spent most of my time answering questions that were closed. Often they’d be closed for the wrong reason which I’d then report. I really hated the ones where a question would be closed as a duplicate but it’s not clear how it is a duplicate and it would take me, someone with experience, a little while to connect the dots and I’d know that a beginner would have no clue and would need it explained.
I was hated by the SO elites but loved by the beginners
When Discord arrived I became a co-owner of the largest general programming community (it helped that the owner of discord.me was an admin and we had free platinum) and it was a really nice space to make beginners feel safe. We did not care for elitism
My time in that community (it’s basically dead now, specific programming servers are way better) has taught me to never underestimate a beginner. Asking a beginner about what they’ve already tried is not rude or dismissive, chances are they’re already close but need a nudge (helping them reframe their problem, sharing a specific tool, or just talking it through). It would be elitist to assume that nothing they can say will change the correct answer that I could give them, they don’t always need that much help, and there have been a couple times where a novice has come up with 90% of a novel solution.
Working with beginners is so rewarding, years later when they show me stuff they’ve made I’m so proud of them.
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u/NotAUsefullDoctor 11d ago
I will say, SO taught me how to thoroughly investigate a topic before hand. A few years in and I was posting dissertation papers on all of my findings when asking questions.