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@@ -14,11 +14,11 @@ This section is divided into two parts. The first part explains what StackExchan
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StackExchange\footnote{\url{https://stackexchange.com}} is a community question and answering (CQA) platform where users can ask and answer questions, accept answers as an appropriate solution to the question, and up-/downvote questions and answers. StackExchange uses a community-driven knowledge creation process by allowing everyone who registers to participate in the community. Invested users also get access to moderation tools to help maintain the vast community. All posts on the StackExchange platform are publicly visible, allowing non-users to benefit from the community as well. Posts are also accessible for web search engines so users can find questions and anwsers easily with a simple web search. StackExchange keeps an archive of all questions and answers posted, creating a knowledge archive for future visitors to look into.
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Originally, StackExchange started with StackOverflow\footnote{\url{https://stackoverflow.com}} in 2008\footnote{\label{atwood2008stack}\url{https://stackoverflow.blog/2008/08/01/stack-overflow-private-beta-begins/}}.
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Since then StackExchange grew into a platform hosting sites for 174 different topics \footnote{\label{stackexchangetour}\url{https://stackexchange.com/tour}}, for instance, programming (StackOverflow), maths (MathOverflow\footnote{\url{https://mathoverflow.net}} and Math StackExchange\footnote{\url{https://math.stackexchange.com}}), and typesetting (TeX/LaTeX\footnote{\url{https://tex.stackexchange.com}}).
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Questions on StackExchange are stated in natural English language and consist of a title, a body containing a detailed description of the problem or information need, and tags to categorize the question. After a question is posted the community can submit answers to the question. The author of the question can then accept an appropriate answer which satisfies their question. The accepted answer is then marked as such with a green checkmark and shown on top of all the other answers. Figure \ref{soexamplepost} shows an example of a StackOverflow question. Questions and answers can be up-/downvoted by every user registered on the site. Votes typically reflect the quality and importance of the respective question or answers. Answers with a high voting score raise to the top of the answer list as answers are sorted by the vote score in descending order by default. Voting also influences a user's reputation \cite{movshovitz2013analysis}\footref{stackexchangetour}. When a post (question or answers) is voted upon the reputation of the poster changes accordingly. Furthermore, downvoting of answers also decreases the reputation of the user who voted \footnote{\url{https://stackoverflow.com/help/privileges/vote-down}}.
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Reputation on StackExchange indicates how trustworthy a user is. To gain a high reputation value a user has to invest a lot of time and effort to reach a high reputation value by asking good questions and posting good answers to questions. Reputation also unlocks privileges which may differ slightly from one community to another \footnote{\url{https://mathoverflow.com/help/privileges/}}\footnote{\url{https://stackoverflow.com/help/privileges/}}.
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Since then StackExchange grew into a platform hosting sites for 174 different topics\footnote{\label{stackexchangetour}\url{https://stackexchange.com/tour}}, for instance, programming (StackOverflow), maths (MathOverflow\footnote{\url{https://mathoverflow.net}} and Math StackExchange\footnote{\url{https://math.stackexchange.com}}), and typesetting (TeX/LaTeX\footnote{\url{https://tex.stackexchange.com}}).
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Questions on StackExchange are stated in natural English language and consist of a title, a body containing a detailed description of the problem or information need, and tags to categorize the question. After a question is posted the community can submit answers to the question. The author of the question can then accept an appropriate answer which satisfies their question. The accepted answer is then marked as such with a green checkmark and shown on top of all the other answers. Figure \ref{soexamplepost} shows an example of a StackOverflow question. Questions and answers can be up-/downvoted by every user registered on the site. Votes typically reflect the quality and importance of the respective question or answers. Answers with a high voting score raise to the top of the answer list as answers are sorted by the vote score in descending order by default. Voting also influences a user's reputation \cite{movshovitz2013analysis}\footref{stackexchangetour}. When a post (question or answers) is voted upon the reputation of the poster changes accordingly. Furthermore, downvoting of answers also decreases the reputation of the user who voted\footnote{\url{https://stackoverflow.com/help/privileges/vote-down}}.
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Reputation on StackExchange indicates how trustworthy a user is. To gain a high reputation value a user has to invest a lot of time and effort to reach a high reputation value by asking good questions and posting good answers to questions. Reputation also unlocks privileges which may differ slightly from one community to another\footnote{\url{https://mathoverflow.com/help/privileges/}}\mfs\footnote{\url{https://stackoverflow.com/help/privileges/}}.
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With privileges, users can, for instance, create new tags if the need for a new tag arises, cast votes on closing or reopening questions if the question is off-topic or a duplicate of another question, or when a question had been closed for no or a wrong reason, or even get access to moderation tools.
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StackExchange also employs a badge system to steer the community \footnote{\label{stackoverflowbadges}\url{https://stackoverflow.com/help/badges/}}. Some badges can be obtained by performing one-time actions, for instance, reading the tour page which contains necessary details for newly registered users, or by performing certain actions multiple times, for instance, editing and answering the same question within 12 hours.
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StackExchange also employs a badge system to steer the community\footnote{\label{stackoverflowbadges}\url{https://stackoverflow.com/help/badges/}}. Some badges can be obtained by performing one-time actions, for instance, reading the tour page which contains necessary details for newly registered users, or by performing certain actions multiple times, for instance, editing and answering the same question within 12 hours.
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Furthermore, users can comment on every question and answer. Comments could be used for further clarifying an answer or a short discussion on a question or answer.
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For each community on StackExchange, a \emph Meta page is offered where members of the respective community can discuss the associated community \cite{mamykina2011design}\footnote{\url{https://stackoverflow.com/help/whats-meta/}}. This place is used by site admins to interact with the community. The \emph Meta pages are also used for proposing and voting on new features and reporting bugs. \emph Meta pages run the same software as the normal CQA pages so users on vote the ideas and suggestions in the same way they would do on the actual CQA sites.
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@@ -106,8 +106,8 @@ One-day-flies may partially be a result of lurking. Lurking is consuming content
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% DONE Non-public and public online community participation: Needs, attitudes and behavior \cite{nonnecke2006non} about lurking, many programmers do that probably, not even registering, lurking not a bad behavior but observing, lurkers are more introverted, passive behavior, less optimistic and positive than posters, prviously lurking was thought of free riding, not contributing, taking not giving to comunity, important for getting to know a community, better integration when joining
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The StackOverflow team acknowledged the one-time-contributors trend\footref{hanlon2018stack}\footref{silge2019welcome} and took efforts to make the site more welcoming to new users\footnote{\label{friend2018rolling}\url{https://stackoverflow.blog/2018/06/21/rolling-out-the-welcome-wagon-june-update/}}. They lied out various reasons: Firstly, they have sent mixed messages whether the site is an expert site or for everyone. Secondly, they gave too little guidance to new users which resulted in poor questions from new users and in the unwelcoming behavior of more integrated users towards the new users. New users do not know all the rules and nuances of communication of the communities. An example is that ''Please`` and ''Thank you`` is not well received on the site as they are deemed unnecessary. Also the quality, clearness and language quality of the questions of new users is lower than more experienced users which leads to unwelcoming or even toxic answers and comments. Moreover, users who gained moderation tool access could close questions with predefined reasons which often are not meaningful enough for the poster of the question\footnote{\label{hanlon2013war}\url{https://stackoverflow.blog/2013/06/25/the-war-of-the-closes/}}. Thirdly, marginalized groups, for instance, women and people of color \cite{ford2016paradise}\footref{hanlon2018stack}\footnote{\label{stackoversurvey2019}\url{https://insights.stackoverflow.com/survey/2019}}, are more likely to drop out of the community due to unwelcoming behavior from other users\footref{hanlon2018stack}. They feel the site is an elitist and hostile place.
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The team suggested several steps to mitigate these problems. Some of these steps include appealing to the users to be more welcoming and forgiving towards new users\footref{hanlon2018stack}\footref{silge2019welcome}\footnote{\url{https://stackoverflow.blog/2012/07/20/kicking-off-the-summer-of-love/}}, other steps are geared towards changes to the platform itself: The \emph{Be nice policy} (code of conduct) was updated with feedback from the community\footnote{\url{https://meta.stackexchange.com/questions/240839/the-new-new-be-nice-policy-code-of-conduct-updated-with-your-feedback}}. This includes: new users should not be judged for not knowing all things. Furthermore, the closing reasons were updated to be more meaningful to the poster, and questions that are closed are shown as ''on hold`` instead of ''closed`` for the first 5 days\footref{hanlon2013war}. Moreover, the team investigates how the comment sections can be improved to lessen the unwelcomeness and hostility and keep the civility up.
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The StackOverflow team acknowledged the one-time-contributors trend\footref{hanlon2018stack}\footref{silge2019welcome} and took efforts to make the site more welcoming to new users\footnote{\label{friend2018rolling}\url{https://stackoverflow.blog/2018/06/21/rolling-out-the-welcome-wagon-june-update/}}. They lied out various reasons: Firstly, they have sent mixed messages whether the site is an expert site or for everyone. Secondly, they gave too little guidance to new users which resulted in poor questions from new users and in the unwelcoming behavior of more integrated users towards the new users. New users do not know all the rules and nuances of communication of the communities. An example is that ''Please`` and ''Thank you`` is not well received on the site as they are deemed unnecessary. Also the quality, clearness and language quality of the questions of new users is lower than more experienced users which leads to unwelcoming or even toxic answers and comments. Moreover, users who gained moderation tool access could close questions with predefined reasons which often are not meaningful enough for the poster of the question\footnote{\label{hanlon2013war}\url{https://stackoverflow.blog/2013/06/25/the-war-of-the-closes/}}. Thirdly, marginalized groups, for instance, women and people of color \cite{ford2016paradise}\footref{hanlon2018stack}\mfs\footnote{\label{stackoversurvey2019}\url{https://insights.stackoverflow.com/survey/2019}}, are more likely to drop out of the community due to unwelcoming behavior from other users\footref{hanlon2018stack}. They feel the site is an elitist and hostile place.
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The team suggested several steps to mitigate these problems. Some of these steps include appealing to the users to be more welcoming and forgiving towards new users\footref{hanlon2018stack}\footref{silge2019welcome}\mfs\footnote{\url{https://stackoverflow.blog/2012/07/20/kicking-off-the-summer-of-love/}}, other steps are geared towards changes to the platform itself: The \emph{Be nice policy} (code of conduct) was updated with feedback from the community\footnote{\url{https://meta.stackexchange.com/questions/240839/the-new-new-be-nice-policy-code-of-conduct-updated-with-your-feedback}}. This includes: new users should not be judged for not knowing all things. Furthermore, the closing reasons were updated to be more meaningful to the poster, and questions that are closed are shown as ''on hold`` instead of ''closed`` for the first 5 days\footref{hanlon2013war}. Moreover, the team investigates how the comment sections can be improved to lessen the unwelcomeness and hostility and keep the civility up.
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The StackOverflow team partnered with \citeauthor{ford2018we} and implemented the Mentorship Research Project \cite{ford2018we}\footnote{\url{https://meta.stackoverflow.com/questions/357198/mentorship-research-project-results-wrap-up}}. The project lasted one month and aimed to help newcomers improve their first questions before they are posted publicly. The program went as follows: When a user is about to post a question the user is asked whether they want their question to be reviewed by a mentor. If they confirmed they are forward to a help room with a mentor who is an experienced user. The question is then reviewed and the mentor suggests some changes if applicable. These changes may include narrowing the question for more precise answers, adding a code example or adjusting code, or removing of \emph{Please} and \emph{Thank you} from the question. After the review and editing, the question is posted publicly by the user. The authors found that mentored questions are received significantly better by the community than non-mentored questions. The questions also received higher scores and were less likely to be off-topic and poor in quality. Furthermore, newcomers are more comfortable when their question is reviewed by a mentor.
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For this project four mentors were hand selected and therefore the project would not scale very well as the number of mentors is very limited but it gave the authors an idea on how to pursue their goal of increasing the welcomingness on StackExchange. The project is followed up by a \emph{Ask a question wizard} to help new users as well as more experienced users improve the structure, quality, and clearness of their questions\footref{friend2018rolling}.
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@@ -163,7 +163,7 @@ Although gaining reputation takes time and effort, users can take certain advant
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% DONE Design Lessons from the Fastest Q&A Site in the West \cite{mamykina2011design} understanding SO success, 1) productive competition (gamification reputation), 2) founders were already experts on site the created (ensured success early on, founders involved in community not external), 3) meta page for discussion and voting on features (same mechanics as on SO page)
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Complementary to the reputation system StackOverflow also employs a badge system \footref{stackoverflowbadges} to stimulate contributions by users \cite{cavusoglu2015can}. The goal of badges is to keep users engaged with the community \cite{li2012quantifying}. Therefore, badges are often used in a gamification setting where users contribute to the community and are rewarded for their behavior if it alignes with the requirements of the badges. Badges are visible in questions and answers as well as the profile page of the user and can be earned by performing certain actions. Badges are often seen as a steering mechanism by researchers \cite{yanovsky2019one, kusmierczyk2018causal, anderson2013steering}. Although users want to achieve badges and are therefore steered to perform certain actions, steering also occurs in the reputation system. However, badges allow a wider variety of goals, for instance, asking and answering questions, voting on questions and answers, or writing higher quality answers.
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Complementary to the reputation system StackOverflow also employs a badge system\footref{stackoverflowbadges} to stimulate contributions by users \cite{cavusoglu2015can}. The goal of badges is to keep users engaged with the community \cite{li2012quantifying}. Therefore, badges are often used in a gamification setting where users contribute to the community and are rewarded for their behavior if it alignes with the requirements of the badges. Badges are visible in questions and answers as well as the profile page of the user and can be earned by performing certain actions. Badges are often seen as a steering mechanism by researchers \cite{yanovsky2019one, kusmierczyk2018causal, anderson2013steering}. Although users want to achieve badges and are therefore steered to perform certain actions, steering also occurs in the reputation system. However, badges allow a wider variety of goals, for instance, asking and answering questions, voting on questions and answers, or writing higher quality answers.
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Badges also work as a motivator for users \cite{anderson2013steering}. Users often put in non-trivial amounts of work and effort to achieve badges and so badges become powerful incentives. However, not all users are equal and therefore do not pursue badges in the same way \cite{yanovsky2019one}. Contrary to \cite{anderson2013steering}, \citeauthor{yanovsky2019one} \cite{yanovsky2019one} found that users do not necessarily increase their activity prior to achieving a badge followed by an immediate decrease in contribution thereafter but users behave differently based on their type of contribution. The authors found users can be categorized into three groups: Firstly, some users are not affected at all by the badge system and still contribute a lot to the community. Secondly, users increase their activity too before gaining a badge and keep their level of contribution afterward. Finally, users increase their activity before achieving a badge and return to their previous level of engagement thereafter.
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Different badges also create status classes \cite{immorlica2015social}. The harder a badge can be earned by users, the more unique it is within the community and therefore the badge symbolizes some sort of status. Often rare badges are hard to achieve and take significant effort. For some users, depending on their type, this can be a huge motivator.
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\citeauthor{kusmierczyk2018causal} found first-time badges play an important role in steering users \cite{kusmierczyk2018causal}. The steering effect only takes place if the benefit to the user is greater than the effort the user has to put into to obtain the badge. If the effort is greater the user will likely not pursue the badge and therefore the steering effect will not occur.
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@@ -180,7 +180,7 @@ Different badges also create status classes \cite{immorlica2015social}. The hard
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% DONE Steering user behavior with badges \cite{anderson2013steering} # all abount badges, steering users, motivation, user may put in non trivial amounts of work to achieve badges -> powerful incentives, badges used in multiple ways (steer users to ask/answer more questions, voting, etc.)
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Quality is often a concern in online communities. Platform moderators and admins want to keep a certain level of quality or even raise it. However, higher-quality posts take more time and effort than lower-quality posts. In the case of CQA platforms, this is an even bigger problem as higher quality answers fight against fast responses. Despite that, StackOverflow also has a problem with low quality and effort questions and subsequent unwelcoming answers and comments \footref{silge2019welcome}. StackOverflow has grown into a large community and larger communities are harder to control. \citeauthor{lin2017better} investigated how growth affects a community. They looked at Reddit communities that were added to the default set of subscribed communities of every new user (defaulting) which lead to a huge influx of new users to these communities as a result. The authors found that contrary to expectations, the quality stays largely the same. The vote score dips shortly after defaulting but quickly recovers or even raises to higher levels than before. The complaints of low-quality content did not increase, and the language used in the community stayed the same. However, the community clustered around fewer posts than before defaulting.
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Quality is often a concern in online communities. Platform moderators and admins want to keep a certain level of quality or even raise it. However, higher-quality posts take more time and effort than lower-quality posts. In the case of CQA platforms, this is an even bigger problem as higher quality answers fight against fast responses. Despite that, StackOverflow also has a problem with low quality and effort questions and subsequent unwelcoming answers and comments\footref{silge2019welcome}. StackOverflow has grown into a large community and larger communities are harder to control. \citeauthor{lin2017better} investigated how growth affects a community. They looked at Reddit communities that were added to the default set of subscribed communities of every new user (defaulting) which lead to a huge influx of new users to these communities as a result. The authors found that contrary to expectations, the quality stays largely the same. The vote score dips shortly after defaulting but quickly recovers or even raises to higher levels than before. The complaints of low-quality content did not increase, and the language used in the community stayed the same. However, the community clustered around fewer posts than before defaulting.
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\citeauthor{tausczik2011predicting} found reputation is linked to the perceived quality of posts in multiple ways \cite{tausczik2011predicting}. They suggest reputation could be used as an indicator of quality.
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Quality also depends on the type of platform. \cite{lin2017better} showed that expert sites who charge fees, for instance, library reference services, have higher quality answers compared to free sites. Also, the higher the fee the higher the quality of the answers. However, free community sites outperform expert sites in terms of answer density and responsiveness.
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wea_ondara