If you were to look at my Stackoverflow account, you'll see me sitting on some modest amount of reputation points..
It took me 2 months to gain that amount of points - with pure effort, and I feel horrible right now about it. Those numbers don't attribute to anything and I've wasted my life pursing that project and those points...
Stackoverflow is a competition, and apparently, when I started, I was competing against a couple of users who are still quite active now:
http://stackoverflow.com/users/1862225/a-v
http://stackoverflow.com/users/1887854/aspiring-aqib
http://stackoverflow.com/users/1729773/atoztoa
http://stackoverflow.com/users/1862225/a-v
http://stackoverflow.com/users/1887854/aspiring-aqib
http://stackoverflow.com/users/1729773/atoztoa
Retention was at an all time high, they [metaphorically] hated me, worked together [somehow] and I hated them, with our answers sometimes converging starkly comments were thrown across. Tensions were high, but damn, staying "professional" takes a lot of effort and will power. So I considered the competition to be mutual, since we all respected each other for gaining that much rep in such a short period of time...
I was looking at my comments and answers the other day; during the time when I was committed to gaining rep and helping people. I unknowingly answered pretty horrible and laborious/tedious questions from 0-500 rep accounts - one of the many reasons that contributed to my hiatus that started on December 25 and ended 3 weeks after.. The competition from A.V., Aspiring Aquib [who, coincidentally was the same age as me] and Atoztoa played a small role in the hiatus, I mean without me, those powerusers can gain as much reputation as they want. Answering mediocre and poor quality questions so they "contributed" made me rethink Stackoverflow as a corruptive force.
I was looking at my comments and answers the other day; during the time when I was committed to gaining rep and helping people. I unknowingly answered pretty horrible and laborious/tedious questions from 0-500 rep accounts - one of the many reasons that contributed to my hiatus that started on December 25 and ended 3 weeks after.. The competition from A.V., Aspiring Aquib [who, coincidentally was the same age as me] and Atoztoa played a small role in the hiatus, I mean without me, those powerusers can gain as much reputation as they want. Answering mediocre and poor quality questions so they "contributed" made me rethink Stackoverflow as a corruptive force.
Stackoverflow is a place for questions that help contribute to the community. The rules should be made clear so that a "localized" question should means any question that doesn't help anyone else. Free help to write code and to build projects should not be the reason someone creates a Stackoverflow account, and I feel for it, well, until the 25th of December 2012, when I stopped caring altogether. And even now I'm not proud of "helping" people.
The community was never hostile to me and I quite like it there, but, I'm going to be start using that website for what it is meant for: finding answers and asking questions (as opposed to answering questions for reputation)
Now this "whoring rep" sensation on Stackoverflow is absolutely confusing me. The no #1 question on Stackoverflow question this week, and month was asked by a guy that seems self confident, in the "try hard" manner.. And it's irritating, because it doesn't promote professionalism and does indeed convey Stackoverflow as a website for ameteur developers and reputation "whores"..
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In short, the imaginary internet points on Stackoverflow no-longer means anything to me, because I don't see it as something that's useful or needed, since they can be easily obtained by asking sub-standard questions that everyone "likes" in most cases.
The gamification of Stackoverflow is facilitated by low quality questions, alongside answers that are "popular" instead of useful, and there should be an effort made to stop this.
The gamification of Stackoverflow is facilitated by low quality questions, alongside answers that are "popular" instead of useful, and there should be an effort made to stop this.
