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This answer on a question about what seems to be a rogue IT security adviser was deleted.

My guess about the closure is because it repeats another answer. However, it's just a guess. It would be nice if moderators tried, just a little, to say why the closure instead of just giving the generic "read the FAQ".

Also, there appear (to my eyes) to be many other duplicate answers on that question. Why are none of those closed by the moderator?

Pointers appreciated on a) why my answer was closed and b) why other answers on the same question are not!

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    We haven't got time sorry, we don't get paid for this and it takes a LOT of time, we also get a lot of crap to deal with, so sorry we don't justify our every minor action. 90% our work is driven by alerts from other users, as it was in this case.
    – Chopper3 Mod
    Commented Jul 23, 2011 at 21:58
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    @Chopper3: Thanks for taking the time to respond! No offence intended, but your comment here comes across as "harried and annoyed" which, in my opinion, is not conducive to reasoned moderation. Perhaps you should re-think your level of engagement? YMMV.
    – Peter K.
    Commented Jul 23, 2011 at 22:38
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    You're right, I am, and the majority of the reason why has nothing to do with you or your post, we've just had a lot of very low users moaning about single post close/deletes today. We get hundreds of posts each day to be checked, some need moderating but the only people that ever complain are new users with some sense that their words and only theirs are gold woven thread that can't be touched, very often the exact opposite is true. I'm sorry that you feel moderators need to be ice-cool perfect people, after all you pay so very much for this site right, you deserve better right?
    – Chopper3 Mod
    Commented Jul 23, 2011 at 22:48
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    @Chopper3: I pay for what I get! ;-) Thanks, again, for responding.
    – Peter K.
    Commented Jul 23, 2011 at 22:52
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    Ultimately you posted a cartoon not an answer, and non-answer get deleted, nothing personal, happens all the time. If I was annoyed it was because we've had a flood of just this kind of easily-answered-but-often-needlessly-argued complaint that takes time away from my weekend and other mod jobs that need doing.
    – Chopper3 Mod
    Commented Jul 23, 2011 at 22:59
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    @Downvoter: Why a downvote? I thought this was the place to ask these sort of questions. I'm trying to get the hang of what and how to ask questions on Server Fault... and I can't see any other place to ask.
    – Peter K.
    Commented Jul 23, 2011 at 23:10
  • I've no idea who or why someone down voted you but seriously dude, concentrate on adding to SF not moaning about losing the odd rep point. Firstly it's only meta, it doesn't really count and it doesn't really matter, you should see how many down votes all of the top rep users get. If you're going to come on here every time some upsets you you'll only get more down votes I'd imagine.
    – Chopper3 Mod
    Commented Jul 23, 2011 at 23:14
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    Don't take downvotes personally on SF -- they mean "this answer is wrong" and "this question could be better", not "you're a bad person". Really don't take downvotes personally on MSF, they just mean "I don't agree with this".
    – womble Mod
    Commented Jul 23, 2011 at 23:17
  • :-) Thanks for the support guys! Much appreciated. I am still trying to get my head around the SF environment, so I thought I'd ask about the downvote.
    – Peter K.
    Commented Jul 23, 2011 at 23:22
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    Also, votes on m.SF don't have any affect, they do not affect your reputation, neither positive nor negative. On m.SF, as womble points out, it means "I agree" or "I disagree". On SF they mean "Good Question" or "Poorly worded/thought-out/factually-flawed Question" (or similar for answers). Also, you posted a cartoon as an Answer, a cartoon which didn't actually answer the question either. I'm sure others have said, read the faq, but this isn't a discussion board or forum, and is meant for professionals to help solve each others problems.
    – Chris S
    Commented Jul 24, 2011 at 3:20

4 Answers 4

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Your guess is likely wrong. I flagged that answer as 'Not an answer' as fails entirely to answer any part of the question. My flag is marked as valid.

There is nothing wrong with duplicate answers, the community judges their validity.

There is no evidence that the auditor is a rogue or an idiot.

For those with <10k this is Peter's answer

This security auditor really reminds me of Dogbert.

enter image description here

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  • Thanks, Iain! I suppose I should have been more explicit as to why it reminded me of dogbert: the auditor was trying to catch the OP out (which others had expressed, hence my thinking it was a dupe).
    – Peter K.
    Commented Jul 23, 2011 at 21:32
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    Take more time to understand the site, you'll quickly figure out why users alerted us to it.
    – Chopper3 Mod
    Commented Jul 23, 2011 at 21:59
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    Haha, I saw that dilbert comic come through my feed the other day. Immaculate timing, but I can see why it was deemed "not an answer"
    – Mark Henderson Mod
    Commented Jul 23, 2011 at 22:02
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I see two strikes against it:

  1. It uses a picture to convey the disapproval. We've deleted 'macro' posts before. While this isn't a macro, it conveys a similar message.
  2. It expresses an opinion of the situation, not a full answer to the problem. The opinion, the auditor is, ahem, seriously misguided, is held by nearly everyone answering. Your post had that as the sole content, and there are two other deleted answers on that same question that express the same point.
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  • Thanks, sysadmin1138! 1. It wasn't a macro. 2. As I said to Iain's answer: my implied answer (obviously not clearly!) was that the auditor was trying to catch the OP out.
    – Peter K.
    Commented Jul 23, 2011 at 21:33
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    Which is a position I agree with entirely but unfortunately the emotive language in the question appears to have blinded many people to the posiblity of.
    – user9517
    Commented Jul 23, 2011 at 21:48
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I didn't see your answer before it got deleted, but as other have said, giving a clever answer by posting a picture is always likely to get deleted here. A few smart-aleck-y answers slip through, but by and large you need to give a clear answer.

The real reason I posted this as an answer, however was to point out something that I didn't want to get lost in the comments on your question: downvotes on a META site don't mean the same thing as on a main site. They don't mean "this is a bad question," they mean, "I disagree with this." In the same way, upvotes on meta mean "good idea," or "I agree."

So the downvotes here mean, "Sorry, I don't think you have a valid complaint."

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If your answer was made to a question with no answers, and had some more explanatory text, I suspect it would have sailed through without comment. However, that question has plenty of very good answers already, and is high visibility, so it's important to keep the question to a certain high standard to avoid the appearance of "broken windows".

Your answer contributed nothing that hadn't already been expressed more clearly by several other people, and it could be seen as an attempt to valuelessly garner rep on a popular question by "hahaha! (click)" rather than valid contribution.

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