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As a user who only came onboard with Server Fault (haven't done any programming in years), I can't help but feel left a little bit cold when it comes to meta and the blog.

You see, they're hosted on stackoverflow.com - now I understand why this would have been (at the time it was the only site that existed, and they didn't know if it was going to be successful), but I feel that being hosted on stackoverflow.com is a bit 'exclusive' (rather than inclusive). Is it only for discussing Stack Overflow? Am I allowed there even though I use Super User or Server Fault? Do I need to sign up for a Stack Overflow account first?

What are people's thoughts on moving it to a site-neutral domain? Especially now that the LOJ exists, would the blog and meta be more suited somewhere else?

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  • 16
    If you're feeling cold, imagine if you were Doctype.com
    – random
    Commented Aug 17, 2009 at 2:12
  • 7
    StackOverflow.com is also the name of the company.
    – random
    Commented Aug 17, 2009 at 2:22
  • Hmm, I wasn't aware of that. That does change things a bit...
    – Farseeker
    Commented Aug 17, 2009 at 2:34
  • 2
    Without programmers from stackoverflow to create server software, there would be no servers to troubleshoot when your hardware and their software faults. ;)
    – Troggy
    Commented Aug 17, 2009 at 7:19

5 Answers 5

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Meta is used for discussing anything SO/SF/SU and even StackExchange related.

Anything as far as questions that follow the proper guidelines are. But if you have a question concerning something SF related, feel free to ask it here.

If it is completely SF related, just make sure to tag it with "serverfault" so that we know you are speaking directly about that site.

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    Oh, I'm aware of that. I'm just not sure if other people from other sites would be. Is the name "meta stack overflow" still appropriate? because it's not a stack overflow-only site...
    – Farseeker
    Commented Aug 17, 2009 at 2:07
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    Same goes for the blog. The blog now compasses a lot more than just stack overflow, so should it be moved to a neutral domain?
    – Farseeker
    Commented Aug 17, 2009 at 2:09
  • Farseeker: all the sites have the links to the blog and meta. And the blog lists all the sites. I don't think that the domain name should really be considered that seriously. StackOverflow is more than just a single site, it's a paradigm. Most people associate the way the sites work with SO more than they would StackExchange, so it makes more sense.
    – TheTXI
    Commented Aug 17, 2009 at 2:12
  • I agree with your sentiment, except for "The domain name should not be considered that seriously". I would argue that the domain name is incredibly important, as a subdomain implies a trusted relationship with the TLD. A subdomain on stackoverflow.com has no trust with superuser.com or serverfault.com except by association (they're all part of the trilogy)...
    – Farseeker
    Commented Aug 17, 2009 at 2:17
  • Trust with the parent domain (not tld)*
    – Farseeker
    Commented Aug 17, 2009 at 2:18
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As documented in

http://blog.stackoverflow.com/2010/05/one-year-of-server-fault/

We now have

http://blog.serverfault.com

And participation on both sites is not optional for our (soon to be) two full time sysadmins. :) We gotta walk the walk if we're gonna talk the talk!

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I've said pretty much the same thing on the doctype question, and probably some other questions. At the very least the use of the stackoverflow name is confusing to new users, but I'd agree that meta feels like site about stackoverflow, not a site about LOJ sites.

At least in part that's due to the fact there's much more stackoverflow users, but the hostility towards doctype by some people claiming doctype was not fitting with "the stackoverflow community" really showed that there was an ignorance to the existance of totally different user groups who weren't interested in programming or stackoverflow.*

Perhaps this will change when superuser goes live and becomes bigger than serverfault, which is only a matter of time imo.

The name isn't just historic, it's symbolic. Until the name changes to something else the other sites will be seen as sideprojects of stackoverflow, and somehow less important.

* I don't mean to imply that was the opinion of everyone, or that there weren't other more practical reasons for doctype to be seperate.

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  • I admit I had similar feelings when I was reading the comments about DocType (I'm quite a lurker, a lot of reading and voting). I bet they felt quite ostracised by people's reactions... I wonder if it's a bit of xenophobia...
    – Farseeker
    Commented Aug 17, 2009 at 4:39
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    It's more accurate to say that Meta is about the Trilogy, not the LoJ. I don't think How-To Geek feature requests/bugs belong here any more than DocType's did.
    – Kyle Cronin
    Commented Aug 17, 2009 at 6:53
  • DocType is a Q&A site, so it has a thematic similarity that HTG doesn't (HTG is the editorial content yang to superuser's user generated content yin)
    – Jeff Atwood
    Commented Aug 17, 2009 at 8:48
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StackOverflow is the roots of the community. Jeff and Joel are programmers, and started a programming site. Henceforth, everything grew from that.

That being said, Meta is about SOFU, not just about StackOverflow. Please feel free to ask, answer, laugh, and cry with us. Well, if you're crying, you may want to do that on your own time. But laugh, laugh with us.

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  • True that it's the root of the community, but that doesn't mean it has to be the focus of every peripheral function. Especially when the name 'stack overflow' is attached to everything, but a user who stumbles upon Super User isn't going to know what stack overflow is.
    – Farseeker
    Commented Aug 17, 2009 at 2:15
  • @Farseeker: And I don't think that a user who stumbles on SU knows nor cares about StackOverflow. But, really, if they want to start becoming a part of the community, StackOverflow is a big part of what SU is, where it came from, and how it was built. I don't think it's a bad thing to make that history transparent.
    – Eric
    Commented Aug 17, 2009 at 2:40
  • I like to think I'm a useful contributor to the community, but I haven't been to Stack Overflow except for a glance to see what colour scheme it uses. Because each site targets a very different audience. History is important to those who were there since the beginning, but the history of the site/community is of little or no significance to someone who just wants to get the job done...
    – Farseeker
    Commented Aug 17, 2009 at 2:45
  • @Farseeker: I think that history plays a huge role in what types of questions are accepted at ServerFault, how issues are handled, etc. StackOverflow only comes up once you start wanting to learn more about the community--either via the blog or via Meta. If that's the case, you have to get where the community came from to understand why we are the way we are. You don't have to go to StackOverflow, but there's nothing wrong with keeping the blog and Meta names/URLs.
    – Eric
    Commented Aug 17, 2009 at 3:06
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The sites are independent of each other, a rep on one is entirely limited to that site; however you can link your accounts between each of the sites: as detailed here.

I'm not sure that I agree that things are too SO-focused; but perhaps as the trilogy grows, and new users come in, that sentiment may become more pervasive.

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