25
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Am I the only one seeing this? What happened? An updated algorithm? Or did we just have an army of zombie answer(er)s that I didn't notice?

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8
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    $\begingroup$ You're not the only one. A lot of the answers in the queue are old (but the questions are still older). Dunno what's going on, but it's the same on other sites. $\endgroup$ Sep 29, 2015 at 19:26
  • $\begingroup$ Yes, I just noticed that too, some answers are several months old. Very strange. $\endgroup$
    – mrf
    Sep 29, 2015 at 19:26
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    $\begingroup$ Reported on Meta Stack Exchange too meta.stackexchange.com/questions/267081/… $\endgroup$
    – quid Mod
    Sep 29, 2015 at 19:28
  • $\begingroup$ Hah, I can beat that. The first answer I saw was from 2012. $\endgroup$ Sep 29, 2015 at 19:28
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    $\begingroup$ This is the first (and most likely the last) time I complete 20 Late Answer reviews in one day. It's...eerie. $\endgroup$
    – daOnlyBG
    Sep 29, 2015 at 20:12
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    $\begingroup$ It's cleared now. $\endgroup$
    – user99914
    Sep 30, 2015 at 0:03
  • $\begingroup$ That was quick, I didn't expect it to clear in 5 hours! $\endgroup$
    – mrf
    Sep 30, 2015 at 7:47
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1 Answer 1

19
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This is the result of a very recent change to the way answers enter that queue. Previously, the conditions were:

  1. the answer was posted at least 30 days after the question was asked; and
  2. the answer's author has at most 10 rep.

It appears that condition (2) has been altered to

  1. the answer's author has at most 50 rep.

As before, it doesn't matter how old the answer is, just the relative time between it and the question, so if an answer that hadn't entered the queue all the sudden satisfies the two criteria, it enters the queue. We just have a lot of "late answers" posted by users who have rep between 11 and 50.

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    $\begingroup$ So as I understand it, once this flood gets through, we will get back to more normal (though a bit higher) levels. $\endgroup$
    – mrf
    Sep 29, 2015 at 19:33
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    $\begingroup$ @mrf That's my thought. There will be more in the late answers queue in the future because of the rep requirement change, but this is a one-time flash flood... until they change the criteria yet again. $\endgroup$
    – user642796
    Sep 29, 2015 at 19:35
  • $\begingroup$ @mrf, With the weaker condition it is likely that there'll be more things in general to review (than in the past) in the "Late Answer" queue, but probably not a spike like today. Thanks for the info Arthur Fischer, I was curious about this as well. $\endgroup$
    – TravisJ
    Sep 29, 2015 at 19:58
  • $\begingroup$ @ArthurFischer, perhaps this is not the appropriate place to ask, but is the limit of reviewing 40 items just for today? or why are we able to suddenly review 40 "Late Answers" but not 40 of anything else? $\endgroup$
    – TravisJ
    Sep 29, 2015 at 19:59
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    $\begingroup$ @TravisJ maybe it depends on reputation, my limit was still 20. $\endgroup$ Sep 29, 2015 at 20:04
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    $\begingroup$ @TravisJ I believe that review limits increase when queues reach over 1k. At least this meta.se answer says so. $\endgroup$
    – user642796
    Sep 29, 2015 at 20:08
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    $\begingroup$ @SilviaGhinassi (See above.) $\endgroup$
    – user642796
    Sep 29, 2015 at 20:09

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