Questions tagged [policy]

For questions on Mathematics Stack Exchange policies.

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12 votes
1 answer
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Should I vote to close very old questions?

I saw some very old questions in my close votes review queue (one from 7 years ago, one from 10 years ago, and another from 12 years ago) like this or this or this, and I was not sure what to do. ...
pie's user avatar
  • 3,591
7 votes
0 answers
251 views

No community promotion ads any longer?

It seems there is no community promotion ads from 2021, so our community won't have that any longer? Different from some irrelevant commercial ads from the SE network, I in fact would like to see some ...
C. Ding's user avatar
  • 2,103
-13 votes
2 answers
403 views

Our Community vs The System

This site means a lot to many people, myself included. It has been my number one source of sharing interesting problems, learning mathematics, and seeing what others have to share. This being the case,...
Graviton's user avatar
  • 4,480
42 votes
3 answers
2k views

New user posts 8 answers, all likely AI-generated, in the span of 82 minutes; I think we either need or are close to needing an official policy

According to Xander's answer to a previous question on AI-generated content, posting chatGPT-generated answers without disclosing they are generated by chatGPT is a violation of openAI's terms of ...
Arturo Magidin's user avatar
31 votes
1 answer
1k views

Answers in a language other than English

I would appreciate if someone could clarify what the policy and etiquette are about using languages other than English on MSE, or point me to an authoritative resource on the subject. What prompted ...
dxiv's user avatar
  • 76.5k
31 votes
1 answer
681 views

How exactly are we incentivized to post links to duplicates?

So yesterday I came across a question (we'll call it Question $1$) which I found interesting, and after having spent a little time thinking about it without result, I started searching MSE for some ...
mechanodroid's user avatar
  • 46.4k
29 votes
5 answers
2k views

What is our policy on AI-generated content?

The author of this answer (now deleted) claims that it was generated by AI (artificial intelligence). This claim could certainly be false (for example, if the user wants plausible deniability for an ...
blargoner's user avatar
  • 2,939
14 votes
4 answers
2k views

Does the moderator violate the EoQS?

This recent question on the main site: If whenever $|x-a|<\delta$, $|y-a|<\delta$ then $|f(x)-f(y)|<\epsilon$, is this equiv. to $f$ cont. at $c$ then $f$ cont. on some interval around $c$? ...
user avatar
7 votes
0 answers
148 views

Closing a post with multiple duplicates

Many questions posted on the site are duplicates, but sometimes it's not easy to identify the most perfect match. Frequently, for instance, there is an older question, itself a closed duplicate, that ...
lulu's user avatar
  • 69.9k
11 votes
1 answer
696 views

Limits on self-promotion?

What, if any, are the limits on using ones participation in math.se for self promotion? I ask because a user (who had already been noticed for 'iffy' answering habits) has now changed their display ...
JonathanZ's user avatar
  • 10.6k
7 votes
1 answer
255 views

I haven't been around for a while; what are the new policies I need to know in order to use the site?

I haven't used this site for a while (years); just busy with other things. A screenshot of my rating chart I've constantly been on Stack Exchange, but seldom on Math.SE (and virtually never on Math....
Rebecca J. Stones's user avatar
3 votes
2 answers
227 views

Can I perform "test solves" on MSE?

I often enjoy designing problems of my own, generally Olympiad-type proof questions. It is often hard to assess the difficulty level of the questions I have designed and hence I was wondering if I ...
user avatar
-5 votes
2 answers
1k views

The community need to make a good decision regarding closing/downvoting good questions/answers

The most common problem I see on this site is that many poor questions/ solutions are highly upvoted and many great questions/ solutions are downvoted. I have no problem with the highly-upvoted poor ...
Ali Shadhar's user avatar
  • 25.2k
0 votes
0 answers
90 views

What does this mean 'Have you considered accepting an answer or starting a bounty for this question?' [duplicate]

Can anyone help me in informing how can I accept an answer? Also can anyone tell how can I start a bounty? I think I have no control about it but please help.
user158293's user avatar
-7 votes
1 answer
521 views

How are policies, norms, and rules are determined in this community?

Many people, including some moderators, have expressed to me the following, which is an excerpt from a moderator's comment, many times in many places: ... the guidelines are guidelines and not rules. ...
Later's user avatar
  • 722
6 votes
1 answer
253 views

How should questions tagged "solution-verification" be answered? [duplicate]

Often when people post their solutions to a particular problem on a question of theirs and they tag it solution-verification, the solution that they give is flawless, or can be improved a small amount ...
A-Level Student's user avatar
0 votes
1 answer
233 views

A question about enforcement of quality standards

I'm reading this post about enforcement of quality standards, and it puzzles me. I feel like most of the time, it a user were able to ask a question that follows the quality standards, they would ...
G. Fougeron's user avatar
  • 1,544
12 votes
1 answer
691 views

Two cheers for EoQS

NB: this post has been edited in the light of @quid's comment revealing all moderator messages link to a text that explicitly contradicts MSE's deletion policies, without disclosing the latter in any ...
J.G.'s user avatar
  • 116k
8 votes
0 answers
137 views

Approved edit that makes question *less* readable

I recently encountered the following edit of a question: https://math.stackexchange.com/revisions/4126525/2 I hope everyone here agrees that the edit is not appropriate. A minor thing is that editing &...
5xum's user avatar
  • 123k
113 votes
7 answers
15k views

Enforcement of Quality Standards

Math SE has a long-standing policy regarding what constitutes a Good Question. The policy is intended to ensure that the collection of questions and answers here is of high quality, is searchable, ...
Xander Henderson's user avatar
  • 29.4k
30 votes
4 answers
2k views

I am a student and have reached my limit of 50 questions per month what do I do?

I am a student and have reached my limit of 50 questions per month. I am poor and can't afford a math teacher and have been using this site to teach me a lot of new things so that I can get better at ...
Michael Blane's user avatar
-1 votes
1 answer
153 views

Should I feel upset because I have accepted few answers over the years? [duplicate]

First off, I want to make clear that I have read this question beforehand thus to avoid duplicating the question. I changed it in such a way that it describes best my current feeling about this ...
Chris Steinbeck Bell's user avatar
12 votes
1 answer
599 views

Policy on posting links to pirated content?

Do we have a policy about users posting links to sites that feature pirated content? Like sites offering "free" copies of my book, for example? (see comment at the bottom). Edit: in case you'...
David C. Ullrich's user avatar
11 votes
1 answer
498 views

Deleting questions with upvotes, or with upvoted answers.

Sometimes, poorly formulated questions contain enough information to answer them and, more importantly, for the community to find them interesting enough. Then I found that there is a race between ...
Andrei's user avatar
  • 37.3k
12 votes
1 answer
387 views

Policies on counterproductive retagging sprees

I have just noticed that, right now, old questions in field theory and Galois theory are being brought up because someone is tagging them ring-theory, for instance here, here, or here. This somewhat ...
k.stm's user avatar
  • 18.5k
28 votes
3 answers
2k views

Blindly answering easy questions without considering whether the question satisfies MSE policy.

Here's the question which motivated me to write this question. Inspite of being clearly mentioned in the MSE's homework policy about Avoid "no clue" questions this question was asked by the ...
SarGe's user avatar
  • 2,980
30 votes
4 answers
1k views

Is arithmetic mathematics and can we answer questions about it?

Yesterday, I answered this question (later deleted, see below for the text) and was a little surprised when the question was closed. A user in the comments stated, "This is not mathematics. It is ...
N. Bar's user avatar
  • 1,600
6 votes
3 answers
754 views

Using text and MathJax instead of screenshot.

I would suggest the community simply close questions containing screenshots of text. I can understand a screenshot of a figure, but if the text part of a question can be easily typeset with the built-...
SarGe's user avatar
  • 2,980
-8 votes
2 answers
309 views

Is it appropriate to ask for possible downvote sources on Mathematics Meta?

I recently received a downvote for an answer I gave, but I am unsure of the cause. I would like to ask for a possible explanation of the downvote on Mathematics Meta SE, but I am unsure of the policy ...
user400188's user avatar
  • 1,936
9 votes
0 answers
385 views

Are questions about ideas in preprints off-topic?

Another note: (Since the first one wasn’t heeded...) OK, so the question was closed again. My appeal below was to both sides of the issue, so even though five people sought fit to do otherwise, ...
joriki's user avatar
  • 237k
14 votes
1 answer
331 views

Math exchange's policies for online exams and COVID-19

Due to the COVID-19 outbreak, almost all US colleges and universities are going fully online for the remainder of the Spring 2020 semester. This includes online or take home final exams in classes ...
Michael Burr's user avatar
  • 32.8k
16 votes
1 answer
383 views

Request: an easy way to access the posts on meta that explain policies or serve as tutorials or lists.

Today when I was going through the questions on our main site, I saw a question that showed absolutely no effort. But the op left a sentence "don't know where to start". Then I remembered I've seen ...
trisct's user avatar
  • 5,211
24 votes
3 answers
712 views

What is our question deletion policy?

I've recently become a 10k plus user, and I was taking a look at the moderation tools, specifically the deletion votes section. As I was looking at the questions nominated for deletion, it struck me ...
jgon's user avatar
  • 28.4k
-3 votes
2 answers
381 views

Why do we care about monitoring for CodeChef problems?

Title kind of gives away the question, but here we go. Very recently another meta-thread has appeared "warning" about the possible appearance of questions related to a CodeChef challenge. There have ...
Taumatawhakatangihangakoauauot's user avatar
18 votes
1 answer
1k views

I voted mistakenly to close as duplicate. When I realised my mistake, my comment explaining why was deleted.

I refer to this question: Comparing logarithms with different bases. Over-hastily, I flagged it as a possible duplicate of How to compare logarithms $\log_4 5$ and $\log_5 6$?. I also thought it was ...
Calum Gilhooley's user avatar
19 votes
1 answer
1k views

Is Math StackExchange aging?

I am just a relatively new user, so please correct me if I'm wrong. If you read about the questions with most votes in MSE, you can find that until the $35$-th of question, the questions are all ...
Tony Ma's user avatar
  • 2,358
0 votes
0 answers
91 views

Immediate question deletion to prevent others from seeing an answer

I recently answered a question about a simple strategy game. (Mine was the only answer.) The OP deleted the question about a minute later. It occurs to me that he might not have wanted a potential ...
C Monsour's user avatar
  • 8,228
1 vote
1 answer
145 views

What happens if the answer which had appeared after starting a bounty is not worthy of that bounty?

This happened to me once. I had a question and started a bounty over its topic but the "new" answer which came for the bounty was "to my standards" not worthy of that particular bounty. Stackexchange ...
Chris Steinbeck Bell's user avatar
17 votes
2 answers
591 views

On bibliographic references.

On this answer, which provides a bibliographic reference to one of the standard sources of information on the subject of question to which it is attached, was flagged for review for Ā«low qualityĀ» and, ...
Mariano Suárez-Álvarez's user avatar
4 votes
1 answer
118 views

Question on proofs with text-&-LaTeX images

Two days ago, I saw a stochastic process question which contained images that could be completely $\rm\TeX$ified. Based on several related questions found on this site, I think those images should be ...
12 votes
1 answer
645 views

Can the site-design be improved to be more welcoming to new users?

I think that the design of MSE could be more welcoming to new users. I don't know how much effort it would take and of course that should be considered. My view is as someone who is relatively new to ...
Stephen Meskin's user avatar
25 votes
3 answers
1k views

Are intuition-based questions off-topic?

I was perusing the "Close Questions" queue just now and noticed a common theme. It seems like a large number of questions involve gaining intuition about some result; most of them use the word "...
Michael Seifert's user avatar
36 votes
2 answers
1k views

Why don't we use a homework policy... like physics.SE?

I was reading Proposal: ban verbatim homework questions which have no accompanying text and I came upon some startling old statistics. Since 2013, the number of questions on this site has multiplied ...
Simply Beautiful Art's user avatar
24 votes
4 answers
1k views

The things that make math.SE 'better' (or worse) than most other math sites

So there was a recent conversation below the main post of When does the series converge?, which prompted this meta post. I know there are plenty of people who are for and against the closure and ...
Simply Beautiful Art's user avatar
29 votes
2 answers
796 views

Best way to "revive" a question (which does not abide by the Math.SE rules) [duplicate]

There exists a question which looks interesting to me, given that I scribbled some attempts to solve it and, in spite of the fact that it "seems" like an easy application of Rolle's theorem, couldn't ...
Clement C.'s user avatar
  • 67.3k
0 votes
0 answers
46 views

Is it a bad thing to give more than one example in a [big-list] question?

In most [big-list] questions, I see that every person has entered at most one example. Why is this so? I recently provided about 5 examples in this answer. Is that considered a bad thing?
Agnishom Chattopadhyay's user avatar
29 votes
3 answers
975 views

Should there be a policy about "hints"?

First, let me say that I completely understand the idea of not posting full solutions, but instead "hints" (or outlines) to let the OP figure out the details by themselves. I tend to do that myself. ...
Clement C.'s user avatar
  • 67.3k
20 votes
0 answers
348 views

How closely must a question match a contest question to fall under our policy?

With the start of this academic year's USAMTS, we are going to get a some questions that have their origin in these problems, some more closely worded to the original than others. Perhaps it is time ...
user642796's user avatar
  • 52.1k
-5 votes
1 answer
170 views

Has there been discussion about a Beginners sub-community?

It would provides a space for beginners to ask questions that may be "stupid" without spamming the serious forum. (Thus only those feeling particularly generous in a given moment would have to be ...
DukeZhou's user avatar
  • 439
12 votes
2 answers
902 views

What to do when someone is answering a question that he/she has no clue about?

It ought to be common knowledge that you should answer only questions that you know an answer to. Well, sometimes mistakes can happen and the answer becomes erroneous. That usually happen because 1.) ...
BigbearZzz's user avatar
  • 14.9k