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We have quite a lot of hit and run users, which do not accept answers. I doubt anything can be done about this. Unless mods have some tools for this, do they?

Despite this we have quite many questions that have no accepted mark from users who are active or semiactive on sister sites.

So what I'm wondering is could we as a community kindly ask if the question was just forgotten or does it indeed imply something else?

Also as group effort it sounds better if the asker is not the one who had the highest score in the question.

edity im not asking if it can be done. Im asking if it would be usefull to have a coordinated campign tp do so.

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Reset to default
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I will usually do what some refer to as "calling out" users. I at times like to see where a user comes from like another site and user's profiles interest me.

That said I usually will leave a comment under the question asking for an edit to their question if one of the answers was not helpful or solved the issue. The OP will always be notified that a comment was left for them under their question but wether they choose to make an edit or accept an answer is their decision.

I know it may not sound like the right thing to do but if a user constantly asks questions then I see no issue in not calling them out in a comment below their question. Personally, I just stop helping them if they do not want to help the community. I have even at times downvoted some users after I have spent some time searching through their questions and realized that our community was doing their project for them.

In regards to forcing we do not have that power nor do I want that power. All I can say is try to be encouraging and engaging in a friendly manner. If the member is new you can always leave an encouraging reminder that we are a site run by rep and for us to know that your issue was resolved please mark it with a check indicating an accepted answer helped you solve your problem. If the member is from another site and their rep is more then 500 then I have no problem downvoting them and calling them out and telling them I downvoted your question because you didn't choose an answer edit the question or choose an accepted answer.

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    Do posts with negative scores buble uo by community less frequently? if so then downmodding would solve that problem
    – joojaa
    Commented Apr 17, 2015 at 14:33
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I'm all for getting questions accepted. It increases rep flow, and it seriously engages the answerers.

How to get askers to accept is another matter. For the users that are active on other sites, all we can really do is place a comment, along the lines of 'Please consider selecting an answer as the correct one, especially if that answer solved your problem. Accepting answers helps other visitors and is good for the site's stats.'

Such a comment will always show up in the akser's Stack inbox, and they are prone to read it if they are using other sites in the network.

Beyond that, I don't see what we can do. Hit-and-run users will always be there. I'm open for ideas, tho'!

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  • Yes Im aware that there is nothing one can do for hit and run types in current framework. I was just wondering about the messaging approach for those hat do visit. How about a new allowing mods to mark very old posts as accepted if user hasn't been on for say 9 months? That way one could exercise judgement.... but yes not really my question
    – joojaa
    Commented Apr 17, 2015 at 12:24
  • I feel you :) But wouldn't you think that would deflate the value of the 'accept' button?
    – Vincent Mod
    Commented Apr 17, 2015 at 12:29
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    The problem is that community brings these onto the front page as unanswered spamming in effect the site. They dont have to be accepted if there would be a mechanism for keeping them from being zombies forever. Putting them on hold seems equally counterproductive.
    – joojaa
    Commented Apr 17, 2015 at 12:43
  • @joojaa Code Review had some really good community meta initiatives for reducing the zombie spread. One answer with a single upvote kills a zombie I think, the just under 1k zombies here could probably be culled heavily in a month.
    – Dom
    Commented Apr 18, 2015 at 10:09
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When you say advertise, that could be a solution.

Not much use is being made of the internal ads system, so perhaps a "reminder style" (maybe handwriting font) advert pointing to a well-written meta post reminding people to accept and explaining why could be effective.

Just an idea.

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I've tried leaving comments and not noticed any real return for the effort.

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  • Ok, then its not worth it
    – joojaa
    Commented Apr 17, 2015 at 18:32
  • I'm not trying to dissuade anyone. Comments can help, but the return is really entirely dependent upon the user.
    – Scott
    Commented Apr 17, 2015 at 18:34
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Maybe I'm petty, but this drives me insane!

Also, maybe we can do something about people that accept the answer, but don't upvote it.

It may be trivial, but I was one of 4 people to be "lucky" enough to earn the Tenacious badge a while back, so that just adds to my frustration haha!

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