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Old 16th February 2012
thirdm thirdm is offline
Spam Deminer
 
Join Date: May 2009
Posts: 248
Default Suggestion: filter news from unanswered threads section

9 out of 10 news posts are typically unanswered, and that's probably how it should be unless you want to become Slashdot.

What purpose might a person have for clicking on "Unanswered Threads?" When I click on it, I think, "maybe there are some poor souls the answer to whose questions were not known by others or who have otherwise been passed over, and maybe I will be of use to one or two of those people today." (okay, down deep maybe it's more, "hey, what's my best chance to pontificate and sound like a know it all before the administrators beat me to it with a proper answer" ) i.e. I think of Unanswered Threads as Unsolved Problems. News isn't in that category but in fact swamps those posts that are.

I can't speak for others' usage of the site, but News is something I do faithfully read here. I like the selection of stories and see it as one of the best draws of the site. Assuming others are similar, if there's a wish to have more discussion under each story (I'm guessing there's no great desire for this unless the responses are especially informative or insightful), removing news stories from unanswered shouldn't contradict that goal. People will see the News stories and comment if they have something to say just as well without them appearing there.

The only use I see having them there is if you were targeting someone who comes here expressly to answer questions to tell them, "hey buddy, you know we have news stories on here too."
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