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Shortly after the question Is “On Sundays my sister and I never play hockey” correct? appeared on the main site I posted a brief comment explaining how the placement of On Sundays makes sense in a context in which the theme or topic (terms from Information Structuring) is about the days of the week on which sporting activities take place. Subsequent answers to the question indirectly make the same point.

My comment was one of about nine comments when it was removed. Other comments that were posted before and after mine remain - including the comment Many thanks, Shoe! from the OP.

Hence my question: What was the reason for removing my comment? I don't want to waste everyone's time in future if I can predict that a comment will be removed. If the comment was considered to be a sufficient and reasonable answer, why was it not converted to a Community Wiki, as often happens?

And a follow-up question: Why was the OP's response to my comment not also removed since it makes no sense to me to let it remain?

[ Strangely, when I do a page search on "Shoe" in Google Chrome, it tells that me there are two occurrences, but there is only one occurrence (in the OP's comment) visible to me. ]

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I can answer this, although it was another moderator who acted here.

Your comment was flagged as being an answer — along with another one, actually.

When moderators get comment flags, we get just the comment and the flag. If the flag looks correct, then it's acted on, usually by clicking the Delete button which accompanies the flag. We don't get a great deal of context for comment flags.

Consequently, when the mod agreed with the flag, your comment was deleted. I've now also deleted the response which, as you say, makes no sense to remain. That comment could easily have been flagged as conversational/no longer needed, in which case it would have been deleted at the time as well.

What was the reason for removing my comment? I don't want to waste everyone's time in future if I can predict that a comment will be removed.

Don't write an answer in the comment box. You may be lucky and not have it flagged. You may be unlucky and have it removed. If you want it to remain, don't put your answer in a place which isn't designed for it.

If the comment was considered to be a sufficient and reasonable answer, why was it not converted to a Community Wiki, as often happens?

If the comment was an answer, why did you not put it in the answer box? If you didn't think it was a good answer, why should it be converted to one? Moderators can convert answers to comments with a few clicks when the post is obviously "Not An Answer" but could be a useful comment; there is no mechanism to go the other way except to create a new answer. Why should moderators do that if you don't think it worthy of being an answer?

If it is an answer, then it's open to anyone to use the comment to create a real answer. Simple copy and paste without attribution would not be a good thing, but there's no actual need to make it a community wiki either: the person who creates an answer is perfectly entitled to points from it (up or down!)

To labour the party line again, comments are ephemeral. Stack Exchange is built on good questions asked using the "Ask Question" button and good answers given with the "Post your Answer" button.

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    I know of at least one mod whose comments could be construed as answers. I know of at least one linguist whose comments are nearly always answers, these are often converted into wiki posts by a moderator. There is no obligation to delete useful and helpful comments, on the contrary these type of comments help build a community's identity. If the only comments allowed were those asking for clarification, or telling the OP their question is off-topic, the community would all be for the worse.
    – Mari-Lou A
    Nov 27, 2022 at 10:23
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    Thanks. That seems like a reasonable explanation of what happened here. A good answer would have been to explain Information Structuring and give more examples of theme/rheme (or topic/comment) as well as providing a link to further information. I didn't have time for that, hence the comment - which I nevertheless thought might be helpful to OP, the main reason for my presence on the site. I appreciate your work as moderator.
    – Shoe
    Nov 27, 2022 at 10:24
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    @Mari-LouA I don't disagree, in which case advice in my second-last paragraph is probably relevant.
    – Andrew Leach Mod
    Nov 27, 2022 at 10:28
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    Stack Exchange espouses the terms "community" and "be nice" but in the same breath they argue that most interactions are "ephemeral". There's a risk of alienating new users when useful, helpful (quasi answers), and friendly comments that help build trust are frequently deleted or shifted to chat.
    – Mari-Lou A
    Nov 27, 2022 at 10:30
  • @Mari-LouA There's no obligation to delete useful comments, but we do act on flags on comments. The only alternative is to decline a well-intended flag, which is worse. Still, we do on occasion decline flags on a case by case.
    – NVZ Mod
    Nov 28, 2022 at 8:56
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    Then it's a fusspot of a user who's continually flagging useful content, comments that are not abusive, chatty, or abundantly off-topic. Flagging a comment because it contains useful info and/or a kernel of an answer is rather petty. I could understand if a user repeatedly posts three or four comments a day that could possibly be constructed into answers but @Shoe isn't that kind of user.
    – Mari-Lou A
    Nov 28, 2022 at 9:07
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    I always like to link this MSO answer when discussions about "answering in comments" come up. Different sites, different rules, of course, but some damn good arguments given in that MSO answer.
    – Rand al'Thor
    Nov 29, 2022 at 17:35
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    I have accepted this response since it is helpful in reminding me of "the party line" on comments on this site. I still feel, however, that it is unfortunate to remove a comment that the OP apparently found useful and to allow others that didn't address the question to remain. The moderator's answer that @Rand al'Thor links to above is essentially my position on this too. He points out, perhaps overly vociferously, that: "It is utterly foolish to destroy value by deleting a comment because you think it breaks some kind of rule."
    – Shoe
    Nov 30, 2022 at 11:23
  • @NVZ Re your comment to MLA: "There's no obligation to delete useful comments, but we do act on flags on comments. The only alternative is to decline a well-intended flag, which is worse" <-- Do you really want to stand by this? Come on NVZ! [Feel free to delete both your comment and mine.]
    – Araucaria - Him
    Dec 2, 2022 at 22:27
  • @Araucaria-Nothereanymore. Not sure I got your question. To expand on my quoted comment, we are not actively hunting down comments. Mod role is voluntary. We have only two options on flagged comments, either mark them helpful (which leads to "why was my comment removed") or decline flags (which leads to "why were my flags declined"). There is no pleasing everyone.
    – NVZ Mod
    Dec 3, 2022 at 9:16
  • @NVZ Yes, point well taken. What I meant was it's surely best to work on the merits or otherwise of the comment, not on the principle that it's a bad thing to decline a well-intended flag!
    – Araucaria - Him
    Dec 3, 2022 at 13:13
  • @Araucaria-Nothereanymore. Surely, we do on rare occasions look to preserve valuable comments as is regardless of the flag and hope the flagger doesn't complain. But in general, ELU's stance has been that comments are ephemeral. You may have noticed that I have converted many comments into CW answers myself.
    – NVZ Mod
    Dec 3, 2022 at 13:22
  • Wow. Another round of deletion of my comments, including those from @Araucaria - Not here any more. Spooky. I don't know whether it's Lambie pulling the strings or Hitchcock. And still silence from you and all Mods? I wonder why Mods are elected, given the secretive nature of their duties.
    – Chaim
    Dec 4, 2022 at 20:48
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    @NVZ `But in general, ELU's stance has been that comments are ephemeral``. No, that's the Stack Exchange stance because developers need concrete answers, I fully get why answers in comments do not fit the SE model, but sites dedicated to language are not so clear cut, there can be various interpretations; and sometimes a question is so banal, so basic, that a comment supplying the quick and ready answer followed by a close vote, is friendlier than a downvote, or 3 users closing a newcomer's very first question. The SE model is not a one size fit all. We, EL&U, can be more flexible than that.
    – Mari-Lou A
    Dec 5, 2022 at 12:43
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    Following up on @Mari-LouA's comment: people who in good faith ask questions that are about to be closed deserve an explanation of why they are about to be closed, and it is often far better to tell them something like 'The answer is . . . . and that's far too trivial to be posted as an answer on this site' than to just give them one of the boilerplate reasons, which are likely to leave them completely bewildered. The moderators' insistence that all answers be posted as answers may have the effect of far too many trivial questions and answers remaining on the site forever.
    – jsw29
    Dec 5, 2022 at 19:30
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This is yet another manifestation of the ongoing tension about the role of commenting on this site, which in turn stems from the more fundamental difference between what one might call prescriptivists and descriptivists about the site's norms.

The prescriptivists say 'Comments are meant to be ephemeral, so there is almost never a good reason to complain about their deletion', and support that by pointing to the explicitly stated rules of the site and of the Stack Exchange system as a whole.

The descriptivists, on the other side, can point out that the role of commenting has evolved over the history of the site and that much of the community (including some of its regular, long-term, highly respected contributors) do not now see the comments that way. They believe that the rules, or at least their interpretation, should reflect that, and therefore continue to be upset when the moderators delete comments (or block them, or move then to chat), notwithstanding the moderators' explanations, which are based on the prescriptivist view of the site's norms.

This disagreement between the two groups is not any more likely to be resolved soon than the disagreement between the prescriptivist and descriptivist approaches to the language. It is thus to be expected that the two groups of contributors to this site will continue to be annoyed with each other, that questions such as this one will keep appearing on the meta-site, and that the answers to them will continue to be essentially the same.

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    I understand this fully but let's not forget that moderators are not external agents, they are from within the community. And it's that moderators are bound by certain agreements to uphold the intended purpose as an expert Q&A site (unlike Yahoo Answers) although a mod may not be personally in line with being a prescriptivist. This maintains that delicate equilibrium and prevents the site from ending up as a free-for-all chat room.
    – NVZ Mod
    Nov 28, 2022 at 8:48
  • @NVZ, it is precisely because both groups are parts of the community and engaged in generally respectful cooperation in pursuing its goals that I think it is unfortunate that they are locked in this conflict. I agree that it important to preserve the overall character of this site, but there is a vast space between enforcing the 'party line' (as Mr. Leach called it) that all comments are ephemeral and allowing the site to disintegrate into a free-for-all discussion forum; it is debatable where in this space the real equilibrium is.
    – jsw29
    Nov 28, 2022 at 16:43
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    The problem is not with the people; the problem is with the design. The comment system is broken. It is being used in ways that were never envisioned when the network was one or two sites about programming. Discussion should happen on a different page and the "valuable" comments promoted to under the question or answer. They way we do it now -- having a human delete comments that meet some arbitrary judgement of value, destroying the context of the discussion -- is a ridiculous waste of time and focus. Both "sides" are right about the problems around deleting or not deleting comments.
    – ColleenV
    Nov 28, 2022 at 17:28
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    Why should a half-assed comment-answer enjoy a privileged place above actual full answers and avoid being ranked by the community? It is completely contrary to the purpose of the system. On the other hand, how do you build a community when the rules encourage people to flag helpfulness for deletion and discourage the chit-chat that helps us engage with each other? The comment system creates this tension by being a bad design.
    – ColleenV
    Nov 28, 2022 at 17:38
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    I dare say it wouldn't be too much coding to include a "chat about this post" link to [create/go to] a chatroom, since moderators can do that with a click when they are given the opportunity. That way comments can be removed from the post altogether. Problem solved.
    – Andrew Leach Mod
    Nov 29, 2022 at 18:17
  • @AndrewLeach The problem with pushing all comments into chat is that we lose the ability to upvote comments and the valuable bits of the discussion never get promoted back out to where they're visible to people who may not even have an account. I think we need to do version 2.0 using everything we've learned over the past decade instead of layering on more duct tape and baling wire. The coding is usually easy (if time consuming); it's the design that's difficult. Also the real-time nature of chat is off-putting to some of us.
    – ColleenV
    Nov 29, 2022 at 18:35
  • @AndrewLeach, moving comments to chat, either manually (as is often done now) or automatically (as you propose), arguably makes sense for the comments that are indeed in the nature of a chat, such as lengthy back-and-forth exchanges between a couple of contributors. Many comments are, however, not like that: they are meant to be seen by everybody who sees the question or the answer to which they are attached (such as the comments that explain why the answer is wrong or incomplete).
    – jsw29
    Nov 30, 2022 at 15:47
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    @ColleenV It's all very well saying that the comment system is a bad design, but it is for by far and away, by a million miles, the most visible indication to most (and often only one ) that there is in fact a community. In fact, without comments, this site would die within weeks (if not days).
    – Araucaria - Him
    Dec 1, 2022 at 0:32
  • @Araucaria-Nothereanymore. You are absolutely right the comments are an important and integral part of the community experience. However that wouldn't save some comments from the occasional housekeeping, since they're by design ephemeral.
    – NVZ Mod
    Dec 1, 2022 at 23:05
  • @jsw29 Perhaps somewhere in the future there would be an AI that can clear up chatty comments and curate the best comments with no moderator involved.
    – NVZ Mod
    Dec 1, 2022 at 23:10
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    Just preface all your comments with: Clarifying question: Is it possible that [insert your comment here]?
    – Tinfoil Hat
    Dec 2, 2022 at 3:23
  • @TinfoilHat, indeed, at least some of the comments that are criticised for amounting to answers could be reformulated as requests for clarifications of questions that would, if the clarifications are not provided, be candidates for closing.
    – jsw29
    Dec 2, 2022 at 16:11
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    Do remember that "Is it possible that an answer could be..." doesn't clarify the question!
    – Andrew Leach Mod
    Dec 3, 2022 at 15:31
  • @Araucaria-Nothereanymore. I agree with you. We need to fix the comment system so that it is better suited for the purposes of community and so we can finally stop the "why were my comments deleted/comments are ephemeral" nonsense. Until the system is fixed to support the purpose for which we are using it, it will continue to suck up time and energy into a black hole of anti-human design.
    – ColleenV
    Dec 13, 2022 at 19:31

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