29
votes
How to guarantee getting downvotes without explanation
There is only a casual relationship between upvotes and answer quality in general. Glib, facile answers can garner scores of upvotes, while seriously thought-out, informed, articulate answers garner ...
25
votes
Does a question which shows no research, no effort deserve a downvote?
Absolutely it can be downvoted. Even the tooltip on the downvote button mentions a lack of evidence of research as a reason to downvote. Stack Exchange has never looked kindly on gimmethecodez ...

Andrew LeachMod
- 94.6k
15
votes
Does a question which shows no research, no effort deserve a downvote?
Did you search the help section before asking this question? If you did, can you show us what you found, and what you're having a problem with? No? Hmmm... that means I have to do it for you, even ...
15
votes
Do the moderators of the site monitor and attempt to bring consistency among voting behaviour of contributors?
Do the moderators ever monitor the extent to which people are using the up and down voting facility?
No, of course not. And rightly so. If someone wants to cast fewer than 100 downvotes in 12 years ...
13
votes
How to guarantee getting downvotes without explanation
The fact is the site would never work if you had to comment on a downvote. I create internal applications at my company that work sort-of-similar to SE and the ones that have less rules get used more....
13
votes
Accepted
How to guarantee getting downvotes without explanation
I had already upvoted this question before I got to my favorite two bullets of all:
look at criticism as helpful, and assume the same about anonymous downvotes
do not take it personally
When I get ...
13
votes
Downvoting newcomers with no explanation or comment
Here is my perspective, as more of a longtime user of this site.
In general, explanations for downvotes are not required, and so shouldn't be expected.
Downvotes are ... something that different ...
13
votes
Accepted
Downvoting newcomers with no explanation or comment
Downvoters often do not explain why they have downvoted. I've gotten downvotes with no explanation on what I think are decent questions and answers (most recently an hour ago.) I think nearly ...
12
votes
Does a question which shows no research, no effort deserve a downvote?
Einstein once said, if I had 60 minutes to solve a problem I would spend 55 minutes thinking about the right question to ask, and 5 minutes on the solution.
Thinking of the right question to ask ...
11
votes
Why do some people have negative opinions against questions on Shakespeare's works?
The central problem here is that most of your so-called “questions”:
show no research
present no theories
and expend no effort.
That situation alone merits a downvote according to the tooltip ...

tchristMod
- 127k
11
votes
Accepted
Why did I get downvotes on my answer, while a similar late answer got upvotes?
The two downvotes (so far) on the OP's submitted answer were probably from users who had not read the post carefully, they probably thought the first suggestion, peep show, was "bad", or "incorrect", ...
10
votes
Voting abuse - why is a perfectly good question being down-voted?
The OP, @aesking, told the community:
To me “to give someone advice” is the most common variant but it sounds phrasally and unidiomatic. However, to be politically correct I think “tell some advice”...
9
votes
Why do some people have negative opinions against questions on Shakespeare's works?
You have a right to be here, and you have a right (it is not off topic) to post questions about Shakespeare's writing. You've gotten upvotes (including mine on occasion) and answers (including mine ...
9
votes
The first anonymous downvote
Downvotes serve a very useful purpose on the Stack Exchange: they discourage answers that are weak, sloppy, incorrect, unsubstantiated, or hastily-written. This motivates many contributors to be more ...
9
votes
Biased downvoting because I told the truth to the answerer
If I needed these easily available results why would I ask my question on Stack Exchange?
Well, this shows me that you’re already in the the right mindset to be here. (You might be surprised how many ...

LaurelMod
- 56.3k
7
votes
How to guarantee getting downvotes without explanation
I'm posting this because I'm tired of commenting on my downvotes, then getting aggressively attacked. My comment is a courtesy I no longer want to extend (but will do so with users I trust).
This is ...
7
votes
How to guarantee getting downvotes without explanation
If posts were purely matters of opinion, or comments on controversial subjects like religion or politics, many up and down votes would require no explanation. They would simply indicate agreement or ...
7
votes
Why do some people have negative opinions against questions on Shakespeare's works?
People are downvoting your questions, not Shakespeare's plays. The reasons are known only to the downvoters (though they presumably include "does not show any research effort; is unclear or not useful"...
7
votes
Why did I get downvotes on my answer, while a similar late answer got upvotes?
Nobody knows why driveby downvoters vote the way they do because they leave no indication of their thinking. These people are a curse and a plague on this site because they either leave the OP no ...
7
votes
Accepted
Is there a reputation level where the identity of down-voters is revealed?
While the intent of the question may have been to ask about mandatory commenting on casting a downvote, it actually asks a different question to which an answer might be useful.
Yes. Downvoting is ...

Andrew LeachMod
- 94.6k
7
votes
The first anonymous downvote
A downvote indicates that somebody thinks your answer 'not useful'; nothing more and nothing less. There is no intrinsic reason why there should be more upvotes than downvotes in total, let alone why ...
7
votes
Coping with downvotes
There are many reasons posts get down voted and most of them you can't really do much about. If you've looked over your answer and feel it's clear, addresses the question being asked, is supported by ...
7
votes
Are the downvotes against my answers fair?
Here are my thoughts on some things that could be improved in the posts you linked. I believe the best response to an unwarranted down vote is to improve my answer to attract up votes from other ...
7
votes
Shouldn't we lose 1 rep for downvoting questions?
Let me turn this around and ask: what impact does the existing -1 penalty for downvoting an answer have on user behaviour?
Well, for a high-rep user who might be accruing (say) 3 upvotes a week from ...
6
votes
Accepted
Etiquette with regard to Downvotes
I've checked your reputation page now, and it appears to me that those serial downvotes are timed mere seconds or minutes apart.
The first thing you can do is wait.
The system has in place some ...

NVZMod
- 22.3k
6
votes
Accepted
Are the downvotes against my answers fair?
There is absolutely no way to know who downvoted something or why—unless they say so in a comment. (Such as here, assuming that the comment is still there when checked.) Anything else is pure ...
6
votes
Accepted
How do we deter unexplained downvoting of newcomers’ questions?
Most of the regular contributors to this site would probably agree with Anton in principle that the newcomers to this site should feel welcome. His post, however, makes a couple of assumptions that ...
5
votes
Accepted
The first anonymous downvote
The officially delineated grounds for downvoting at EL&U are not (it seems to me) internally consistent. On the one hand, on the Help Center's Privileges page, the "vote down" privilege ...
5
votes
Let's talk about why this question is being downvoted
Forget about the backstory: I actually enjoy questions which have a bit of a narrative to them, and especially ones which share personal motivations for asking. That makes them not only more fun to ...
5
votes
Answers which are downvoted
Go ahead and edit it.
It will pop up to the top of the 'most recent' list. Sure, maybe the downvoters won't see it to change the direction of their vote. But other people might see it and upvote. (...
Only top scored, non community-wiki answers of a minimum length are eligible
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