Forum Discussion
Yeah, in my opinion this functionality should only be used by the author of the question indeed. And fully agree on the TechNet/Answers remark, that was my argument when we initially discussed this feature for the MTC. The problem with TechNet/Answers is that the mods are "graded" based on the "answers" they give, it goes against their evaluation, thus they have all the incentive they need to abuse it.
But, this is NOT a support forum, so the "official answer" label has a slightly different meaning here. It can simply designate that someone from the corresponding PG has posted a reply, even if it's not a proper "answer". Plus, people are generally friendlier here, so you can just address the issue with the person directly.
I tried to look at your posts and funny enough the only ones I see are post I've replied to, I hope I'm not the perpetrator here :) I don't recall ever marking my own post as an answer, here or on an other community, but you never know :)
VasilMichev wrote:
[...] The problem with TechNet/Answers is that the mods are "graded" based on the "answers" they give, it goes against their evaluation, thus they have all the incentive they need to abuse it.
Yep, that is exactly one of the reasons why TechNet/Answers became unusable in the past years. At least for me.
VasilMichev wrote:
But, this is NOT a support forum, so the "official answer" label has a slightly different meaning here. It can simply designate that someone from the corresponding PG has posted a reply, even if it's not a proper "answer". Plus, people are generally friendlier here, so you can just address the issue with the person directly.
That is just semantics. I don't think that it matters whether it's called Best Response instead of Marked Answer, or anything like that. If it shows that any response has been marked, than it will turn away possible good answer - or worse - correct answers to begin with. That is my experience with TechNet, where I often formulate a good question, to have a MS-Partner drive-by-killing the thread by responding with something entirely unrelated and marking it as an answer. It is just frustrating, because in the end, I'm left alone without a solution.
Regarding the designation, MVP's here have a green borders. And I am sure (but I've only been around for three days) that knowledgable people can be identified by similar badges, if not by the upvotes on their responses. So I don't see the necessity to also provide them the way to highjack my question.
People are friendly in the TechNet forums, too. But I got tired asking Partners and MVP (or whoever is able to mark answers) to do that. I even created a signature for the sole purpose to tell everyone and their cat to please not mark any answers. It just doesn't work and it won't work here, I promise.
I like this place. It's organised and visually appealing. But that one time that person marked his answer already gave me PTSD from the TechNet **bleep** show (sorry).
VasilMichev wrote:
I tried to look at your posts and funny enough the only ones I see are post I've replied to, I hope I'm not the perpetrator here :) I don't recall ever marking my own post as an answer, here or on an other community, but you never know :)
No, you're good, it wasn't you. :) I appreciated your answers and as you probably notices, did also mark them as Best Response.