Please update the site policy to reflect community consensus on allowing identification questions

Question

The community has recently reaffirmed its support for allowing identification (ID) questions on our site. It's time to update our policy and documentation accordingly.

Over a month ago, we had a discussion about what to do with identification questions. The results were clear: the two highest-voted answers (with 17 and 13 upvotes) supported allowing ID questions, while the sole answer in favor of keeping the ban received only 9 upvotes. This almost 2:1 ratio in favor of allowing ID questions reflects a strong community consensus. (To ensure a fair representation of community opinion, I've focused on the raw upvote count rather than the net score. This approach gives equal weight to all users' voices, including those who don't have the 125 rep to downvote.)

It's worth noting that this isn't a new development. Our community has consistently voted against banning ID questions in four previous meta discussions:

1. Discussion on identification questions
2. Shall we ban identification questions?
3. Check in on Identification questions
4. We are discontinuing support for identification questions

Despite this clear consensus, I've noticed that ID questions are still being closed and deleted, often by moderators. It's time to align our practices with the community's expressed wishes.

To facilitate a smooth transition and ensure we're all on the same page, I'll be posting an answer to this meta post outlining steps we should consider. I encourage all members of our community to contribute their thoughts and suggestions. If you have ideas on how we can best implement this change or any other considerations we should keep in mind, please feel free to add your own answer.

Let's work together to make Movies & TV Stack Exchange an even more welcoming and diverse platform for all film and television enthusiasts.

Regarding quality standards

We have the flexibility to discuss and adjust our quality standards via meta posts at any time, just like any other site policy. The ID ban was implemented within 37 days of the initial call for input meta post, so a similar timeline seems reasonable here. I respectfully suggest that we implement the community-supported policy without waiting for a separate quality standards discussion that could take months. This would allow us to move forward with the community's decision while addressing any specific concerns through targeted meta discussions as needed.

Answer 1

To implement this policy change, I respectfully request that our moderators take the following series of actions. These steps will help align our site's practices with the community's consensus and create a more welcoming environment for all users.

1. Stop the closure and deletion of ID questions. Recently, many identification questions have been closed or deleted by a moderator shortly after they were posted, which does not align with our community's consensus. Let's give these questions a chance to thrive.

   • status-completed after this meta post was made. (I no longer see ID questions closed and deleted.)

2. Remove the ID ban close reason. This will prevent confusion on our site policy and prevent them from being closed as off-topic.

   • status-completed 2024-08-04 Thanks to @iandotkelly.

3. Update our site tour and help center to remove references to the ID ban. These are often the first places new users look for guidance, so it's crucial they reflect our current stance.

   • status-completed Thanks to @iandotkelly

4. Unblacklist the [identify-this-*] tags and restore their pre-ban tag wikis. This will help users categorize their questions correctly and make it easier for others to find them. Since unblacklisting tags requires Community Managers' involvement and may take several months, I suggest our moderators proactively contact the CMs about our policy change. This way, we can start using the tags sooner, and users who prefer not to see ID questions can ignore these tags.

   • status-review 2024-08-08 Thanks to @iandotkelly

5. Update meta tags for clarity. Specifically:

   • Remove the faq tag from posts about discontinuing ID questions:
     • We are discontinuing support for identification questions
       • status-completed 2024-08-11 Thanks to @AnkitSharma
     • How can I find the title of a movie from just a description or image? (This should also be edited to remove references to the ID ban. I made the edit but it was rolled back by a moderator.)
       • status-declined 2024-08-10 Provided flag decline reason from a moderator: "No need to update every historical decision ever made. We have enough meta posts for that already featured or active "
   • Add the faq tag to the recent discussion post allowing ID questions to inform users about our site policy:
     • What does the community want to do with identification questions?
       • status-declined 2024-08-14 Provided flag decline reason from a moderator: "Declined - That is a community discussion." (Note: I'm puzzled by this reason, as all but three faq-tagged questions are community discussions.)

6. Begin reopening ID questions. This action will demonstrate our commitment to the new policy and potentially revive valuable content. Moderators can likely use their tools to do this efficiently without bumping questions to the top of the feed. status-review 2024-08-10 Thanks to @iandotkelly

7. Begin undeleting ID questions. While not the highest priority, this should be addressed after completing the above actions. Since most ID questions were closed and immediately deleted by moderators, and non-moderators can't undelete mod-deleted questions or search for deleted questions by other users, this task falls to our moderation team. Priority should be given to recent and high-quality ID questions (those with significant details provided).

   These changes will prevent confusion, and help users quickly find accurate information about our current policy.

As we move forward, it's important that we be generous and welcoming to those who ask ID questions, recognizing that their questions have value and worth. Every ID question represents someone's genuine interest in a piece of media, and by helping them, we're not only growing our community but also sharing our passion for movies and TV shows.

By implementing these changes, we'll ensure our site's policies and documentation accurately reflect our community's position on ID questions. This alignment will create a more welcoming environment for all users, especially those seeking help with movie and TV show identification.

Answer 2

First of all, your enthusiasm for a way forward is appreciated as well the invitation to a discussion by the whole community. However, I find this post a bit too prematurely or directly worded in its demand of an immediate policy change. We're having a good discussion about how to proceed with identification questions on this site and there seems to be a rising desire among the community for bringing these questions back in some form. However, there's still a lot unclear of how to actually proceed with this. I would have wished this to be part of the discussion over there and some answers did indeed get into this a little. We could take this question as a more direct step towards this direction, but we'd have to strip it of its rather "answery" nature for that, I'm afraid.

First of all, on a more general note, a strong complaint about the moderator process of banning these questions was that it seemed hasty to some users. Back in the day, the consensus was very clear, but it certainly is an important decision and needs to be thought through thoroughly (say that 3 times in a row!). Suddenly undoing all the work that went into cleaning up the site at the drop of a hat does sound a bit premature. Don't get me wrong, it's clear these questions are likely making a comeback sooner than later, but if we don't want to overhaste things, we need to put a bit more work into this issue. Believe it or not, this isn't an easy problem, it never was for the entirety of the site's lifetime. And especially for a "smooth transition", doing all that you describe in your answer immediately doesn't seem like a good idea.

But let's first look at some specific problems I see with this question and its answers. There is a strong desire by some users to make this a solely vote-based poll and it is understandable why, it makes things rather easy to decide on the drop of a voting arrow. But as much as we have to consider votes for seeing what people might agree with, we even more so have to look at the actual discussion and the genuine plans of what to do with these questions. But even if we look solely at the votes, the top-voted answer on the discussion actually talks about bringing back these questions under strict quality requirements. It seems figuring these out before opening the flood gates again would be a much more fruitful approach to this. We actually have years long experience with these questions and tried a lot of things to make them work. So we don't have to start on square one and see how bad the questions will get before deciding what to do about it, we already know and can work with this experience.

Then I also find it a bad idea to undelete millions of bad questions from the history of this site. We kept those ID questions undeleted that were of acceptable quality and had satisfying answers (which was about 1000 of them). Resurrecting all the dead questions disregarding of their quality and have god (or the user's of this site) sort them out yet again really sounds like a terrible idea. Reopening the existing questions might be an option (and they certainly can be unlocked, I guess), given that they might be on-topic again and ostensibly of resonable quality. However, even then they have to be first vetted against whatever quality criteria the community comes up with according to the linked discussion. You see how getting that hashed out first is essential to knowing how to proceed with this?

---

However, I do agree that since we are currently in a state of discussing how to proceed with these questions, it's probably a bad idea for moderators to single-handedly close and delete them. It's a bit of a 6 year old reflex, I admit. ;-) But acknowledging that this is an open discussion and falling very much in favour of allowing at least some of these questions, I will refrain from closing and deleting these questions for now and will coordinate with the other moderators on that.

However, this does also not mean, you're free to berate users who still do close-vote these questions. This is as much part of the ongoing discussion as the moderators refraining from closing them single-handedly. Once we have a clear policy on this, the close-reason will certainly get at least adapted if not removed. But we are still very much in the process of gauging these questions and this includes allowing users to express that based on the specific question.

As a general appeal, while these questions might become on-toptic again and being welcoming to people is always a good idea, you also have to live with the fact that there are still many users who do think these questions (or just specific instances thereof) are bad and bad for the site and you'll have to live with the fact that they will express this judgment with downvotes, because that is what downvotes are for. It would be great if this will work without too much of a rift within the community, but it is also very apparent that we're not in a situation where the site whole-heartedly welcomes these questions back rather than in a state about a decade ago with some people embracing them and others eschewing them and it's unclear if this issue will ever entirely disappear. It's clear not everyone hates these questions (in fact that was never really the case), but thinking suddenly everyone loves them would be equally wrong. Treating all these people with genuine concerns about these questions as somehow "sore losers" or disregarding their downvotes as invalid is as unwelcoming as admonishing each and every ID asker would be. Being nice to others is indeed a core tenet of this site and this includes experienced users as much as new users whose questions you'de like to answer.

---

That being said, you have provided some way forward, although I don't agree with every specific point in your answer (and find it too early to do everything, especially all at once). But do know, that this is a hard process and quite a change and journey for the site. It also was back then when we had a very clear consensus of what to do with these questions. It'll take a lot of work to make these questions work again and I think we first need to work out in which form we'll bring them back, taking the recent discussion and the presented approaches into account.

Answer 3

I'd like to address some of Napoleon's points and clarify my position on moving forward with ID questions.

However, there's still a lot unclear of how to actually proceed with this. [...] And especially for a "smooth transition", doing all that you describe in your answer immediately doesn't seem like a good idea.

I understand your concern about moving too quickly, but I believe we can make progress without undue haste. The ID ban was implemented within 37 days of the initial call for input meta post, so a similar timeline seems reasonable here. We don't need to solve every problem immediately, but we can take some concrete steps:

1. Remove the ID close reason
2. Update the tour and help center

These actions would align our site policies with the community consensus. If the moderator team needs time to discuss these changes, that's understandable. However, it would be helpful to have a timeline for when you actually plan to implement these basic updates.

There is a strong desire by some users to make this a solely vote-based poll [...] It seems figuring these out before opening the flood gates again would be a much more fruitful approach to this.

While I appreciate the desire to establish quality standards before reintroducing ID questions, I respectfully suggest that we can implement the community-supported policy without waiting for a separate, potentially lengthy discussion on quality standards. We can address specific concerns through targeted meta discussions as they arise, just as we do with other site policies.

This approach allows us to honor the community's decision while remaining flexible and responsive to any issues that emerge. Delaying implementation until we have a comprehensive set of quality standards feels unnecessary and could be perceived as a delaying tactic.

Then I also find it a bad idea to undelete millions of bad questions from the history of this site. [...] You see how getting that hashed out first is essential to knowing how to proceed with this?

No one suggested that we undelete all the deleted ID questions. Obviously, only high-quality ID questions (those with significant details provided) should be undeleted, with priority given to the most recent ones. If unsure, I suggest that you just undelete and reopen them and let the community vote on whether to close, delete, or have Roomba (the Community user/bot) delete them.

Also, undeleting old questions is not the highest priority. This should be addressed after we’ve removed the ID close reason and stopped deleting new ID questions. And we can always discuss the specifics of handling old questions through dedicated meta posts later.

It’s worth noting that since most ID questions were closed and immediately deleted by moderators, this task will primarily fall to the moderation team. Non-moderators can’t undelete mod-deleted questions or search for deleted questions by other users.

As a general appeal, while these questions might become on-topic again [...] you'll have to live with the fact that they will express this judgment with downvotes, because that is what downvotes are for.

I completely agree that downvoting is a fundamental part of how Stack Exchange works, and users should feel free to downvote as they see fit. However, close votes are different, as they should be backed by community consensus. Given that there's no longer a clear consensus for banning ID questions, it seems appropriate to remove the ID close reason.

By your very own vote-based standards, the community's decision is to allow these questions under quality requirements. And to honour this decision does seem to commend hashing these requirements out...

I'd like to clarify that my answer currently has the most upvotes. As I've said several times already, to ensure a fair representation of community opinion, we should count the upvotes rather than the net score. This gives equal weight to all users' voices, including those who don't have the 125 rep to downvote. Otherwise, we'd be unfairly giving two votes to users with 125+ rep.

I intentionally didn't include a requirement to establish quality standards before implementing this change, as I'm concerned it could be used as a delaying tactic. The delays and lack of assurance that ID questions will be allowed are worrying. I'd like to see a clear commitment and timeline from the moderation team to implement this policy.

Not sure this odd gerrymandering is really bringing us forward in any way here. First people are clearly against the ban because the announcement is downvoted to hell. Now we disregard downvotes because your answer is clearly more popular.

I'm a bit confused by your use of the term "gerrymandering" here. It's not just that your introduced ID ban got a lot of downvotes. What's really significant is that the answers disagreeing with the ban got the most upvotes. The fact that it's "downvoted to hell" is just the cherry on top. The initial check-in post wasn't even meant to be an outright vote on banning ID questions, according to the OP, so I'm still wondering how exactly that led to an ID ban. Whether you look at overall scores or just upvotes, the message is the same—the community isn't behind this ID ban.

Then we don't need to care about quality requirements because in effect the top-voted answer just wants ID questions back, too and the quality requirements are just a menial detail.

I think you might be misinterpreting my stance here. I never suggested that quality requirements aren't important. What I'm saying is that we don't need to have every detail ironed out before we take action. We can absolutely work on quality standards as we go along. My concern is that using quality requirements as a prerequisite feels like it might be delaying progress unnecessarily. Let's move forward with the policy change and fine-tune the details as we go—that way, we're not holding the entire process hostage over specifics we can address later.

Like, c'mon, you wanted a discussion, you got it. Now work this stuff out.

I'd like to clarify that I didn't initiate this discussion about the ID ban. OldPadawan (who is in favor of the ban), created the meta post. I felt that the four previous meta posts with highly upvoted answers opposing any ID ban were sufficient. In fact, I expressed doubts about the need for another meta post in my response to OldPadawan. However, given the apparent resistance from the moderation team, we find ourselves here once again.

At this point, we now have five posts indicating the community's desire not to implement any ID ban. It's unclear to me why there's still a delay in action. Are you suggesting we need yet another discussion on handling ID questions? As the moderators elected with the power to implement community consensus, I believe it's crucial for you to communicate your plans for enacting the consensus.

The moderation team is acknowledging that we are currently in the process of bringing these questions back again.

I appreciate that the moderation team acknowledges the process of bringing these questions back. However, I'm hoping for more transparency. Could you share the outcomes of the mod team's discussions? What steps do you believe are necessary before implementing this policy, and what's your expected timeline? The current lack of clarity is concerning. Are you waiting for another meta post? If so, what should it address that hasn't been covered already? How long do you expect this discussion to continue? I'm concerned that we're stuck in a loop of discussions without moving forward, and I'm worried that this seems to be delaying tactics. Can you help alleviate these concerns?

---

I believe we can move forward with reintroducing ID questions in a measured, responsible way. Could the moderation team provide a timeline for:

1. Removing the ID close vote reason
2. Updating the site tour and help center
3. Allowing the use of identification tags

If any of these steps will take significant time, it would be helpful to understand why and have an estimated completion date.

By taking these initial steps, we can begin to implement the community's decision while remaining open to ongoing discussions about quality standards and best practices for handling ID questions.