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In "SharePoint Overflow joins the Stack Exchange 2.0 family", it is stated that "we will re-add some of the best quality content from the old site". Perhaps it isn't phrased accurately, but this sounds like much less than 50% of content will be migrated.

However in our Area 51 proposal discussion, it was stated that "Questions, answers, comments all transfer" (emphasis mine).

I'm quite concerned that the SharePoint community (both on this site and as a whole) loses content because of this migration. Sometimes just one question and answer can be pure gold! Then there's the amount of time people put into their posts that could end up 'for nothing'.

It also wouldn't be nice to see our users lose reputation (beyond what may occur with vote value changes in Stack Exchange 2.0) or badges.

Can this please be explained? Also, how will the quality level be determined?

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  • i can only imagine how James feels about that statement, and hope he and others do not get disheartened, for surely that would not be good for the community
    – djeeg
    Commented Apr 9, 2011 at 7:17
  • Meh, I'll just have to graft again, continually keep up the reputation. True point though, "best quality content" is really mostly stuff with Answered Questions, particularly those with high upvotes.
    – James Love
    Commented Apr 9, 2011 at 11:07

1 Answer 1

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A quick background to bring everyone else up to speed…

In our discussions with the SharePoint Overflow folks, we discussed that the best way to build a lively and engaging site was to go through that same process of community engagement that the other Network sites go through. We have learned from launching other sites pre-populated with lots of posts that users seem to skip over a crucial part of participation — the part where communities start to organize and take ownership of the site, discussing the scope, community involvement, and other governance issues.

Unfortunately, our experience has been that those imported sites just sort of plod along and never really see that same explosive growth and success of our other Stack Exchange sites.

We want to assure that same level of success for the SharePoint Stack Exchange.

So that's where we are now.

In several weeks, we are going to integrate the old posts from SharePoint Overflow into this new site. We're hoping there will be a smooth transition from the old content to the new. It will take a community effort to make sure the imported material works within the scope and tone of this site. We're trying to avoid the trap of just dumping stuff into dusty back rooms where it is neglected and forgotten under the auspices of "legacy content."

We're going to start by importing the posts from SharePoint Overflow while, hopefully, leaving behind less relevant and ignored content — the stuff that received few votes and little participation. If a post has a reasonable number of total upvotes, views, and favorites -- it should be here. But if we miss anything, we have provided a data dump of ALL old content so nothing gets missed. Let's see how it goes.

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    -1 This is lame, you first abandoned us as a community on SE 1.0, then we agreed to move and now you have changed the URL, and moved few questions!? This community was working well before your intervention, much better than some other SE 2.0 sites…
    – Toni Frankola
    Commented Apr 10, 2011 at 12:23
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    The data dump of ALL old content is pretty useless if it is not integrated in this site. I am sure some crappy SEO company will pick it up and publish it, but I got most of those blocked in Google :-). Let's not beat around the bush, I want my points.
    – Jeroen Ritmeijer
    Commented Apr 10, 2011 at 20:47
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    @Toni: Surely we should be looking at ways to make the community better, rather than the same? I can't see how questions that were pretty much forgotten on the previous site will add value to this one, personally.
    – Stu Pegg
    Commented Apr 20, 2011 at 7:07
  • I think Toni has a point - yes make it better rather than the same, but not worse. Not back to square one. Jeff, I understand that it may not be feasible to make a smooth transition, but I don't buy your argument about it all being for our own good. C'mon, you're better than this.
    – SPDoctor
    Commented Apr 20, 2011 at 7:53
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    See my answer on this topic here: meta.sharepoint.stackexchange.com/questions/84/… The more I'm reading in these threads, the more it is pissing me off. Those old answers have value - they are answers, not just me and some of the guys talking about SharePoint.
    – Marc D Anderson
    Commented May 18, 2011 at 4:01

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