Stack Overflow is full of idiots.

The Stack Overflow culture needs to be fixed. The overall gatekeeping & elitism in computer science & programming - as a whole - needs to be fixed. I just see it more on Stack Overflow than anywhere else.

There's a lot more to be said on the matter. I could be more clear in some areas - like not all people on Stack Overflow are like this. So if you're one of the good ones on Stack Overflow and you're watching this, don't come after me. Go after the folks in your community that ARE like this. But to be honest, at the end of the day I don't care what you say. I don't care if you try to justify it. There's a problem with gatekeeping in CS that turns off a lot of people and make us all look bad. It's annoying and downright unacceptable. And anyone who does it, I will call every single one of y'all out for it.
And this isn't some cancel culture crap - this is calling out BS that needs to be FIXED, not cancelled.

Let me finish off by saying this - there are a lot more good, encouraging folks in computer science than bad. Don't let those negative individuals discourage you from getting into coding.

We will get back to coding in the next video.

#FixStackOverflow

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[fknight]

There's a lot more to be said on the matter. I could be more clear in some areas - like not all people on Stack Overflow are like this. So if you're one of the good ones on Stack Overflow and you're watching this - don't come after me. Go after the folks in your community that _are_ like this. But to be honest, at the end of the day I don't care what you say. I don't care if you try to justify it. There's a problem with gatekeeping in CS that turns off a lot of people and make us all look bad. It's annoying. And anyone who does it, I will call every single one of y'all out for it. So if any of you in my community stumble upon something like this, feel free to send it my way. And remember - this is supposed to be a fun hobby, a fun job.

Let me finish off by saying this - there are a lot more good, encouraging folks in computer science than bad. Don't let those few negative individuals discourage you from getting into coding.

We will get back to coding in the next video.

PS - And at 3:17 when I say "comment, " I mean question. Also, this isn't some cancel culture crap - this is calling out BS that needs to be FIXED, not cancelled.

[smisantos]

How to use Stack Overflow:
1. Create your question with your account
2. On a second account give a wrong answer with a confident language
3. Wait for the right answer along with offenses to the wrong answer

[hnasr]

When someone says you should do more research that means they can’t articulate it clear enough or they don’t understand it themselves and they want to seem like they do.

[yahmn]

The worst thing is when the #1 google search result for a question has someone telling the OP to "google it".

[Frissdas]

I remember being new in IT almost 10 years ago. I asked a co-worker "I'm stuck on issue, here's what I've tried here's what I've looked up. Any suggestions on what to Google? He said "Google better" my supervisor overhears this, comes over and says "how about instead of being an asshole, you help him understand what he should be googling? He already told you he's trying and he's stuck. If he knew what to google based off what he's tried, would he be asking for help?"

Co-worker said "how's he supposed to learn if I give him the answer?" Boss "he didn't ask for the answer, he asked what else he should try looking for to find the answer. Quit wasting everyone's time."

[dmh]

Typical stackoverflow : question: 'im doing X and I need to know Y.'. Answer: ' you shouldn't be doing X and Y is stupid'

[El-ljpz]

The worst part is when they down vote you AND write an essay on how your question is stupid instead of answering the question which can be one or two line of code, or just point you to the right direction

[cgme]

The first comment I ever made on Stack Overflow (4 years or so ago) was talking about structs for C++. I tagged C and C++, a mistake, and the first two people that saw it downvoted my comment and told me I was an idiot. I had also mentioned how I was in school and needed help before an impending project deadline. I started arguing with the guys, and this only gave me more downvotes.
Finally, some guy with an IQ above 72 replied and was extremely kind and helpful. But that’s honestly rare.

[HappyRussianGaming]

We were all young squids writing "hello world " for the first time, if a young and inexperienced person were to be met with this kind of behavior it would be a deterrent rather than encouragement for their future learning.

[arielvinda]

When I started programming I asked what did I need to know to make a simple DAW (Digital Audio Workstation), and the first answer was "If you have to ask, you are not ready" and the answer directly below it was "I don't recommend starting with it directly as the knowledge curve is pretty steep as it involved advance mathematics and cs concepts that requires years, but you could start investigating how to make plugins for it" and started listing a ton of frameworks and books and resources that really helped me on my path. The first one was upvoted to the sky and the second one downvoted to hell... Stack overflow community is as toxic as a nuclear wastebin from chernobyl

[DomeHepot]

I’m majoring in CS and this is a huge issue even in classes. I’m honestly afraid to ask questions during class at this point cause most of the time another student will have the same energy and make a remark or laugh.

[taylorrathbone]

"God forbid he has human interaction during his research" that hits home

[dertyp]

One of my biggest problem with stackoverflow is that people tend to intentionally overcomplicate answers to throw people off. Like someone asks how to convert an int to a string and they will go on write 30 lines of code double and tripple checking unneccesary statements just to make it look more complicated than it actually is.

[NikolaNevenov]

As a hobbyist programmer, I can't do anything else but agree. I've gotten so sick of asking for help or opinions from other programmers, that I don't ask for anything anymore, but instead spend the countless hours trying to do everything on my own. Now some might say that's how you should do it...but honestly the point of these communities is to help people save their time and get pointed to the right direction, and not to be a ego drug from some big brain narcissists.

[zembo]

“There are no stupid questions, only stupid answers, ” is the mantra I stand by.

[moteq]

I was going through a depressive episode (still depressed today though) when I asked my very first stackoverflow question, but as you said, I was met with hostility. Not only was I having a hard time with my classes, I felt like an outcast in college. I couldn't communicate with people very well, so I thought that the "online" people could help me out and that stackoverflow would be my solace. Well, that wasn't the case.

After the responses, I felt so bad about myself that I thought that I'm not a capable programmer (while also going through depression in college). I had no one to talk to, no one to ask for help, and I questioned my intelligence. I failed a class, dropped some classes, and then left school for a year. I came back to college though since I am almost done with my undergrad. I'm better now, still depressed, but I'm fighting my way out of it.

I have finals this week and next week. My grades aren't the best. My GPA low since I screwed up my previous classes. But hey I'm almost done. This is my last semester.

[srclogann]

I'm just a 12 year old guy trying to learn programming. When I asked my first question on stack overflow, I had already received advice on how I should put a lot of information because there are a lot of people who don't even answer if they don't have "easy and enough" information.
So I put in as much information as possible (it was a simple question about an online exercise). Even having done that, the few who answered me were rude, said that if I had such a simple question I should google it (I did it, but I didn't understand with the explanations I found), and that they wouldn't read it all just to answer a simple question.
After that, I didn't ask anything for a while, until I was really confused by another question last week. I asked the question, didn't put so much information, added the correct tags and left the link to the question's website

[Descent]

As someone who answers a bunch of questions on stack overflow and helps teach high school coding courses a lot of stuff on SO pisses me off. I can't count the number of times I have been in the middle of writing a long response with details for people who are trying to learn something to have it closed and counted as a duplicate to a question that doesn't answer the original posters question and I have to try to overturn the decision to give them an actual answer. Also anything that has even the smallest amount of subjectivity is apparently completely off limits, any sort of design questions you're apparently just supposed to know or you aren't a good enough dev. In the world of software dev there are concepts that many people don't even know the names of to be able to learn about and SO just outright stops people from being able to learn about these concepts (i.e. if you don't know what inheritance is, you can't just google inheritance because you have to know about it to learn about it).

[griffincosgrove]

Not stackoverflow it's software engineering as a whole.

[goodgian]

This really hits the feels. I've been feeling this every time I go to stack overflow. Irritates me to the core. You can see their egos from the moon.