1 upvotes, 1 direct replies (showing 1)
View submission: Announcement: New Rules, Guidelines and Flair System
Just to underline ADD and add in one specific way:
By applying for flair we are able to cut down on that work, provided you do indeed qualify. (Those who don't are generally dissuaded from answering so often.)
Besides the fact that top-level comments of flaired users are less likely to be in the moderation queue at all, when they are reported I know that I read them differently. When they are about a subject I don't know well (a necessity for all mods), I am more likely to moderate an unflaired user's comment, especially if the comment contains something like a follow-up question. Not all of these are helpful and in cases where I don't really know (because I am not an expert) I happily defer to the expertise of others who I reasonably believe to be experts.
Comment by oth_radar at 06/11/2018 at 01:03 UTC
3 upvotes, 0 direct replies
I think that, for adjacent reasons, flair helps me as a panelist as well. I know that when I've answered a question with my Undergrad flair, and then a Prof steps in and corrects, that I'm probably in the wrong and need to amend my answer. That's not to say I always will, because even professors have their philosophical biases, but as a general rule, it means that my answer has missed some nuance or subtext that I'm not aware of. This allows me to amend my answer, which helps both me as a panelist and the person who asked the question, who will now also have access to that greater nuance. If the same person had corrected me but they were unflaired, I wouldn't, as a panelist, be as inclined to research what they had said, gain insight, and amend my answer, and instead might erroneously "correct" them or dismiss them, which would be a disservice to the questioner, who might be misled into ignoring something relevant.