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Welcome to Codidact Meta!

Codidact Meta is the meta-discussion site for the Codidact community network and the Codidact software. Whether you have bug reports or feature requests, support questions or rule discussions that touch the whole network – this is the site for you.

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Q&A How should Codidact "advertise" and gain community members?

I think this is going to be site specific. It may take a while, but in the end, users will go to where questions get good answers. It's like the Build it and they will come philosophy. I like to...

posted 4y ago by Olin Lathrop‭

Answer
#1: Initial revision by user avatar Olin Lathrop‭ · 2020-06-02T12:29:37Z (almost 4 years ago)
I think this is going to be site specific.  It may take a while, but in the end, users will go to where questions get good answers.  It's like the *Build it and they will come* philosophy.  I like to call it *Answer and they will ask*.

This process is slow, because it relies on word of mouth.  That's exponential in the early stages.  One advantage of Codidact is that there isn't a profit to be made, so there is no need to hurry.  Of course the occasional mention in various places of expert answers available over on Codidact will greatly accelerate this process.

As Joel Spolsky pointed out in the paragraph you quoted, this all hinges on having a core group of experts that are willing to provide quality answers.  At least that's necessary for technical subjects.  There may be a very different dynamic for more social sites.  Those are not what I'm talking about.

It's interesting that this very observation is what SE forgot as time went on.  Perhaps they were blinded by the need to make a profit, where clicks are revenue, and masses provide clicks, so volume matters and quality doesn't.  The flaw in this logic is that the masses are only there because of quality, despite how much they may bitch and moan at attempts to keep the quality high.  Once the experts get disillusioned and leave, and quality falls, the masses also leave because they no longer get the good answer they came for.

Fortunately, the experts in a particular field are usually well known.  To start a new site, you invite them personally.  To keep them, you keep the place clean, and give the experts the power to help keep it clean, and have some system for giving them recognition in return for the high quality free answers.  The few good answers initially will attract more questions, and you're up and running along the exponential curve.

*Answer and they will ask*.