Discussion on: I feel like the quality of posts in Dev is deteriorating

[Jesse Smith Byers]

I have a couple thoughts to add to this discussion:

1. Increase education for users on how to browse and how to post

   • I just stumbled upon some tips for how to adjust the weighting of the tags I follow and the experience level of the posts in my feed. These settings make a huge difference in what shows up in the feed! Making this info more prominent on the homepage could be helpful.
   • Similarly, frequent reminders / more prominent messaging about how to rate the experience levels of the posts we write, and proper use of tags could also be helpful.

2. Write more of the kind of posts you'd like to see

   • Some writers are here to write more for ourselves - for logging and solidifying our own learning - than for an outside audience (this is certainly true for me). Some of us are here more to consume content than to produce it. And this ratio changes over time. But I think it is always helpful to have the "be the change..." mentality, and just write the type of posts that you feel are lacking. At the very least, it gives someone else a high-quality read. Best-case scenario, it serves as an example and inspires more people to up their quality.

3. Focus on the long game, not the moment

   • I really like the suggestions of others on using the Week/Month/Infinity tabs to find higher-quality content, as well as using the search bar - this is where I've found the most valuable content for my own learning. It doesn't have to be about the feed.
   • But this is true on the writer side as well. A post might not get a lot of views right away, but may get a lot of views over time. For example, I posted a few articles last spring that got zero traction, and all of a sudden they seem to be getting views on a regular basis. Trust that if you create something high-quality, people will find and share it...but maybe not right away.