I personally refuse to change an answer to a comment or to delete an answer (not obscene or spam) that has an uptick. Someone thought that answer deserved an uptick and I don't believe we should deny that individual the points awarded. If management feels this must be done perhaps some method can be arranged to leave the points intact. In the meantime I won't make those changes.
I agree with you wholeheartedly. Someone found it helpful and it should remain as is.
All answers should be editable so that they can be improved over time. The more highly upvoted an answer is, the more strongly you should consider your actions before making any changes, but even a very good answer that 10 people have found helpful still stands to grow and improve over time.
As for deleting answers and comments - I mostly agree with you. Comments should not be deleted unless they are spam or offensive. Answers should generally not be removed if they have upvotes, unless they can be merged with an already existing answer with more up votes that contains all of the same information and more.
I will sometimes delete one of my answers even if it has an uptick if someones gives a better solution than mine in the same thread or if I was wrong with the proposed solution.
2 Comments:
I will delete one of my OWN answers also if I've given a wrong answer. +
by rj713
I too delete any errors I've made, participating in "improvement over time".
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8 Comments
Moving an answer to a comment doesn't delete it - people can still find it.
by James Pearson Hughes
The problem isn't reading it--it's denying the points to the person who answered the question.
by rj713
Well, then, a better solution would be to have upvotes for comments, no?
by James Pearson Hughes
@James Pearson, I do not think so. Comments should be just that, comments. Not answers. Sometimes you need to make comments to clarify etc. I do agree with rj713. If you have an answer that is up-voted, and it is clearly an answer, either leave it alone, up-vote it if you think it is right, or down vote it if it is blatantly wrong. Who are we to say that an answer, that was up-voted, did not help someone else? I think that would be a fair solution.
by oldturkey03
I agree completely with OT-thanks for your reply.
by rj713
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