Posting this under the heading it deserves: Moderation log format change Everything below is what sits behind that.
Moderation log format change keeps being re-asked here and I think that is because the answer is conditional and the conditions never travel with it.
Attempting to write the conditional version down properly. Corrections welcome and expected — I would like this to end up as a maintained page rather than a fifth thread.
Thank you — that answers what I came here to find out.
Moderation log format change is a question about a distribution, not about a value, and treating it as a value is what produces the confident wrong answers.
I read post #3 twice before replying, because I had assumed the opposite.
I would call the community position on moderation log format change likely rather than established, and I would be comfortable defending that hedge.
Feedback to announcements: if you have feedback on an announced change (not a question, but your position) post it in the Meta category rather than here.
The rule of thumb is fine; the edge cases are where it earns its keep.
Practical answer on moderation log format change, since the theoretical one is upthread: do the simplest check first, write down the result, and only then decide whether the complicated explanation is needed. It usually is not.
Coming back to post #6, because the follow-up matters more than the original answer.
The rare case here is the one that costs somebody a week, though, and the common case costs everyone ten seconds. I think the trade is clearly correct.
The version of moderation log format change that circulates here is a simplification of a simplification. It is not wrong, but it has lost the conditions under which it holds, and those conditions are where the interesting cases live.
I have no financial interest in anything named in this thread and I want to say so before I comment on moderation log format change, because it is the sort of subject where it matters.
The edit is clearer. For anyone arriving now, read the edited version — the confusion in the replies above is about wording that no longer exists.
The honest answer is that it depends, and here is what it depends on.
Confirming post #9 from a second method, which matters more than confirming it from a second person.
What I can speak to on moderation log format change is narrow, so I will keep it narrow rather than generalising from it. Beyond that boundary I do not know.
Counterpoint on moderation log format change, offered without confidence: the same observation is consistent with a much duller explanation, and nobody has ruled the dull one out.
Reading this as a member rather than staff: the change is sensible and the explanation is better than the change. Publishing the failure mode that prompted it is what makes it possible to argue with.
Same conclusion as the reply above, reached differently, which is mildly reassuring.
Where I part company with post #13, and it is a narrow parting.
One question about the transition rather than the policy: what happens to topics that are in flight when it takes effect? The announcement is clear about posts and silent about drafts.
That holds for the case as described. Change the assumptions and it may not.
Post #13 is the version of this I will quote in future. One addition.
One more thing on moderation log format change that took me far too long to see: the two figures people quote are not measuring the same quantity. Once you notice that, the apparent contradiction disappears.
Clear enough that I do not think I have a follow-up, which is unusual.
Noting appreciation rather than asking anything. Several years of unpaid work on something with no leaderboard and a public log of your mistakes is a peculiar thing to volunteer for.
That has held every time I have looked, which is not the same as always.
Following up on the announcement above with the part people usually ask about first: no existing topic is affected, no existing post is edited, and nothing is removed. The change applies from the date forward only.
Reading rather than contributing, but this is the most useful thread I have found on it.
Announcement, with the reasoning rather than just the change. The behaviour described takes effect at the start of next month, it affects posting rather than reading, and nothing already posted changes. Objections belong in Meta and will be answered there.
Saving this. It is the version I will quote when the question comes round again.
Worth saying publicly: stepping back cleanly and handing over is a service. Documents with an absent maintainer go wrong quietly, which is the worst way for them to go wrong.
Someone should write this up properly, and it should probably not be me.
Where I part company with post #25, and it is a narrow parting.
The moderation log will carry the announcement entry, so the date is recoverable. It will not be visible on the topic itself, which is probably the right level of clutter.
Take it as a starting point and not as a specification.
Adding the measurement that post #26 says would settle it.
The rare case here is the one that costs somebody a week, though, and the common case costs everyone ten seconds. I think the trade is clearly correct.
Written in the hope of being told what I have missed.
Post #26 answers the question as asked. The question underneath it is different.
Adding a small correction to the moderation log format change summary above rather than a disagreement with it. The substance holds; one of the figures is out by a factor that matters.
I read post #28 twice before replying, because I had assumed the opposite.
The edit is clearer. For anyone arriving now, read the edited version — the confusion in the replies above is about wording that no longer exists.
Anyone who has looked at this more carefully, please correct the record.