trashhaloJul 25, 2023

The Fall of Stack Overflow

https://beehaw.org/post/6801729

The Fall of Stack Overflow - Beehaw

Over the past one and a half years, Stack Overflow has lost around 50% of its traffic. This decline is similarly reflected in site usage, with approximately a 50% decrease in the number of questions and answers, as well as the number of votes these posts receive. The charts below show the usage represented by a moving average of 49 days. — What happened?

Show threadryan659
If this and Reddit are going downhill, where will we look for our tech questions?! (/s, there will always be others)
Jul 25, 2023 at 11:28amWeb
Show threadthingsiplayJul 25, 2023
@ryan659 Activity Pub.
Show threadRoboRayJul 25, 2023
We may have to start reading the manuals!
Show threadjarfilJul 26, 2023

My bets for the future:

  • RTFM
  • Have ChatGPT RTFM
  • Read a book about general principles
  • Ask ChatGPT to apply general principles to its own answer after RTFM, then ask it to double check it
  • Spin up a VM, just try the thing. If it doesn’t work, ask ChatGPT why.

When everything else fails…

  • Ask a question at any random place (SO, Reddit, Discord, Mastodon,Lemmy, etc.)
  • Feed the answers to ChatGPT and have it summarize them, then double check its own answer