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Looking at this edit I made, you see it doesn't say I made the edit. It says that Al Everett made the edit. In reality I was the one who edited that text, he only changed one word in all those changes. Why is a user able to take a suggested edit, change one more thing in that edit, and receive the credit for the edit with no attribution to the actual editor? I have made multiple edits and the same user seems to keep making one other small change and getting the credit and reputation.

I know the 2 reputation from editing is small, but it all adds up, so I don't see why I am getting ripped off for trying to help? The edit summaries are even the exact same as mine in the edits.

2 Answers 2

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When you get a suggested edit to review you see four buttons: enter image description here
The first two and the last button are self explanatory (or at least I hope they are). Button 3 - "Improve" is what interests us here.

There are two scenarios:

  1. The suggested edit was almost right.
  2. The suggested edit was wrong, but the post needs editing anyway.

In the former case the user just tweaks the edit and hits "Save". The suggestion is approved (no need for any more reviews) and you get the 2 point bonus.

In the latter case the user corrects the edit but unchecks the "this suggestion was helpful" box. In this case your suggestion is rejected and you don't get the 2 point bonus: enter image description here

Yes, it's up to the reviewer to decide this and there are no checks, but your edits will be seen by lots of different reviewers so any bias will "average out" in the long run.

I would only worry about this if you were getting a lot of rejections.

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  • But in both my suggested edits that I made recently I my suggested edits were used, just things were added/changed ontop of them. So my suggested edits were not wrong, they were "almost right".
    – ComputerLocus
    Jul 29, 2013 at 15:49
  • @Fogest - as I said it's totally up to the user whether they clear this check box or not and no other user reviews the review.
    – ChrisF Mod
    Jul 29, 2013 at 16:05
  • @Fogest: If you're going to edit a post, please fix all the things that are wrong with it.
    – ale
    Jul 29, 2013 at 16:17
  • @AlEverett As Chris describes though, there are two choices you have. You yourself are even saying that my edits were almost right, so I don't see why the option of my suggested edit being selected as wrong is being chosen here?
    – ComputerLocus
    Jul 29, 2013 at 17:24
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    In the one you linked to, you left more broken than you fixed. So, no, it wasn't "almost" right and I unchecked the box. On other edits of yours, there was only one or two things that were missed, so I left the box checked.
    – ale
    Jul 29, 2013 at 17:41
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    @AlEverett You only changed 1 thing on the linked post, and everything else including the title change, tags, and grammatical changes were kept, yet you considered my post to be not helpful. Anytime a user tries to help contribute towards editing it is helpful. The only time it is not is if it was some malicious edit with no intention of helping the community.
    – ComputerLocus
    Jul 29, 2013 at 22:53
  • I changed more than one thing, but I can't point to definitive evidence either way. I don't know why you think I have something in for you. I don't. I have more often left the "helpful" box checked when I've improved your edits. I'm not trying to take credit for anything. I have the badges. I have the reputation points. I'm just trying to make the site better. You made some edits that helped, but didn't go far enough. I didn't think you deserved full edit credit for that. But, really, are you getting this upset over two points?
    – ale
    Jul 30, 2013 at 12:45
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This is the first time, I've come across this option, and therefore I never used it (I'm glad it's enabled every time).

But I won't use it in the future as well. Active users, willing to participate in making Web Applications better, should be rewarded. If a reviewer decides to improve the suggestion, that will indicate the "suggestee", to improve their suggestions the next time.

Otherwise, I would reject the suggestion.

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  • But in the case of what Al Everett is doing it appear he is using it more to get some quick edits on his record. He takes an edit and changes one more thing and says the other persons edit was not helpful.
    – ComputerLocus
    Jul 29, 2013 at 22:52
  • @Fogest No, Al has the Copy Editor badge already and he keeps on editing. Al is choosing a different way of telling people their suggestions weren't good.
    – Jacob Jan Tuinstra
    Jul 30, 2013 at 6:08
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    Do not encourage bad or incomplete edits. If the reviewer has to do more work than the suggester the edit was not helpful.
    – fuxia
    Jul 31, 2013 at 8:25
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    I'm encouraging everybody to suggest edits. I'm voicing my opinion, as a reviewer, about doing it differently.
    – Jacob Jan Tuinstra
    Jul 31, 2013 at 17:59

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