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How do you feel about trust and safety on the Fediverse?

@evan Your polls tend to miss neutral options. I don't have any special feelings about trust and safety, at least not different ones from other social networks. Nobody knows you're a dog and everything.

Also, for some of the topics I didn't care either way but couldn't vote for that. I don't remember the topics, but for some of them I remember thinking "'I don't care' must be at least half of the people".

Is that intentional?

hamato

@janl @evan

I could, and often I do, but as I deal with polling, social sciences and psychology as part of my job, I cannot help but note that not providing these options tends to make the results even more heavily biased (sometimes even useless) than they already are through selection bias.

If it's just Evan's hobby to do polls, I'm fine with that. I wanted to help more than annoy, and if I did the latter, I apologize.

@hamato @evan nah, you have a point. No annoyance created. I just sneakily shared how deal with this :) maybe the vote popularity is the signal Evan uses to make up the difference.

@janl @hamato Yes, that's usually the case. If I post a poll about an obscure topic and <100 people respond, that's the signal I trace.

I do find it hurtful when people try to make me feel bad about my interests and those of people around me by making a big deal about not having an "I DON'T CARE" option. It's not my job to make polls that you care about; go do something else with your time.

@evan @janl I didn't want to make you feel bad, I just wondered if it was intentional because of my professional background. Often a "I don't care either way" is a useful answer (e.g. if you ask "season the steak before or after grilling?") while sometimes you already know almost everyone has a strong opinion on the topic at hand, such as vi vs. emacs, Linux vs. BSD, etc.

Interestingly enough, I notice that "it doesn't matter" is the answer to an increasing number of issues as I grow older.

@hamato @janl I didn't mean you! I get a few people who respond to my polls saying, how do I say IDGAF, and I'm like, I guess you just did.