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I really hate to ask this, because it's about a single comment flag, but can we get some clarification on what the moderators consider good vs bad comments?

I am asking because a flag I had on the following comment was declined:

I'm sorry, why do you disapprove of this answer, downvoter?

I've had a few other declined comment flags, but when looking through them, they were all removed later. Unfortunately, that means I can't provide examples of what they were before someone either went back through and removed them or other community users flagged them as well.

(Edit, later on:)

Here's an example of an comment that had an "obsolete" flag on it declined:

@Andy feel free to add that to the answer – Firepower0701 Sep 14 at 18:11

It was flagged as obsolete because an edit negated the point it made.

The comment above is not constructive. Users can vote however they wish for whatever reason they wish. They also do not need to provide any other feedback. Granted, it'd be nice if they did, but asking for such feedback doesn't accomplish anything except add noise to a post.

My question, before I continue flagging and seeing either declined flags or declined and eventually removed, what do the moderators want removed from the site that we should be flagging?

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    I'll let the moderator that handled these respond to this specific case, but I agree with you that these should be deleted. Great discussion for the community to be having, thank you!
    – Undo
    Nov 18, 2015 at 16:08
  • I had a dig, and identified one "obsolete" flag you had declined - I've edited it in.
    – ArtOfCode
    Nov 18, 2015 at 18:32

1 Answer 1

Reset to default
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I was the one who declined the flag on that comment.

At the time, the comment appeared to ask a perfectly legitimate question, which it still does, but I see how it is definitely noise. I guess this was a single case where I confused general noise with something that could be helpful.

I'll remove the comment soon. As for what we want removed, the best blanket description is anything that is flaggable (excluding the custom reason unless you honestly have a decent one to give). This means general noise, spam, too chatty, rude/offensive, not constructive, or obsolete comments.

Comments should essentially be only used as a way to ask for more info, discuss current info, or provide notes that can help solve the author's problem.

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