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I moderate other communities outside of Stack Exchange, and in most other cases I have put on my app developer hat to make some helpful bots. I haven't done that yet for Space Exploration, but I'm considering doing so for tags.

Superfluous tags continue to be a problem here, so I would like to come up with an easy way to help the community stay aware. I'm thinking about creating a bot that will track new tags created each week and make a post here on meta with the new tags (assuming there is 1 or more). I'm hoping that would bring more attention to the tags that are getting created so we can be more proactive about discussing whether they are good tags or not.

Before I set about creating a bot, I wanted to check and see what you all think of the idea, and if you have any suggestions I'd love to hear them.

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    $\begingroup$ As far as existing apps, the only one I could find that might do something similar is Boson, but it specifically posts to chat. I'd rather the bot post to meta. But if anyone knows of an existing bot that can do this, I'd definitely check it out. $\endgroup$
    – called2voyage Mod
    Mar 25, 2021 at 17:41
  • $\begingroup$ A different but related concern: I like to watch the "Active questions" tab, but it is often cluttered by re-tagging. It would be nice to have a "Retagged questions" tab where such edits could appear, and remove them from the "Active questions" tab. $\endgroup$
    – DrSheldon
    Mar 29, 2021 at 1:14
  • $\begingroup$ Any progress or further thoughts on this? Is more positive feedback necessary? Are you now hoping thee isn't because it's a big challenge and there isn't enough time to take it on right now :-) $\endgroup$
    – uhoh
    Aug 3, 2021 at 2:32
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    $\begingroup$ @uhoh I'd still love to make this, just been bogged down $\endgroup$
    – called2voyage Mod
    Aug 3, 2021 at 3:40

2 Answers 2

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Users with 2,000 or more reputation already have such a report; it's in the moderation tools (near the bottom of the page). Thanks to @uhoh, this is how it looks like right now:

enter image description here

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    $\begingroup$ Thanks for pointing that out! That's a good resource to know about. Unfortunately, that means that information is a little buried. It doesn't do a lot to bring awareness to the new tags. $\endgroup$
    – called2voyage Mod
    Mar 25, 2021 at 17:55
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    $\begingroup$ I agree, it doesn't. (And before you ask: I made quite a few bots too, but nothing similar to what you're proposing.) $\endgroup$
    – Glorfindel
    Mar 25, 2021 at 17:56
  • $\begingroup$ Yeah, I noticed you have. Glad to know I didn't miss anything existing bot-wise--at least as far as you're aware. $\endgroup$
    – called2voyage Mod
    Mar 25, 2021 at 17:57
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    $\begingroup$ Where's that moderation tools link on the page (apparently "near the bottom" isn't specific enough for me, lol)? The link in the answer works for me, but I can't find it on the page itself. $\endgroup$
    – Organic Marble
    Mar 25, 2021 at 22:33
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    $\begingroup$ @OrganicMarble space.stackexchange.com/… these are the new tags for the last 30 days, Yikes! i.stack.imgur.com/247gi.png $\endgroup$
    – uhoh
    Mar 25, 2021 at 23:25
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    $\begingroup$ @uhoh wow/ugh/yikes $\endgroup$
    – Organic Marble
    Mar 25, 2021 at 23:33
  • $\begingroup$ Soon, you will be. You are the only people on the SE whose icon causes reflexive "accept" click by me in the reviews. $\endgroup$
    – peterh
    Mar 26, 2021 at 17:03
  • $\begingroup$ @Glorfindel so we'll have to see about getting your rep up to 2k ASAP :-) c'mon, ask some space questions! Who doesn't have some question about outer space that they've always wondered about? $\endgroup$
    – uhoh
    Mar 30, 2021 at 17:29
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    $\begingroup$ @uhoh thanks for the encouragement. Trouble is, most questions I have are already answered :) $\endgroup$
    – Glorfindel
    Mar 30, 2021 at 18:47
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a bot that will track new tags created each week and make a post here on meta with the new tags (assuming there is 1 or more)

In principle it sounds wonderful!

For example, at the bottom of moderation tools for last 30 days I see we have many tags that should not have been created and need to go to the corn field ASAP.

Many people will experience a sense of panic; "Oh no! What should I do?"

I've seen a few meta posts in the past about the dire state of tag-adding. See for example @called2voyage's answer to How is our tagging situation? What can we do to improve it? who's been working to keep bad tags from growing exponentially, but it's great if the bot will make the high bad tag creation rate more visible to the community.

Eventually we may learn to start noticing new, ill-advised tag creation in real time, by doing a quick check of the tags under each question we read to see if something seems amiss, e.g. is ambiguous and is probably unhelpful.

What should be provided in each report is a short explanation of exactly how we should react to these, what we can, can't, should, shouldn't do. If we all immediately go off and start removing tags then it might get disorganized or counterproductive.

It might include a: users with X reputation can...

too many bad tags!

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    $\begingroup$ I've never quite understood why the "moderation tools" available on stackexchange were so user-unfriendly and hidden away, when the rest of the system seems reasonably well engineered. I can only hope that actual mods get something a bit more convenient. $\endgroup$
    – Starfish Prime
    Mar 26, 2021 at 7:41
  • $\begingroup$ @StarfishPrime squeaky doors have higher probability of getting oiled; if there aren't questions in the main meta about improving them, then other more pressing things will get the attention. $\endgroup$
    – uhoh
    Mar 26, 2021 at 12:35
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    $\begingroup$ Stack overflow launched 13 years ago; my observations are certainly not new. Stuff like this is apparently not important enough, or at least not valuable enough to put limited amounts of developer time into fixing (especially when people like the OP are happy to write tools to fill the gaps!) $\endgroup$
    – Starfish Prime
    Mar 26, 2021 at 12:54

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