Why is there no option to flag Answers posted as Comments?

Question

Often I see Answers posted as Comments - sometimes I will add a comment asking the user to add an answer themselves, but this is usually ignored.

Posting Answers as Comments clearly impacts the site as a usable resource, as it reduces the search-ability of any particular search performed by a user.

There are also particular moderators who use a sock account to Convert these comments into answers.

Given all of the above, why can't I flag a comment as an answer specifically? Should I just be using the Other field? This feels like something that should have a dedicated flag option.

Answer 1

There's nothing really for a moderator to do in these circumstances that you could not do yourself*.

So, it's hard to see what a new specific flag type would be useful for. The other flag types should suffice in all cases I can immediately think of.

The main reason I had a separate account for comments converted to answers is that I don't want these answers associated with my main account. Max Vernon has one of these as well, off the top of my head. There may be others.

The separate account was useful to show people that regularly leave perfectly good answers in comments how much rep (and badges etc.) they're missing out on!

People that know me will already know my (strong) opinions about answers posted as comments. Honestly, aside from making work for others, I find it a little arrogant to post an 'answer' that will always be at the very top of the page, and cannot be downvoted 😉

All that said, I do agree with you to some extent. It would be nice to convert comments to answers directly sometimes. The reason I don't advocate for it is that I don't like the idea of posting an answer with someone else's name on it. They chose not to answer, so I shouldn't force them to. I don't altogether love that reasoning in all its aspects, but it is a tricky issue.

I am, however, more than happy to delete comments that shouldn't have been comments, so long as no truly useful content is lost, one way or another.

On the whole, the issue isn't out of control on dba.se like it is on some other sites, so I am grateful for everyone's help on that. Particularly those of you that regularly edit useful comment content into posts and flag the original comments as obsolete.

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_{* For people that really don't want to take action themselves, I personally am willing to handle the odd custom flag explaining that they'd like me to convert the comment(s) to an answer, but I can't speak for the other mods. Also, I'd really like not to spend my own time on too much more of this - it is limited like everyone's.}

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Related:

• Is the comment-only answer acceptable?
• What should be done with questions that have been self-resolved as a comment instead of an answer?

Answer 2

Moderators don't have the ability to convert a comment to an answer (as ourselves or as whatever sock thing you're alluding to), and we can't force a user to do that either.

We can turn an answer to a comment, but not the reverse. The best we could do is create a new answer based on the original user's comment, but we can't make it their answer.

If you want a person to convert their comment to an answer, you'll need to ask that person. A flag isn't going to help you, at least the way the network currently works. That's a feature request that belongs on the broader meta, but it has already been discussed:

• Allow converting comments to answers

Answer 3

I'm not a moderator but on rare occasions I will post a helpful comment rather than an answer because, as Aaron pointed out in one of his comments above, I may not be confident in the subject matter or I may not be able to find documentation or evidence to support my theory. I personally would not want it to be automatically converted to an answer because somebody has flagged it, as I may be wrong or just taking a wild guess. If somebody forced a comment of mine into an answer that I didn't want to post I would delete it. And that would drive people away from our site.

That being said, if I post a comment and the OP says that it was indeed the solution, I will convert it to an answer. Conversely, I may have commented a potential fix but then received no feedback from the OP regarding whether it worked or not. It would be wrong for me to make this an answer as I may have just been taking a stab in the dark at what the problem may be. If somebody takes my comment, and posts an answer that gets accepted, I will delete my comment as it is now obsolete.

I joined this site not only to help others, but to learn from people such as Paul and Aaron. We all give up our time to help people and support this site - and our moderators have to give up a large amount of time to go through all of the content. Adding another flag is more work for them and so personally, I'd not like a flag for it this - but instead prompt the poster to add an answer, or post an answer yourself.