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I'm thinking that for certain fields where a user's name (and reputation) is shown, there should be instead a collapsible tab. Something like a "spoiler" prevention. The information about who asked/answered the question and who made the last edit will still be there except that it's not directly shown. Either revealed on click or on mouse-over.

This allows for more objective assessment of question/answer quality.

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  • I think this has been suggested on meta.stackoverflow. It may have been rejected. I'm surprised I haven't seen this suggested on skeptics.SE, as they're all about removing bias.
    – Andrew Grimm
    Dec 28, 2011 at 13:09
  • What kind of bias would cause problems?
    – Questioner
    Dec 29, 2011 at 1:10
  • @DaveMG. Argumentum ad numerum, ad populum, ad hominem, ad verecundiam, et cetera. All those may result in illogical conclusions.
    – Flaw Mod
    Dec 29, 2011 at 1:17
  • That kind of thing is a risk in any medium where humans interact. Is there a particular example of where this is an issue on this site? I can't think of an example where incorrect or misleading information occurs as the result of perceptions about who posted.
    – Questioner
    Dec 29, 2011 at 6:01

2 Answers 2

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Here's a quick jQuery script (just as a demonstration):

var hideCls = '.user-details, .user-gravatar32';

$('.post-signature').
    mouseover(function() {
        $(this).find(hideCls).css('visibility', 'visible');
    }).
    mouseout(function() {
        $(this).find(hideCls).css('visibility', 'hidden');
    }).
    find(hideCls).css('visibility', 'hidden');
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  • I do not know jQuery. Is it possible to use your script with Greasemonkey?
    – Tsuyoshi Ito
    Dec 31, 2011 at 14:12
  • 1
    @TsuyoshiIto I've posted a proof-of-concept to userscripts.org/scripts/show/121933. Unfortunately there's a delay as Greasemonkey only executes once the page loads. It could probably be better written, but seems to work for now.
    – cypher
    Dec 31, 2011 at 19:03
  • @TsuyoshiIto jQuery is the most widely used Javascript library. Although, not all websites use it.
    – user458
    Dec 31, 2011 at 19:04
  • 1
    A few minutes late, but here's another one. I don't notice any delays. userscripts.org/scripts/show/121934
    – Louis Waweru
    Dec 31, 2011 at 19:24
  • cypher, @Louis: Thanks! I am currently trying out Louis’s script. This is fun, although I am not sure if it is useful to avoid bias. By the way, on my computer, it has the delay which cypher mentioned; that is, the user name is visible for a short period of time while the page is being loaded.
    – Tsuyoshi Ito
    Dec 31, 2011 at 23:29
  • @TsuyoshiIto Unless I use Temperfox, I've got a bad delay in Chrome. But it seems like the script runs before the page loads in FF8 & 9. What version are you using?
    – Louis Waweru
    Jan 1, 2012 at 0:15
  • @Louis: Firefox 8.0 on Windows, with Greasemonkey 0.9.13. It does not always have delay depending on how long it takes to load the page. It seems to me that when the page takes long time to load, the user name is visible during that. The reason I realized it is probably because the Internet connection of my place is sometimes bad.
    – Tsuyoshi Ito
    Jan 1, 2012 at 0:18
  • @Louis: I cannot reproduce the behavior I mentioned any longer. Either it was my mistake or the Internet connection of my place got better for no apparent reason….
    – Tsuyoshi Ito
    Jan 1, 2012 at 20:18
  • @TsuyoshiIto thanks for letting me know.
    – Louis Waweru
    Jan 2, 2012 at 4:59
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Sounds like an interesting idea, but it is hard to say whether it is really useful or not without trying it out. In principle it should be possible to implement the suggested feature as a user script, but I am not sure how difficult it is to write such a user script.

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