"Should you edit out Flavour/Attitude from questions/answers?" Parsed StackOverflow Meta answer by user "Don't Panic"

of-edits-and-intent.txt

StackOverflow Meta: Should you edit out Flavour/Attitude from questions/answers?
https://meta.stackoverflow.com/a/348020/5545315

When a user,
 └─ attempting
     ├─ to find their place as an upstanding member of this community,
     └─ to contribute toward the noble goal of lovingly curating this vast and varied repository of
         └─ knowledge
             ├─ (which) we all hold so dear,
             ├─ which has aided us in our times of need,
             │   and
             └─ which we endeavor to support
                 └─ so that it continues in this capacity as an invaluable resource to countless developers,
                     └─ (who are) working on solving any number of different problems
                         ├─ of various levels of importance to the world in general,
                         └─ but each one (problem) personally valuable to its specific developer,
                             └─ (valuable) in that
                                 ├─ we all take pride in our work,
                                 │   and
                                 └─ feel the satisfaction that comes with
                                     ├─ not only achieving our goals,
                                     └─ but truly understanding how the things that we have created work,

encounters a question or an answer
 ├─ which contains
 │   ├─ some nugget of useful information,
 │   └─ some shining insight which guides them to better understanding,
 │   but
 └─ which may be obscured by an excess of additional verbiage,

the user must attempt in good faith
 ├─ to apply their efforts to grasp the true intention of the writer,
 │   and
 └─ to maintain that intention as they attempt to improve the question or answer,

and in doing so
 ├─ the question of style often arises,
 │   and
 ├─ this prospective editor is confronted with the possibility that
 │   └─ the style
 │       ├─ may detract from the key point of the post,
 │       └─ but on the other hand, may
 │           ├─ also be found pleasing,
 │           │   or
 │           └─ even possibly improve the readability or understanding of some other future reader,
 └─ and the loyal user
     ├─ desires to seek the wisdom of the community to aid in this decision,
     └─ and brings their concerns to meta for discussion,

(?)
 ├─ surely some different viewpoints will be voiced,
 │   and
 ├─ each contributor will have their own unique perspective on the content in question,
 │   and
 └─ the user knows that they should
     ├─ take all of these points into consideration,
     └─ and combine that input with their own judgement to strive to reach their own conclusion
         └─ as to
             ├─ which words to preserve
             └─ and which ones to strip away,
but
 ├─ even when
 │   ├─ the best efforts have been made,
 │   └─ and all the guidance of the community has been followed,
 └─ some residue of doubt may still remain,

and
 ├─ even when the edit is complete,
 ├─ the user may ask themselves if the edit
 │   ├─ was truly worthwhile,
 │   │   and
 │   └─ was seen
 │       ├─ as an improvement to the post by the community,
 │       └─ whether
 │           ├─ they really made a difference
 │           └─ or if the post was actually a turd which should not have been polished,
 │   and
 └─ these doubts are a burden for those of us who wish to edit,

but
 ├─ we must not allow them to discourage us from our task,
 └─ and we must
     ├─ put
     │   ├─ our best foot forward,
     │   ├─ or feet, actually, since there are more than one of us,
     │   └─ but not feet in terms of both of the one persons feet,
     │       └─ because you can't really put them both forward at the same time,
     │   and
     └─ apply the edit with courage and confidence in the fact
         ├─ that our intentions are good,
         │   and
         └─ that others will
             ├─ see that
             │   and
             └─ judge us accordingly.


-- Don't Panic (http://stackoverflow.com/users/2734189)