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That's mostly a perk for the question asker. Nobody (that I know of) stops reading at the first answer, because there are usually multiple good ways to solve an

That's mostly a perk for the question asker. Nobody (that I know of) stops reading at the first answer, because there are usually multiple good ways to solve any problem in programming. And if the accepted answer has a fraction of the upvotes of the answer just under it.. that's another strong signal to "keep scrolling"

dantiberian 8y ago
People definitely stop reading after the first answer, especially if it looks like a reasonable solution. It is a very common experience for me, where I won't realise that there is a much better rated answer below the accepted one, especially if the top answer is long enough so that the second one isn't visible without scrolling. From a UX perspective, you want to put the most relevant information at the top. The votes of all Stack Overflow users gives a far greater signal than the one 'accepted' flag from the asker. This is one of my biggest pain points with Stack Overflow.
- codinghorror 8y ago
  There's zero evidence that people stop reading at the first answer. Otherwise no other answers would have any upvotes, and you can see that's not the case.
  - dantiberian 8y ago
    I'm not saying that every single person stops reading at the first answer, just that people drop off over the page, and in my personal experience (and talking with others), it is common to miss that there are higher ranked answers below the accepted one.
  - Flimm 8y ago
    What's the value in pinning the OP's selected answer to the top, even if it has -100 votes? Or even if it 100 votes, but the second has 900? Shouldn't the overwhelming will of the community take precedence over OP's selected answer, who may not have bothered to review the answers for years? Also, I'm sure the claim isn't that everybody stops reading after the first answer, but that the first answer does get a lot more reads than answers further down. I bet it would be possible to prove this with the right analytics.

dantiberian 8y ago

People definitely stop reading after the first answer, especially if it looks like a reasonable solution. It is a very common experience for me, where I won't realise that there is a much better rated answer below the accepted one, especially if the top answer is long enough so that the second one isn't visible without scrolling. From a UX perspective, you want to put the most relevant information at the top. The votes of all Stack Overflow users gives a far greater signal than the one 'accepted' flag from the asker. This is one of my biggest pain points with Stack Overflow.

codinghorror 8y ago
There's zero evidence that people stop reading at the first answer. Otherwise no other answers would have any upvotes, and you can see that's not the case.
- dantiberian 8y ago
  I'm not saying that every single person stops reading at the first answer, just that people drop off over the page, and in my personal experience (and talking with others), it is common to miss that there are higher ranked answers below the accepted one.
- Flimm 8y ago
  What's the value in pinning the OP's selected answer to the top, even if it has -100 votes? Or even if it 100 votes, but the second has 900? Shouldn't the overwhelming will of the community take precedence over OP's selected answer, who may not have bothered to review the answers for years? Also, I'm sure the claim isn't that everybody stops reading after the first answer, but that the first answer does get a lot more reads than answers further down. I bet it would be possible to prove this with the right analytics.