Ah, recentism.

As Ben Kelley’s answer reflects, but not enough answers have acknowledged, dragging one’s feet about gay marriage has become a bipartisan thing.

Gay marriage has become a flashpoint for the current culture war in Australia; the ex-PM and leader of the conservative faction of the Liberals, Tony Abbott, announced that if you’re sick of political correctness, you should vote against.

The inaction is partly because culture war issues are much more prominent in Australian politics than it was a decade ago. It’s something that conservative commentators, such as Andrew Bolt and Abbot’s former chief of staff Peta Credlin, use as a cudgel against current PM Malcolm Turnbull, who is known to be personally pro gay marriage. “Aussie families don’t care about gay marriage! They care about their power bills!” (Because, presumably, gay couples aren’t real Aussie families to them.)

But more importantly, it is because both parties have been much more riven by internal conflict and factionalism than they were (as witnessed by the revolving door of PMs in the past several years); and progressives in the parties can’t afford to antagonise the conservatives in the parties. The issue is certainly a proxy war between moderates and conservatives among the Liberals; contrast Abbott’s stance with Christopher Pyne’s leaked gloating that the moderates were on the ascendancy within the party, and marriage equality was a matter of time.

Labor has no right to be smug about this now, because Labor was just as captive to its own conservatives when it had the chance to legalise gay marriage. Because of how Labor works, the most prominent opponent was not a member of parliament: it was union head Joe de Bruyn, whose opposition is founded on Catholicism.

The late Gough Whitlam, sainted progressive PM of Labor, was always ready with a quip. Here’s Joe de Bruyn – Wikipedia on de Bruyn on gay marriage:

The SDA [de Bruyn’s union] is associated with the Labor Right, Labor Unity or Centre-Unity grouping or faction of the trade union movement and the Australian Labor Party. It also has a long-established reputation as a supporter of conservative Catholic parliamentarians. De Bruyn, himself a Catholic, is a leading figure in the right wing faction of the trade union movement and the Australian Labor Party. De Bruyn has come under scrutiny for voicing his socially conservative views while being secretary of a trade union and holding a position on the National Executive of Labor, a centre-left political party. He has repeatedly voiced opposition to abortion, and to legalising same sex marriage.

In response to a 2014 poll with 72 percent support for same-sex marriage, de Bruyn dismissed the figures but refused to poll his members on the issue. He says he “knows they agree with him absolutely. When we talk to our members about out these things they agree with us”.

At a quarterly SDA members meeting in February 2011, de Bruyn moved a resolution against gay marriage, without giving any members a chance to speak or vote on the issue. This led to the first instance of members of the SDA speaking out and challenging de Bruyn on his stance on gay marriage. Speaking at an AWU event in 2003, former Labor Prime Minister Gough Whitlam quipped that “Joe de Bruyn is a Dutchman who hates dykes.”

Labor is pro gay marriage now. But that’s easier in opposition than government.

It’s kinda guess work, but this is my thinking on the topic.

Musics of adjoining regions have a family resemblance. German music and Greek music don’t have a lot in common. But German music has things in common with Czech music, which has things in common with Hungarian, which has things in common with Romanian, which has things in common with Serbian, which things in common with Greek music. (I don’t actually know this for a fact, I’m just arguing it.)

Greek music isn’t being exported to China, Thailand, and Kenya. It’s being exported to areas where there is cultural affinity for the music, where it sounds familiar, because those are neighbouring areas which have had cultural interaction.

And the music being exported successfully isn’t Greek Euro-pop. It’s music from the Greek Laïko tradition: what I usually call on Quora “bouzouki pop”. Laiko ultimately derives from Rebetiko, which ultimately derives from Smyrneiko—as Wikipedia describes it, “Ottoman café music”. The Peiraeus sound of Markos Vamvakaris in the 1930s was Smyrneiko with subtle Western influences, both in the jaunty beat and in the selection of modes. Government censorship after 1936 encouraged less oriental-sounding modes; and Laiko itself is Rebetiko with much more overt Western influence.

In other words, the Greek pop music being successfully exported is a fusion: it’s identifiably Levantine, but it also sounds much more Western than its antecedents. Fusions, I surmise, are more approachable to external audiences, so they travel better.

The big story that Evangelos Lolos’ formulation of the question misses (I asked it, but he asked it first as a comment) is Israel. Greek music is huge in Israel.

Members of the Anglosphere might be puzzled to hear this, because their understanding of Jewish culture is mainly Ashkenazi, and Ashkenazi music is supposed to be Klezmer, it’s not supposed to sound Middle Eastern or Turkish. Or Greek.

To which, two retorts. First, Israel is not just Ashkenazi. It’s also Sephardi and Mizrahi. And both are Levantine, and as a result have significant cultural affinity with Greek music.

The second retort is a thought experiment. What happens if you take a Greek modal, quick, whirling folk dance tune—and you put a Germanic oom-pah bass underneath it?

Nikos Skalkottas. 36 Greek Dances. #11: Syrtos.

Tell me if that doesn’t sound Yiddishe to you.

If that doesn’t work, see here:

Nick Nicholas’ answer to Why is Greek music being exported so successfully to outside markets like the Balkans, Turkey and the Middle East?

I’m not sure. Really, I’m not sure. I say that, because the following is speculation that your friend might not welcome.

Vavasis Βαβάσης does not have an obvious Greek etymology to me. It may have one, but I can’t discern it.

My first guess was that it is a hellenisation of Babasis Μπαμπάσης, which turns up in Corinthia, and is thus likely Arvanite (i.e. ethnic Albanian); cf. Ndriçim Babasi – Wikipedia, a member of the Albanian parliament.

However, googling establishes a critical mass of Vavasises in Cephalonia, and (from Facebook: Πολιτιστικός Σύλλογος Πάστρας Παλιόκαστρο ) that the surname is associated with the village of Pastra. The surname is given as Cephallonian in the list at Τα επώνυμα των Κεφαλλήνων, originally compiled by Miliarakis in 1890. The surname, FWIW, is not included in the list of local nobility (the Libro d’Oro) of 1799 (http://www.kefaloniamas.gr/κοινω…)

I still can’t think what Greek or Italian name it’s associated with…

… and then, I read the Greek Wikipedia page: Πάστρα Κεφαλονιάς – Βικιπαίδεια

The village was founded by Albanian mercenaries working for Venice in the 15th century. The Pastras family are apparently the majority of the village, but I think it’s still likeliest the surname is Albanian in origin.

Assuming I’m right, I’m going to have to ask Albanians on Quora what it likely means. I don’t know that I’m right, but like I say, I can’t see a Greek or Italian origin for the surname.

I’m pretty sure there won’t be a fixed amount, and that there’s some degree of discretion.

I have sighted the final appeal response for a ban to one user, who got counts of moderation sanctions in response. Their count was 39 BNBRs. I don’t know if that includes successfully appealed BNBRs or not.

I’ve seen the number 4 mentioned in variants of this question for blocking. I have had 4 BNBRs, but 3 appealed successfully (eventually).

EDIT: Matthew Bates is a data point for 4 BNBRs; I’m a data point for it being 4 BNBRs appealed unsuccessfully:

I’ve been edit-blocked for a week for my fourth BNBR violation. This one came from an answer I wrote over a month ago that already had over 1.2k upvotes.

I do believe someone is trolling me… reporting everything I write and seeing what sticks.

Anyway, I’m going to use this time to work on some other projects. If you’re wondering why I don’t say anything for the next week, that’s why.

Originally Answered:

Does any Quoran actually like the elimination of question details?

From the comments to the blog post announcing it: at least 3. From one of several questions about it: at least 8. Not all of them are Marc Bodnick.

I wrote the following to identify whether there were any recurring characteristics among them. And yes, I know perfectly well that it’s a ridiculously low number to say anything about.

• Who likes Quora Without Details by Nick Nicholas on The Insurgency
• Stats of Who likes Questions Without Details by Nick Nicholas on The Insurgency

No.

Protest it or boycott it, not because it will change things. It won’t. We are all fungible; we are all blips on a chart to Quora. How could we not be? Quora isn’t in the making its users happy business. It’s in the content providing business. And the content is going to keep rolling in anyway.

Protest it or boycott it, not because Quora will listen to you. They won’t.

(I’ve had a user confide to me that Quora only listens to a “handful” of users. There’s a handful of users that enthusiastically approve of the change, and I don’t think that’s a coincidence: they’re aligned to Quora’s goals, and that’s why they have Quora’s confidence.)

Protest it or boycott it, if you are going to do so, only in order to say “not in my name.” Quora doesn’t care about what you do about something you don’t like here. But you should.

And remember not to thank them for it, or doff your cap and say “I’m sure they know what we want best.” Quora did this because to them, it’s just business. Our relationship with Quora Inc. should likewise be just business. Otherwise we’re setting ourselves up for gratuitous heartbreak.

The question is amusing to me, given that part of Quora’s raison d’être is to sift bad knowledge from good knowledge, via both credentials and the wisdom of the crowds. See A Breakdown of Mills Baker’s Answer: Democratizing Access (Pt 1/2) by Ryan Q.Y. See on The Insurgency (much more readable than the original, though longer).

While Quora wants to democratise the production of knowledge, outside of the bastion of academia and Wikipedia, it also wants to act as a corrective to bad knowledge available online. And Quora engineers, if asked, will tell you that conspiracy theories are an exemplar of that; read the post.

And yet, Quora has awarded Top Writer to a proponent of a variant of the Phantom time hypothesis (Roman and Early Mediaeval History as we know it is a fiction perpetrated by mediaeval scribes).

It’s no more a magnet, I suspect, than other forums disseminating knowledge online. Where Wikipedia uses the cudgel of original research to block it (and in the process blocks a whole lot of stuff it shouldn’t—celebrities can’t correct their own middle names on Wikipedia, unless there’s a published source corroborating it), Quora is meant to use the gentle corrective of bots and machine learning.

It’s gentle enough that crap will get through, and that does not exempt the reader from the onus of being sceptical of anything that sounds crazy. And yes, sometimes people really are wrong, and people shouldn’t have to waste time proving to “sceptics” the entire body of work of a discipline.

BNBR is a deeply problematic notion. It can be reactionary, it can certainly have a chilling effect. In this regard though… I don’t see a way around it that will not shut down too much besides it.

In bots we trust *sigh*

This is a special shout-out to … oh, I can’t notify the head of Quora ontology, because he’s blocked me.

OK, those are the fortunes of war. Fine. This is a special shout-out to the rest of you.

So I start creating a topic for my home suburb: Oakleigh. I start typing and see “Oakleigh East, Victoria” and “Oakleigh South, Victoria”, and I figure, “oh, ok, better make it “Oakleigh, Victoria”.

Topic created. I can’t tell Quora that this is a town, because I don’t have topic admin privileges. Fair enough, the great unwashed can’t be trusted with ontology is-a statements; you have to be a certified accredited topic gnome (presumably not blocked by relevant staff) to do that kind of thing. If I was the head of Quora ontology, I’d do the same, I guess.

I try to make Oakleigh, Victoria a child of Melbourne.

Melbourne’s blocked, because blocked topics are a thing, and you have to be a certified accredited topic gnome (presumably not blocked by relevant staff) to edit blocked topics.

OK, that’s how they play, let’s see if I can work around it.

Oh, so all the suburbs of Melbourne are listed as children of the parent of Melbourne, Cities and Towns in Victoria.

Not how I woulda done it, but I see the argument, today’s exurb is tomorrow’s suburb, cool.

I make Oakleigh, Victoria a child of Cities & Towns in Victoria.

And I notice that cities & towns in Victoria are all suffixed “, Victoria, Australia.”

OK, I’d better fix that then. Rename Oakleigh, Victoria to Oakleigh, Victoria, Australia.

Computer says No. Topic already exists.

I search the topic Oakleigh, Victoria, Australia in the search box. No result.

So if there’s no topic there… why can’t I rename Oakleigh, Victoria to Oakleigh, Victoria, Australia?

Have you guessed the answer yet?

I didn’t; I gave up, and created my question anyway with the topic I was able to use. I also recounted the story to Miguel Paraz, who was looking forward to my patisserie recommendation.

Miguel has been here longer than me. And he guessed what I didn’t.

https://www.quora.com/topic/Oakl… : the topic was there just fine. The Quora Topic Bot had deleted it.

Although even when Miguel restored the topic, it still doesn’t show up in autocomplete.

So. There’s a range of things that could be a bug or a feature:

• That the Quora Topic Bot doesn’t think my suburb exists.
• That the Quora Topic Organizer doesn’t tell me why I can’t rename my topic to a deleted topic.
• That the Quora Topic Merger doesn’t tell me why I can’t merge my topic to a deleted topic.
• That the Quora UX doesn’t tell me that “, Victoria” as a suffix instead of “, Victoria, Australia” is considered harmful.
• That the Quora UX lets you undelete a topic, but doesn’t add it to autocomplete, so you can’t use an undeleted topic.

Seriously, these may be bugs, or they may be features. I cannot tell any more.

And then there’s these more human-oriented bugs or features.

• That Quora staff can refuse input from people who might, occasionally, be trying to help.

Seriously. Quora staff are users, and as users they can tune out whoever they like; but they are also Quora staff. I’m not convinced that, as staff, they should get to do that. A topic gnome of much longer standing than me constantly has to ask others to do things on their behalf at the Topic Gnomery blog, because they’ve been blocked too. I don’t believe that’s the most efficient way to do topic administration.

I don’t know to what extent any of these are:

I do know that after this week of DeleteDetails-palooza and BadHombreBot-geddon, I have an unusually low patience for the opacity of this UX, even by my standards.

Quora Obtrudes by Nick Nicholas on The Insurgency, I wrote last week. Quora gets in the way of me doing what I want to do here.

Quora now even gets in the way of me trying to help them.

I got the message, Quora. If you don’t want my help, I’m not helping you. I’ll leave the gnoming to others.

If a lot of people boycott answering questions (perhaps for a day or 2) to protest Quora’s decision to remove details, would they put them back? is a question with a non-zero number of respondents who have blocked me.

I can’t comment on their responses. Of course.

I can’t comment on their comments to their responses. Of course.

What strikes me as confusing is, I can’t comment on anyone else’s comments to their response. Same goes for posts they post on their blogs.

Is this deliberate, because they should not be exposed to any content that is a child of their “story”? Even though they won’t get a notification of it?

And yet, they’ll see my content as a child of someone else’s “story”, if we’re both commenting on it.

Insert meme here: I can’t tell if this was deliberate, or just easier to program.