Request for Thoughts on What to do Now: pros and cons of staying or leaving

Question

SE and Monica have arrived at an agreement, which I find beyond disappointing but not surprising. But I respect whatever Monica decides.

Yesterday, I asked for my account on SE Meta to be deleted. SE has not yet done so, but already I feel a great relief -- like putting down the pack at the end of a long slog.

I haven't decided what to do with the accounts on SE that I have not yet deleted, and was hoping for input from others who are conflicted. I am not asking for someone to tell me what to do, but what factors besides my own amusement (a pro for staying) and my queasiness (a pro for leaving) I should be considering.

Answer 1

I'm very close to doing the same - this "settlement" doesn't make me feel confident in the treatment I may get in future, although I hope Monica feels she is okay with it.

As regards accounts, removing them will leave all the posts, so your value to date will remain, but you will definitely be missed by the community. I'll miss you.

Answer 2

I am also conflicted.

My work life depends on give and take at https://dba.stackexchange.com/

My personal life makes me wants me to save and improve lives with posts at https://pets.stackexchange.com/

I have pretty much lost interest in any kind of admin work that saves work/money for the for profit company, that depends on volunteers in way that is likely a violation of New York labor law.

If the replacement at https://forum.codidact.org/ was up and running with replacements for the areas I care about, I would be 100% there now, and completely done here.

I am leaning towards, updating my profile to mention all the things that are driving me away, and only continuing with asking and answering questions.

On sites like Pets.se and TGO.se where there are no advertisements, there is no short term profit for the company, the only short term benefit is to the community. Long term... I just don't know, and that increases my internal conflicts.

Answer 3

I don't know about anybody else but at this point, I don't see us being able to wring any further concessions out of SE and they don't seem to want to apologize for their part in the whole mess or the damage they have caused to the communities (especially for causing so many experienced users to leave).

Hopefully, the friction we created, even if it wasn't enough to get what we wanted, will be enough to prevent them from trying any similar things in the short term.

So as of now, I am changing my username back and will be back to reviewing and answering and editing and voting. I don't really feel like asking questions, but we will see.

Finally, there are efforts to recreate the system elsewhere and migrate the existing content. Here is an example of that already happening. Once that software is in place, I think it would be worth taking our content and moving off the SE platform.