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Comment by CiPHPerCoder | Hacker News Reader

> Can you get StackOverflow to "sponser" this idea?

Possibly. I wouldn't even know where to begin.

> Because the problem is there are many "old" accepted answers, with high upvotes, that will always come up as number 1 or 2 in google searches.

Yeah, that's my concern. I can definitely edit anything tagged [php], due to having a gold [php] badge, and I think I can edit anything because I have a reputation higher than 10,000.

The hardest problem for me, here, is identifying these old accepted answers with high upvotes.

My general approach is something like this:

https://stackoverflow.com/questions/tagged/php+encryption?so...

https://www.google.com/search?q=site%3Astackoverflow.com+php...

View on HN

IMO (as someone with 45k rep on StackOverflow, largely in PHP) - the best way is to modify the "flag" option on answers - and have an extra option called "out of date". If someone flags an answer as out of date, then anyone with a gold badge in that tag (i.e. PHP) - can review and accept or decline the flag.

If 5 gold people accept it - then the answer is formally highlighted as out of date, or even deleted.

You could raise this on Meta Stackoverflow as one possible way to start: https://meta.stackoverflow.com/

edit: There probably should be another flag option - called "security" - where even if an answer "works" and is "in date" - people can flag it as insecure due to a better option. Think of all the stupid SQL injection answers. You can downvote it to hell - but sometimes they should just be flagged/deleted.

Please don't delete out of date information.

Signed, someone who's done a lot of legacy code maintenance (have you tried to find VB6 or .NET 1 doco these days?)

Ok, so it's not deleted but maybe it gets a banner with links on up to date stuff like in OP. Then, if they can't use that due to legacy software, they go forward with whatever the answer contains for what they're stuck with. That might help both types of users.

> Possibly. I wouldn't even know where to begin.

Ask the folks on meta.stackoverflow.com. Be prepared for some resistance -- the concept of calling out bad answers in any way more nuanced than downvotes or comments is not popular -- but your involvement with the greater PHP community may give you some extra leverage.

Want some help? Why not query some of it? https://data.stackexchange.com/stackoverflow/query/edit/7837...

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