August 2011 Newsletter

*Welcome to the Stack Exchange Moderator Newsletter. This monthly newsletter highlights the top community-related issues and events of the previous month.*

##Past Issues now Archived

The monthly newsletters are now archived in blog format. You can see all previous issues of the Community Moderator Newsletter at [http://stackmod.blog/](http://stackmod.blog/). The newsletter will continue to go directly to your inbox, but the blog format provides a convenient way to find and reference previous articles.

##A Recipe for Supporting Community Conferences

We continue to sponsor community leaders to attend interesting, relevant, and useful conference. This latest blog post goes into greater detail about how to sponsor community leaders to attend or speak at an event on behalf of your site (of course, moderators are eligible, too!). Take a look at the article to see examples of the vinyl stickers, t-shirts, flyers, and cool business cards we put together to support your community’s events.

[Supporting Community Conferences](http://blog.stackoverflow.com/2011/08/supporting-community-conferences/)

##A Fresh Look at Area 51 Analytics

Many users have asked what the [statistics in Area 51](http://area51.stackexchange.com/proposals/4059/musical-practice-and-performance) mean to the future of their beta site. We’ve said on many occasions that [a site can remain in beta](http://blog.stackoverflow.com/2010/10/when-will-my-site-graduate/) as long as it takes, but this latest blog post takes a closer look at what those analytics numbers mean and, more importantly, **what you can do improve your participation and traffic.**

[Does this site have a chance of succeeding?](http://blog.stackoverflow.com/2011/07/does-this-site-have-a-chance-of-succeeding/)

##Your Site Has a Newsletter

Have you noticed the [newsletter ads](http://stackexchange.com/newsletters) appearing on all of the sites? Despite our aversion to spammy email, this feature has been in high-demand. We’re hoping these newsletters will get less-engaged users coming back to the site. Newsletters include the top questions for the week, unanswered questions, and (coming soon!) important **moderator announcements**. They’re a great way for users to catch up on what they might otherwise have missed each week.

[Stack Exchange Site Newsletters](http://blog.stackoverflow.com/2011/07/stack-exchange-site-newsletters/)

##Deleted Comments now Visible

Moderators can now view any deleted comments on a post. From the ‘mod’ menu, click on ‘show deleted comments’ (available only if there are deleted comments on that post). This should prove handy when cleaning up obsolete or resolved comment threads. Once comments no longer serve a purpose, they should be deleted.

[Should moderators delete obsolete and resolved comment threads?](http://meta.stackoverflow.com/questions/77373/should-moderators-delete-make-correction-done-comments)

##Collecting Anonymous Feedback

Typically, about 90% of your site’s traffic is from anonymous unregistered users. We now provide a way for these users to provide feedback on posts other than passively incrementing the post’s view counter. This data is currently being evaluated to see what we can do with it. If you have any suggestions, add your feedback to that meta thread!

[Anonymous user feedback now in testing](http://meta.stackoverflow.com/questions/98630/anonymous-user-feedback-now-in-testing)

That’s all I have for now. See you next month!