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At the end of each year, our nemesis friendly neighbours at Code Review vote for the best questions and answers from that year. I think that is a great tradition we should steal adopt here as well, because it allows us to showcase some of the amazing content we've created and potentially reward the authors.

2015 has already ended, but I don't see a problem with determining the winners a few weeks into the new year.

To start, we need categories. That's what this post is for! Each answer should contain a category for a challenge or answer to be rewarded. The top-voted categories will then receive separate nomination posts to find the actual winners. (I don't want to put a fixed number of categories here, because I can't anticipate how many proposals we'll get. Something between 5 and 10 seems reasonable.)

Winners will be rewarded with bounties where applicable (that is, for answer categories). For question categories I'm happy to take suggestions for rewards. Maybe our supreme challenge writers like Calvin's Hobbies and Zgarb might volunteer to post a challenge related to the author?

If you're willing to reward the winner of a category yourself (by offering your own rep for the bounty), please mention that in the category proposal.

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    \$\begingroup\$ So now we know that you visit Code Review throws tomato. \$\endgroup\$
    – Fatalize
    Commented Jan 4, 2016 at 14:26
  • \$\begingroup\$ How would awarding a bounty for the winner of a category work? AIUI there aren't bounties on meta. I suppose that for answer categories the bounty could go directly to the answer, but for question categories? \$\endgroup\$
    – Peter Taylor
    Commented Jan 4, 2016 at 14:48
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    \$\begingroup\$ @PeterTaylor That's what I meant. Winning answers will get bounties. For winning challenges we need to sort out something else. \$\endgroup\$
    – Martin Ender Mod
    Commented Jan 4, 2016 at 15:04
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    \$\begingroup\$ @Fatalize Truth is, I do, but only their meta to check this question. \$\endgroup\$
    – Martin Ender Mod
    Commented Jan 4, 2016 at 15:04
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    \$\begingroup\$ To some extent, even without a reward, a winner is likely to see more views and votes on their question than otherwise. I still like the idea of thinking up ways to reward questions too though. \$\endgroup\$
    – trichoplax is on Codidact now
    Commented Jan 4, 2016 at 17:08
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    \$\begingroup\$ It just occurred to me that it might make more sense for people to offer their rep for bounties independently of specific categories in case they win those categories themselves. So anyone who is willing to give up some of their rep for this, let me know, and we'll sort out how we split up the categories once we have the winners. \$\endgroup\$
    – Martin Ender Mod
    Commented Jan 4, 2016 at 17:20
  • \$\begingroup\$ @MartinBüttner I wouldn't worry too much about that. If I offer 50 rep as a reward for thingiest answer, and then my answer wins, I get the same rep in both of the following cases: 1. I give my 50 rep elsewhere and receive someone else's 50 rep for my answer, or 2. We do nothing (the award is just not given, so I don't gain 50 but also don't lose 50). I still get the prestige of being announced thingiest answer here. \$\endgroup\$
    – trichoplax is on Codidact now
    Commented Jan 4, 2016 at 17:29
  • \$\begingroup\$ @trichoplax That's a good point. It would probably still be fairer to the generous people offering their rep if the bounties were split up evenly between them at the end. \$\endgroup\$
    – Martin Ender Mod
    Commented Jan 4, 2016 at 17:31
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    \$\begingroup\$ Also, actually giving the bounties would have the additional effect of drawing attention to that answer for 7 days. \$\endgroup\$
    – Martin Ender Mod
    Commented Jan 4, 2016 at 17:31
  • \$\begingroup\$ The drawing attention point is a good one - that changes my mind. \$\endgroup\$
    – trichoplax is on Codidact now
    Commented Jan 4, 2016 at 17:32
  • \$\begingroup\$ Sounds like we need to decide how rep will be split between awards too. Can a generous donor choose for 500 to go to just one award that they consider more important, or will it end up split evenly between all the awards? \$\endgroup\$
    – trichoplax is on Codidact now
    Commented Jan 4, 2016 at 17:33
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    \$\begingroup\$ @trichoplax ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ that's why I think it would be simpler to just get a pool of people who want to offer their rep and work it out between those people in chat. \$\endgroup\$
    – Martin Ender Mod
    Commented Jan 4, 2016 at 17:34
  • \$\begingroup\$ That works... :) \$\endgroup\$
    – trichoplax is on Codidact now
    Commented Jan 4, 2016 at 17:36
  • \$\begingroup\$ Are we allowed to have awards for people that are not specific to a particular challenge or question? I see some of Ampora's suggestions are in that category. \$\endgroup\$
    – geokavel
    Commented Jan 5, 2016 at 1:32
  • \$\begingroup\$ @geokavel sure, why not, as long as the category is somehow related to the content produced by that user. \$\endgroup\$
    – Martin Ender Mod
    Commented Jan 5, 2016 at 7:45

40 Answers 40

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Tiger Woods: Answer with the best, most impressive golfing.

If you feel this category is unnecessary/overlaps with others please upvote Martin's comment.

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Best use of a Stack Snippet

Question or answer which demonstrated the best use of a stack snippet.

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Win with a longwinded language

Win with a language such as Java, beating out shorter languages.

Needs some better criteria.

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  • \$\begingroup\$ This applies only to code golf answers, I assume? \$\endgroup\$
    – Martin Ender Mod
    Commented Jan 4, 2016 at 16:24
  • \$\begingroup\$ @MartinBüttner Yes, but a different category might be for popularity-contest. \$\endgroup\$
    – Riker
    Commented Jan 4, 2016 at 16:28
  • \$\begingroup\$ Seems like there would be overlap with Right Tool \$\endgroup\$
    – AdmBorkBork
    Commented Jan 4, 2016 at 16:28
  • \$\begingroup\$ @TimmyD Possibly. I might change it to in a popularity contest. That might be better. \$\endgroup\$
    – Riker
    Commented Jan 4, 2016 at 16:31
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    \$\begingroup\$ I think this is liable to go to an answer that just uses the perfect built-in of the longwinded language. I'd find that pretty disappointing, since it's more about knowing that built-in exists and being first to post, rather than doing something creative. \$\endgroup\$
    – xnor
    Commented Jan 4, 2016 at 21:42
  • \$\begingroup\$ @xnor, assuming there are any candidates at all. \$\endgroup\$
    – Peter Taylor
    Commented Jan 4, 2016 at 21:46
  • \$\begingroup\$ @PeterTaylor I think you're right. Even when someone does something clever that beats out golfing langs for the moment, others port the methods into golfing langs. \$\endgroup\$
    – xnor
    Commented Jan 4, 2016 at 21:49
  • \$\begingroup\$ Doesn't necessarily need to be a code-golf competition ... codegolf.stackexchange.com/a/58760/42963 \$\endgroup\$
    – AdmBorkBork
    Commented Jan 5, 2016 at 14:52
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Philanthropist: The person who has given away the most reputation in bounties this year.

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  • \$\begingroup\$ begins offering bounties \$\endgroup\$
    – Conor O'Brien
    Commented Jan 6, 2016 at 2:25
  • \$\begingroup\$ you can't do that now; it's 2016. \$\endgroup\$
    – lirtosiast
    Commented Jan 6, 2016 at 3:05
  • \$\begingroup\$ @ThomasKwa I'm planning ahead. \$\endgroup\$
    – Conor O'Brien
    Commented Jan 6, 2016 at 3:10
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    \$\begingroup\$ I'm not sure this is a good fit as it doesn't necessarily reward great content. \$\endgroup\$
    – Martin Ender Mod
    Commented Jan 6, 2016 at 10:39
  • \$\begingroup\$ I agree with Martin; plus this is objective. \$\endgroup\$
    – user45941
    Commented Jan 7, 2016 at 8:18
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Good Samaritan: The person who has contributed the most to other people's answers.

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    \$\begingroup\$ I expect that there are a few people with more than 100 contributions over the year, and evaluating which of them has made the most overall contribution would require a lot of effort. \$\endgroup\$
    – Peter Taylor
    Commented Jan 5, 2016 at 19:33
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Most Ripped-Off Idea

Often somebody has a very clever idea or workaround to a standard technique. This idea – if clever enough – will most likely be copied adopted by a lot of other answerers by simply applying it to their language.

Example

The Mathematica answer to Advance Happy New Year, 2016! is a very good example, as nearly every other answer adopted the used technique, which led to massive byte reduction in almost every language.

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    \$\begingroup\$ This will probably overlap significantly with this category (at least that Mathematica answer is what I was going to nominate for that category). \$\endgroup\$
    – Martin Ender Mod
    Commented Jan 8, 2016 at 13:10
  • \$\begingroup\$ @MartinBüttner Ah, true that. I completely overlooked that category. It's strongly related. Funny though, that we both have the same answer in mind. :) \$\endgroup\$
    – insertusernamehere
    Commented Jan 8, 2016 at 13:15
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    \$\begingroup\$ This isn't quite "FGITW on a question which hit HNQ", but it's close. \$\endgroup\$
    – Peter Taylor
    Commented Jan 8, 2016 at 15:54
  • \$\begingroup\$ The proposal in general. \$\endgroup\$
    – Peter Taylor
    Commented Jan 9, 2016 at 1:25
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Flypaper

Question that has attracted the largest number of first time answers.

That is, the question that has brought the largest number of newcomers to the site.

We'd need to settle on the finer details of the rules:

  • First time answers only count from users who then went on to post at least one more net positively voted question/answer.
  • First time answers only count if they are net positively voted and not deleted.
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    \$\begingroup\$ I think the two additional requirements you mention would probably be a good idea for this one so that it actually measures "number of users drawn who provide high-quality content". \$\endgroup\$
    – Martin Ender Mod
    Commented Jan 4, 2016 at 15:33
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    \$\begingroup\$ This is too correlated with "won the HNQ lottery" for my taste. And the question poster probably already got a buttload of rep for it. \$\endgroup\$
    – xnor
    Commented Jan 4, 2016 at 21:44
  • \$\begingroup\$ @xnor That's why I added the extra conditions. Are there any others you'd add to reduce this effect? \$\endgroup\$
    – trichoplax is on Codidact now
    Commented Jan 4, 2016 at 21:50
  • \$\begingroup\$ I'm not too worried about questions that already have lots of rep being recognised - it can be a smaller award to reflect that if you like but I still think they are worth celebrating... \$\endgroup\$
    – trichoplax is on Codidact now
    Commented Jan 4, 2016 at 21:51
  • \$\begingroup\$ @trichoplax I don't think adding conditions like that saves it because HNQ is such a large multiplier. Even with an ideal definition of "good activity", I think there's too much luck in timing and network effects. \$\endgroup\$
    – xnor
    Commented Jan 4, 2016 at 21:54
  • \$\begingroup\$ @xnor I do think that even awards that have objective conditions like "largest" or "highest" should still be decided by discussion on meta. If the question that most fits the condition is considered a poor example then another can be chosen instead. \$\endgroup\$
    – trichoplax is on Codidact now
    Commented Jan 4, 2016 at 22:34
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Most Difficult: This challenge got only a few (or no) answers because of its incredible difficulty.

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    \$\begingroup\$ Challenges of incredible difficulty should be closed as too broad, not rewarded. \$\endgroup\$
    – Dennis Mod
    Commented Jan 6, 2016 at 16:57
  • \$\begingroup\$ That's totally not true. We have many "really tough" challenges that are totally on topic. Consider the Build a game of Tetris using Game of Life challenge. Its certainly not too broad, but is really hard. \$\endgroup\$
    – Nathan Merrill
    Commented Jan 6, 2016 at 17:25
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    \$\begingroup\$ I'm sorry, but I don't agree at all. If a challenge is too difficult to get any answers, neither active nor passive members benefit from it. This particular challenge isn't self-contained and doesn't have a winning criterion other than first person to create a demonstrably working example. I'm not even convinced it should remain open. \$\endgroup\$
    – Dennis Mod
    Commented Jan 6, 2016 at 18:14
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Class clown: An answer that made everyone guffaw when they first read/understood it.

Note that this should probably only apply to answers that also followed the rules of the challenge to which they were posted, as wilfully misinterpreting rules is no longer funny.

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Justified: The answer with the most hilarious justification why a certain task needs to be solved in as few bytes as possible.

Now I need just need to add more text in order to avoid this answer to be converted to a comment because it was considered a trivial answer.

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    \$\begingroup\$ I'd rather not encourage that practice any further. :/ \$\endgroup\$
    – Martin Ender Mod
    Commented Jan 4, 2016 at 23:58
  • \$\begingroup\$ @MartinBüttner Why do you dislike it? \$\endgroup\$
    – user45941
    Commented Jan 5, 2016 at 7:49
  • 5
    \$\begingroup\$ @Mego it was funny when the justifications still made remotely sense. At this point it just clutters up the specs. \$\endgroup\$
    – Martin Ender Mod
    Commented Jan 5, 2016 at 7:51
  • \$\begingroup\$ Independent of this suggestion here: Are 'negative awards' something you generally do not want to here? \$\endgroup\$
    – flawr
    Commented Jan 5, 2016 at 11:01
  • \$\begingroup\$ @flawr Considering how you described them as "negative", probably not. \$\endgroup\$
    – Addison Crump
    Commented Jan 5, 2016 at 18:53
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