Allow addition of new options after a poll is created

Hello @triskaideka , indeed I agree this would be a nice UX improvement. I'll leave this idea open to gather some votes :)

After reflexion with the team, we see a few risks for end users;
1- People that wants to vote will choose in the options, but maybe later when author added a new option, they will notice new one is better fit and they will be upset for their first response (even may want to update their first choice)
2- Maybe author will change poll text to completely diffrent than what people vote in first place. So I can create Option A, B, C and later when I see Option C get the most vote but I support A, I can replace them.

What are you thoughts?

In some ways, I’d like to mention a possible compromise here.

What if you were to be able to have unlimited edits to the poll (subject to the one hour limit if it’s applicable) as long as no-one has voted yet but if it’s already had some votes, send the edit to Control to have a moderator double check?

That way, if you realised you goofed and just wanted to fix a spelling mistake right after creation, that should be a piece of cake, but still affords protections on heavily active polls.

Hey @Blastoise186 @triskaideka 

Liking this idea - our super users love creating polls but there have been a few occasions where they’ve asked us to delete their thread entirely so they could redo it, due to spelling mistakes or missing out an option by accident. Would be much easier to be able to edit the poll - even if that option was only available to moderators, to avoid the scenario of endless changes. 

Thanks!

I definitely think that a possible compromise exists that can strike a reasonable balance. For obvious reasons, it wouldn’t be fair to allow the OP to edit the poll after at least one vote has been cast since it might corrupt the result. However, if no-one has even seen the poll yet, then making changes to it is probably unlikely to cause any issues. I’d also be cool with approving edits that simply fix spelling mistakes no matter what state the poll is in. 

And that’s why I think the compromise of sending edits to an approval queue when votes already exist, whilst auto-approving edits where the poll is still empty might be a best-of-both worlds option.

It’d also be a little bit less spammy for anyone who has notifications enabled for new threads as well. :)

From the poll creator’s perspective, I think they are mostly smart enough to realise that if they go around editing their polls willy-nilly after people have started voting, the validity of the results will suffer.  So I don’t think we’d see much desire for editing long after the poll is created and I’d be happy with compromises around an editing window that closes after votes received or some time period.

From the respondent’s perspective regarding being annoyed that another option has appeared which they would have preferred...is there scope for giving people the ability to change their vote?  I’m not sure how well this would mesh with the fact that you can’t currently see the voting results until you’ve cast your own.  Is there a fear that after you’ve seen the results, crowd mentality might make you change your vote to fit with the majority?  I don’t think that would be too likely, at least while the votes remain anonymous.  (I’m aware the points about not seeing the results until you vote - even if it’s your own poll - and the anonymity factor have also been discussed in their own topics, so not wishing to go off on those tangents here!)

Maybe author will change poll text to completely diffrent than what people vote in first place. So I can create Option A, B, C and later when I see Option C get the most vote but I support A, I can replace them.

On this point specifically...this would be acting in bad faith, and people doing so would pretty quickly get caught out and earn themselves a reputation as such. As long as the moderator tools allow evidence to be captured so that the community can protect itself from such folks (perhaps by making poll editing a revocable permission) I think the risk is low.

Would love to see this come to fruition as well!