# How to get the only answer marked as correct

I have answered a question here. It is the only answer to a reasonably up-voted question (+7), but it has not been selected as the correct one. Short of tracking down the original poster, is there any way to 1) get it marked correct or 2) increase the chances of it getting marked correct in the future?

Nope. Especially since the OP deleted his/her account.

Sorry about that; but the only person who can mark an answer as accepted is the OP.

"Accept" - that little checkmark - does not mean "this answer is correct."

It just means the author of the question accepted it. Hence the name.

Folks accept all kinds of things. Things they find helpful, or reassuring, or funny, or insightful, or don't like but are convinced are unavoidable...

Sometimes, folks accept the truth. But there's no guarantee that something is true just because someone accepts it. In particular, if there's no actual problem being solved, the asker's opinion on answers means very little.

Fortunately, the asker isn't the only arbiter. Anyone with a bit of useful participation on the site can vote on answers. If your answer is getting up-voted, that probably means a lot more than the checkmark.

• Yeah, that is certainly fair enough, but the reputation gain makes people ($ie$ me) feel like they are contributing. It seems a reasonable thing to ask if there are other ways to get an answer marked as accepted. – levitopher May 14 '13 at 23:01
• If you're answering a lot of questions, particularly stuff that's fairly specific to the asker, that little boost from the accept - both in rep and just in what it represents (you helped someone) - is fantastic. Long-term though, most of your reputation will come from others' votes (unless you're busting the rep-cap every day by collecting dozens of accepts). – Shog9 May 14 '13 at 23:38
• Hi @levitopher, I think the amount of rep is not everything, quality and level of what you contribute counts more, and that is not always too strongly correlated with rep. High level research level theoretical physics as you are obviously doing, has at present a smaller audience than popular questions and answers here. There are some people who do very high level contributions who do not have the amount of rep they deserve because of this (and because it takes them longer to come up with new questions and answers of very high quality), but their contributions to the site are appreciated :-). – Dilaton May 15 '13 at 10:07
• I like that this answer has more votes and isn't accepted. Fine irony. – krs013 May 17 '13 at 23:47
• If only there was some way we could get the OP to accept this answer instead of the other one... – Michael May 28 '13 at 0:10