Why is there a 20 posts limit on the review queues?

Question

Why is there a 20 posts review limit on the review queues?

I've searched the help pages and read the corresponding privilege page, but nothing even seems to mention that there's a limit to begin with, let alone the reason.

The only thing I found was this question: http://meta.askubuntu.com/questions/5275/if-youre-not-going-to-review-and-fix-questions-dont-use-the-review-queue Is it because of this question? Because people were OKing reviews when actually an action should have been taken?

Also, is this limit removed (or the cap increased) after a certain reputation, or are we all limited to 20?

Answer 1

There are a few MSO threads that are the definite why:

• Why are suggested edit votes limited?
• How do the review limits work?

It boils down to three things:

1. Vote diversity: The most given reason for the limit is that it ensures that it takes many people to deal with the queue. We don't want one person to deal with everything because there's no balance in opinion or method.

2. Fresh meatbags: If somebody were allowed to [heroically] hog all the reviews, that also stops new users entering into servitude. People leave and others find their time restricted. We need a fluid review team and if the same old crew are dealing with everything, others won't have a chance to get into the flow.

3. Personal sustainability: We also don't want people to burn out. This isn't a sprint. Speaking as somebody who has on occasion spent too long on the site in a day (for an entire month), I can tell you it takes a while to recover from that sort of investment. We'd rather more people gave less but more consistently.