Welcome to the Power Users community on Codidact!
Power Users is a Q&A site for questions about the usage of computer software and hardware. We are still a small site and would like to grow, so please consider joining our community. We are looking forward to your questions and answers; they are the building blocks of a repository of knowledge we are building together.
Comments on Closing "unclear" questions
Parent
Closing "unclear" questions
A frustrating situation is when a mod decides that a question is "unclear" and closes it, and yet the question is not actually unclear. Unfortunately, the close prevents anyone else from posting answers.
I've seen this many times on Stack* sites and I've now seen an instance here.
This type of close is confusing to me. IMO, the question has provided sufficient detail to the answer the question posed. If someone feels that more detail would improve the question, they can say so in the comments. The asker can then decide whether they are convinced. Sometimes, people incorrectly complain about missing detail when in fact it is all there, and ultimately it should be up to the asker if they feel like they need to improve their odds of getting a good answer by adding detail.
The crucial thing is that if you post a comment wrongly claiming that there is insufficient detail, there is little harm done. Your comment will not prevent someone else from answering the question and settling the matter. Indeed, if someone else has been able to answer to the asker's satisfaction, it is patently false that the question is unclear.
However, closing the question bans other people from trying to answer the question. It's hard to see the purpose of this outcome, since it seems like "I don't understand this question enough to answer - and no one else is allowed to try answering it either!". Yes, one could try to fight the close vote, and eventually it may be reversed, but this can be a tedious and bureaucratic process and most people simply give up and assume the community is intent on being unhelpful.
In situations like this, the question should not be closed. Deleting would make sense, after a very long time has passed (say 30 days) with no answer, because at that point it's just spam clogging up our site. But one moderator's opinion should not be enough to bar other people from actually helping the asker. Moreover, moderators are sometimes wrong about this type of close.
Post
The following users marked this post as Dangerous:
| User | Comment | Date |
|---|---|---|
| matthewsnyder |
Thread: Dangerous I consider this approach dangerous for the long term success of this site, in that it would appear to significantly harm the new user experience and re... |
Aug 14, 2023 at 18:46 |
That question seemed to mostly quotes from elsewhere. I can see the point to it having been closed due to being link-only. "Unclear" is probably the nearest handy close reason.
3 comment threads
0 comment threads