Lately I noticed the following on SO:

  • Users ask questions and disappear (question isn't accepted)

  • Users who never accept an answer or never post the solution (if they found it on their own)

How can we deal with this? Perhaps add a 'Not satisfied' flag?

marked as duplicate by bummi, issathink, IronMan84, Ken White, Bill the Lizard Dec 30 '14 at 1:41


  • 6
    People do this all the time. There isn't anything you can do about it. – BradleyDotNET Dec 29 '14 at 23:32
  • Several of my own questions remain unanswered. Simply because none of the answers are correct/satisfactory. – Matt Dec 29 '14 at 23:34
  • @BradleyDotNET you're right. What i meant it helps if you google something and you find a pertinent question for your solution but with these unaccepted questions it's not easy. – issathink Dec 29 '14 at 23:37
  • 3
    Then upvote it. The acceptance mark only indicates that it worked for the asker. I would go for the community "accept" (via upvotes) over the green check any day. – BradleyDotNET Dec 29 '14 at 23:38
  • 2
    You are posting answers in the [android] tag. It is pretty notorious, adjust your expectations downwards. – Hans Passant Dec 30 '14 at 0:32

I'm somewhat confused, however, by your second item. How do you know if they did indeed find an answer? If they did find one, it would indeed be nice to let us know.. but surely we cannot make judgement on them if they disappeared.

That said, there is no obligation for the user to accept any answer. None, whatsoever. It is the user's prerogative. It is up to the user to decide. They should select an answer if it indeed solved the problem. But we should not force it upon them, it has been discussed before. See -

Answered but unaccepted but upvoted questions?

  • Of course there is no obligation, it would be nicer to close it or let other know that it isn't solved. – issathink Dec 29 '14 at 23:44
  • 4
    It's quite common that users leave a "thank you, this is exactly what I needed" type comment, but never accept it. In those cases, you do know that they found an answer. – Reto Koradi Dec 29 '14 at 23:53

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