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I recently came across a question which had been closed because it was supposed to be "not constructive" (this question).

And I noted that some 70 odd people had favorited the question as well, which leads to the question.. wouldn't it be more helpful if it were reopened?

Admittedly, the question was not constructive. But as a source of information, it's helped me a lot, and isn't that the objective of the site? to provide information to people in need?

P.S I would have cast a reopen vote, but unfortunately, I don't have the required reputation.

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Nope, these are exactly the kind of questions which are (no longer) appropriate for SO. They are not outright deleted because the information contained within them is valuable. But we don't want to promote them. And as you might see, it is not exactly attracting the best of answers. –  Bart Nov 13 '12 at 11:13
Well, if the question was popular enough and the moderators find it fitting, they can apply historical lock on it, but it will still stay closed. –  Shadow Wizard Nov 13 '12 at 11:19
ah well.. apparently this has been discussed a zillion times.. and I see what I requested will probably never happen.. Never mind then.. –  SatheeshJM Nov 13 '12 at 11:23
required reading: The Trouble With Popularity –  gnat Nov 13 '12 at 11:24

2 Answers 2

up vote 5 down vote accepted

It's a great topic, but it's not a good fit for Stack Overflow.

The "question" isn't actually a question that fits our style. A hey, I'm having a problem with this question. It's a , "Share your favorite tutorial links that could die" question.

We want to own the knowledge. If we merely wanted to link to the knowledge, then there'd be no need for Stack Overflow. There are dozens (if not hundreds) of forums for people to just share links.

The question also has its 'answers' in the question itself, further driving home the point that it doesn't fit in our QA system. In rare circumstances the "share a link" format can be made to work, but it's very rare and very unlikely at this stage of Stack Overflow's genesis.

I'm willing to historically lock the question (since it's still generating flags), but I'm not willing to re-open it, or say that it's an appropriate question for Stack Overflow.

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"The "question" isn't actually a question that fits our style." -- Then why not let the community handle it? –  GEOCHET Nov 13 '12 at 16:25
I apologise for bringing this up so late, but today, I stumbled across the answer that is discussed here and I find out that some information available there was outdated, and so is my request to please open it, if possible for purpose of edition. –  DroidDev Feb 11 at 11:15

It's a source of information, but SO rules want questions with a unique answer possible, following the rules.

I write that question when I started to use SO because I was very frustrated looking for some help starting using a library, based on a famous question on SO about C++ books. That question already said that is not a model to use in SO, it was only an exception

By the way, I consider, and this is only an opinion, that it must be possible to classify this type of question:

  • With no answer
  • Allow answers to add information
  • Tag as Wiki, no as Not constructive
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The question should never have the answer in it. That it sort of like putting the bread on the inside and the peanut butter and jelly on the outside. It gets messy quickly. In the rare circumstances where it works, it's far better to have an answer that is a 'wiki' and have all the answers compiled to that answer. –  George Stocker Nov 13 '12 at 14:34

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