8

I have noticed people are choosing to answer their own questions.

Is this apart of the go-to-live from the proposal stage or people answering anything?

The idea of asking a question is generally that you have attempted to google/read/research something first and not ask some question to answer it yourself.

Example 1

Example 2

4 Answers 4

16

While that does seem odd at first, it is actually encouraged by StackExchange.

http://blog.stackoverflow.com/2011/07/its-ok-to-ask-and-answer-your-own-questions/

TL;DR Version:

  • if you have a question that you already know the answer to
  • if you’d like to document it in public so others (including yourself) can find it later
  • it is OK to ask, and answer, your own question on a relevant Stack Exchange site.

To be crystal clear, it is not merely OK to ask and answer your own question, it is explicitly encouraged.

3
  • 1
    Thanks for the Answer - My background is SciFi-Fantasy and you generally do not see the answer there. I just worry I suppose that some answers are very basic and answered with a simple google.
    – Pandom
    May 7, 2013 at 22:12
  • 1
    While I can see the need for this I think there also needs to be a balance between seeding the site and the quality of the self-answers. If the question is "When do I choose fiber over copper?" It's a low-quality question and neither the question or the self-answer are beneficial.
    – smithian
    May 8, 2013 at 8:24
  • @smithian Then downvote it and make suggestions to improve the quality! Just because it's a self answer doesn't mean the rules no longer apply.
    – rtf
    May 8, 2013 at 14:44
5

Please be careful about staging questions you already know the answer to… especially so early in a site's development. I try and convey this to every new site we launch: Your home page says a lot about your site, and if there's a sense that that the users don't really need the help they are asking for, the whole exercise would likely be perceived as a waste of time.

Please, at least read

Your New Site: Asking the First Questions

I understand there are places that actually encourage posting self-answered solutions to interesting problems you've encountered… but let's not present this as some type of solution — i.e. seeding the home page — as a way of growing this site. Ask about problems you actually have, and please don't "seed" questions as a way of upping your numbers.

It will not work; trust me… and it may actually work against you when evaluating the whether this site has something interesting to add to the network.

1
  • I think that ultimately, just as was/is the case for growing traditional communities from times and places when/where there were no kinds of telecommunications technology at all, growing a SE community depends upon attracting many real people. Real people encounter real situations where real questions naturally arise. Many real people naturally generate many real questions that in a tolerant community are gladly answered when other community members are able to do so. May 20, 2013 at 6:45
4

This is something that has been debated in the past on various meta-SE sites.

I think it's even more interesting as of now as the site has to be filled with interesting questions with answers to motivate people to come back.

It's even mentionned in NetworkEngineering FAQ.

1
  • Your second link needs more exposure, especially in light of Scottm32768's answer:
    – smithian
    May 8, 2013 at 11:27
0

For a private beta like this, I think that we want to do a very good job of seeding the site with some good questions and answers to attract high quality users, etc. we want to be the canonical site for answers and questions, what better way to start than by priming or ourselves?

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