What can be done to bring up site quality?

Question

We are now at the point that most questions on ELU get closed. Our 90-day closure rate (10k only) is sitting at around two in every three. Some days it’s worse than that, some days it’s better, but in the long run we’re at around 65% closed.

Other quality metrics are also telling, albeit perhaps less obviously. Beyond closure rate, the number of answers per question has gone down over time, and we no longer appear to draw the quality questions and more importantly, answers, that we once did.

Here is a random assortment of 50 closed questions from the not-too-distant past. Some of these have been deleted so you will need 10k reputation to view, but many have not.

1. Another word/phrase for “caught in their mess” or “entangled in their mess”?
2. A slogan choice
3. A synonym for intimacy?
4. A term that can be used to describe a person in this situation?
5. Could you please help me with my IELTS task 1 essay
6. Could you please tell me If I wrote this wrong?
7. Crimeshifting: The act of accusing your opponent of a crime of which you yourself are guilty in order to shift the discussion to them
8. Enjoy discount by settling full payment
9. ESTABLISH A COMPANY
10. Explain about the remaining 2 rupees
11. Formal version of water down
12. He looked at the people from on the building?
13. How do I get rid of my feeling
14. I am looking for a word that describes someone who always pawns off work to others and is lazy at work.
15. I AM LOOKING FOR ONE WORD IN ENGLISH …SOMETHING TO SIGNIFY “ENHANCING VALUES ”( VALUE CAN BE ANYTHING THAT Changes life or the organisation
16. I just wanted to confirm that the following sentence is grammatically correct or not
17. i ma looking for a name for a character with darkness powers that means or has similiar meaning to “unwanted hate directed at oneself”
18. I need the awnser
19. In US Contract law, when there is a disagreement between a spelled out dollar amount and typed numeral, which prevails?
20. Is “I am applying at the referral of…” grammatically correct?
21. Is there any synonyms for “put in the same category as”?
22. Is there a word for someone who does something specifically to use it against someone else?
23. Is the sentence “The novel's language is largely prosaic” logically correct?
24. Is this sentence complete? Correct?
25. looking for another way to say “private room”
26. May I know what's JAR?
27. need help with grammar
28. Needing a better word or phrase
29. Negative Connotations And Positive Connotations
30. Noun for a person that finishes work on time
31. Please help me..I'm a bit confused
32. Single-word request, or phrase request
33. Synonyms for “proficiency with”?
34. The Finch House
35. the souls of St. vs soul/s od St. Tammany
36. Topic writing in englsih
37. using I am not well when physically injured?
38. What does it mean to finally wake up to yourself
39. What does this word mean?
40. What do you call a guy who chooses to prioritize beautiful ladies among other customers/clients?
41. What is a more formal but colorful word for the verb 'jam'?
42. What is a word for someone who should not use the internet?
43. What is one word (noun) of a person who is initiative?
44. What is the correct order?
45. What is the difference between phlegm, mucus, and snot?
46. What is the difference between Speech and Writing ( with examples)?
47. What is the formal way to ask about salary payment to my boss
48. What is this article about?
49. Word for someone who is multi-talented
50. Word the describes someone who takes advantage of vulnerable people

Please look those over as you can. Then see if you can think of any possible measures that would attract more questions that would draw expert answers instead of ones like those which are doomed to closure.

Answer 1

Update: This suggestion is now live! You can see the discussion that led up to it here or experience it for yourself on the ask question page.

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I didn't have time yet to go through all the questions, but it seems like a lot of these questions are single-word-requests. This isn't really surprising considering most of our questions (closed or not) are tagged with this tag. In addition, we've had discussions about quality problems in this tag in the past.

Despite all the discussion, we've not really done anything about the problem that I've seen. So here's my suggestion: tag warnings.

Tag warnings (also called "tag tips") are already a thing on other sites, such as Stack Overflow. When you are asking a question and add certain tags to the question (e.g. [SQL]), you get a message like this:

I think that this would be a great idea to have for single-word-requests. We just need to decide what it will say, then have a CM put it in place. I think it should mention at least the following points:

• Be sure to include a sample sentence and context.
• If you know a similar word, check a thesaurus to see if any words will work. List the words that didn't work in your question and explain why they don't fit.

Answer 2

UPDATE

I go through swings (or is it moods?), some days I feel more optimistic about EL&U's future and permanence on the Internet, other days I feel the website is just doomed. The last week or so has been simply awful.

The flood of not low – but extremely low-quality questions – is just too depressing for words. Hmm... maybe I should post that statement as a single-word-request.

Here is but one random example from the active page, the question is called: is this sentence right

Is this sentence right " this report represents our findings at the times and places of discharging and landing operation only"?

thank you

A question like that, and there are so many more, shouldn't even reach first base. Let alone have someone posting an answer, and hanging around for hours until five users close it for being off-topic. THAT is an off-topic question that cannot be saved. THAT is a question that is useful for only the person asking.

Yet, the mods close, pardon, lock the 2nd most upvoted question in EL&U's history because, and I quote

This question exists because it has historical significance, but it is not considered a good, on-topic question for this site, so please do not use it as evidence that you can ask similar questions here. This question and its answers are frozen and cannot be changed.

If only more newcomers were to write first questions with as much detail, context and care! But 99% of them don't give a sh*t! There's too many of "them" and too few of "us". By us I mean users (new and old) who do respond, and do post supported answers.

Original Post

My question: Are perhaps too many questions being closed unnecessarily?

Is there never the possibility of improving a low-quality question that shows at least some interesting/useful language aspect? E.g The question about "....the cockles of one's heart" was closed before it was edited. The question about the use of inversion was recently reopened.

Answer 3

In my experience, you can't do much to change whether or not the first question someone asks is good quality; you can only change whether the second question they ask is better than the first. I have seen good results if questions are closed with the intent of helping the author bring them on topic and are quickly reopened after an author takes the first step toward improving the question.

The best way to educate someone about community standards is for someone to show them in a concrete way how to meet those standards. Everyone who asks a question is a potential new active member of the community. EL&U could just close questions and tell folks to read the help and come back when they've figured out how to meet the quality standards, or the community could invest in new users with an eye toward turning them into regular contributors of high quality questions (and possibly answers).

That might involve cutting new users a little more slack if they are making an effort to improve. It will definitely involve some effort on the part of EL&U veterans to help the author figure out exactly what they could do to get their question off of hold. Only about 1 in 7 of the users I've seen get significant guidance from the ELL community end up adjusting the way they post, but the ones that do "convert" tend to actively help other new users improve their question quality. That leads to a positive feedback loop that eventually results in a better balance of quality questions.

There will always be questions from the folks that just want their homework done and no amount of education or help text will make them put effort into writing a decent quality question. But there are also some folks that jump in without really figuring out how things work that could either be encouraged to become valuable contributors or discouraged from ever posting again because they're not sure how to post a question that would be well-received.

Answer 4

I like EL&U and would like to see it survive.

I think ColeenV has it right, that it's not the low-quality questions that are the problem, but attracting and developing new users (and keeping the interest of the many people who have already made so many great contributions).

Stack Exchange (and its Q&A model) are relatively new and operate in a changing environment--not necessarily entirely suited to the defined scope of EL&U. So the first suggestion is to be, within the constraints of the model, as flexible as possible within the diverse and changing environment of the use of English in the modern world, and let the site evolve. If it overlaps a bit with writers or linguistics or language learning, so be it. Downvote or ignore the bad questions and forget about them.

• People seeking to improve their English through reading (e.g., fiction without too much dialog) or listening are asking an out-of-scope question, but they're potential contributors to the site--and EL&U might allow itself to provide some guidance on the English language that goes beyond the rules of the books the learners seem to be using for their exams.

• Speculation, partial answers, and discussion in Comments are interesting and useful, and perhaps should be less discouraged. (In truth, not much about "what not to do" seems to have been useful in the time I've been here.)

• Although one goal of the site is to be a repository of English-language questions and answers useful to others in the future, it is much more likely to be an evolving response to current interests. It needs to be of interest to current users if it is to maintain its vitality. (The uncommon interest in how a children's English-alphabet ball came to have one letter with a Swedish picture is actually a fascinating story, whether it will be of interest five years from now or not.)

Other matters:

• The "help" section is close to useless--and mostly disciplinary (what not to do).

• The "search" section is poor, and is now (I haven't been around much since mid-October 2017) close to blacked-out.

• I don't pay much attention to tags, but it seems to me that a tag like "pejorative" only invites the kinds of questions we are not trying to encourage.

I haven't said much of this very well; my apologies.

P.S. I think the diversity (backgrounds, geographical) of frequent contributors and what they know and observe about the language is an amazing resource. How do you use that?

Answer 5

Just a few thoughts:

Improving the site is both a question of quality and quantity.

A few good questions among a plethora of off-topic LQQs is a quantity problem that affects the quality of the site.

First, as noted, new users just ask, no matter the rules, and to reduce the unavoidable quantity of off-topic LQQs, the only thing that might work, in my opinion, is a barrier to entry for new user and very low rep users. Questions posted by new, low rep users shouldn’t be automatically posted on the main page, but rather enter an “acceptance” line where they are “validated” by higher rep users. That is what already happens with the VTC, LQQs, First Post etc. lines we already take care of, only that it would be ex-ante , rather than ex-post. In other words, we still do the “dirty” job, but before a question is posted rather than after. (Btw, what’s a low rep user? 200, 500 or 1.000? To be decided)

The benefit would be much less ex-post close votes, a cleaner and a higher quality main page and a chance that in the meantime new, low rep users will familiarize with the site rules.

Second, higher quality in a more general sense can only be attained, in my opinion, with a more active contribution by higher rep, experienced users. It takes time for new users who love the site to give a significant contribution in terms of Q&A, but experienced, veteran users who are already familiar with all the workings of the site should probably make an effort in answering, but mainly in asking.

Answer 6

I agree with @Mari-Lou A that there may be a tendency to close too many questions.

Having only been here for just under four months and having only reviewed just under 2,000 questions, nevertheless I find it too easy (especially when tired) to vote closure rather than make a definite attempt to rescue a potentially interesting and informative question, especially if the questioner is clearly struggling to express themselves in their second language, not their first.

It needs a positive outlook and a patient attitude, I am finding.

Answer 7

It may be helpful for all involved to be specific about what constitutes a high quality question. Certainly, duplicate questions, questions unrelated to any facet of the English language, or inflammatory questions--fall into the "low quality" (the undesirables) category.

Of course no one wants this place to be treated like a translation service--so I can see questions like "what does such and such mean" get down voted.

On the other hand, if a question leads to a discussion of (say) the nuance of a word, a phrase, or an idiom, doesn't that help enrich this site? Does the "quality" of the question really matter?

So many times I have seen demands that a user must "demonstrate research"--Well, if one can find an answer by googling (or by scouring dictionaries), why would anyone come here? You know, it is easier to google for an answer than posting a question here (after creating an account) and then waiting for a response. Is it the goal of this site to become the repository of "tidbits not found anywhere else"? Is it the goal of this site to be the next Oxford (or whatever) English Dictionary?

We all have encountered situations where we search for the right word, but ESL speakers often simply don't have enough knowledge of the knowledge to find it. Behind a question seemingly lacking in research may be a ESL learning working hard to perfect his/her English skills. Is it going to bring down the reputation of this site for someone to offer an answer?

Seriously: Do people have specific expectations for the kind of questions that enhances this site--maybe questions asked by English majors? How about graduate students majoring in English? If every question must fall within prescribed range, then this place will be nothing but an echo chamber -- and be better off taken over by an English Department.