@ZeroTheHero : It is difficult to discuss your opinion without hearing your arguments. Let me just note that, everything else being equal, I prefer that a question be closed by an elected moderator, rather than by a random "enthusiast". That does not mean that I don't want questions to be closed by users, but I'd like to have some checks against arbitrary closing in that case, so I would prefer that questions be closed by 5 users, rather than by 3.

@tpg2114 : "While close efficacy went up, so did reopen efficacy" - I am not impressed at all: the number of first close votes is an order of magnitude greater than the number of first reopen votes, so it does not really matter if reopen efficacy increased. Why don't we just use the results of the test at Stack Overflow and decide that we do not need the change?

@AaronStevens : I cannot offer my own statistics, but, judging by the statistics from the link, most questions getting the first vote to close will be closed under the new rule. I think this is too much, you may think this is actually great:-)

@AaronStevens : I was not trying to say that it was one and the same user in all cases, I was saying the first vote to close became too influential. So for each closed question, it was just one user (not the same user for all questions) that pretty much determined the fate of the question.

@AaronStevens : Please look how it was done at Stack Overflow (see the link to the results and an in-depth analysis in the above question). Before the experiment, the initial vote to close lead to closing in 36% of the cases; during the experiment, the initial vote to close lead to closing in 55% of the cases. In the link, they call it "a resounding success". I call it dangerous sensitivity to an opinion of just one trigger-happy user.

@AaronStevens : And who will assess the results of the test and decide if this measure should be permanent? I am afraid that will be the same trigger-happy enthusiasts of express closing.

@tpg2114 : I did not say that an individual user would be able to close a question if fewer votes are enough, I said the outcome would be more sensitive to actions of such a user. If elected moderators are reluctant to close flagged questions in a hurry, maybe we, thousands of other users, should also manifest such wisdom and be reluctant to have questions closed with just 3 votes:-)

@JMac : If the rules are not strict, you should not have a problem with my "many people liked the question, so maybe it just should not be closed?"

@AaronStevens : "it still seems like it should be considered off-topic." "I am not calling for it to be closed." I do apologize, it was naïve of me to think these two statements were mutually contradictory.

@AaronStevens : Maybe you changed your opinion later, but the quotes I gave speak for themselves.

@AaronStevens: "I am not calling for it to be closed." Then what did you mean by "I understand that it is a very interesting problem whose solution is not straight-forward, but it still seems like it should be considered off-topic"? Or by "What makes this problem different from other homework problems to make it acceptable?"

@JMac : For all intents and purposes, the rules are a legal document for us, and should be read as written.