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Stack Exchange has a lot of general guidance on how to use the site, including how to ask and answer questions. One of those concerns the topic of self-answering questions (or more specifically, posting questions to which you already know the answer for). However, many communities across the SE network approach those matters differently, and especially given that a lot of users around here are new to the whole SE business, I think we should figure out how we feel about this policy and how we wish to deal with it.

Now, there are many different circumstances in which one may want to self-answer. The issue was brought up by Nike Dattani under this post of mine, which I posted a self-answer to, with the intent being that this is a "big list" kind of question, and my answer is just one of many examples. More "classical" kinds of self-answers are ones meant to document existing knowledge. And then of course there are cases where the person asking eventually figures out the answer after posting.

I am going to post these three types of scenarios as separate answers, so we can use the upvotes/downvotes to express our opinions (and give comments under individual answers to discuss those scenarios). Feel free to explain other situations where this question might arise in answers so those can be discussed too.

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    $\begingroup$ @GuyCoder Thank you for your comments anyway! Yes, this issue is definitely far from black-and-white, and I don't think the policy should be rigid in any way. Still, I believe some kind of general guidance on what should and shouldn't be encouraged should be helpful. $\endgroup$
    – Wojowu
    Commented Feb 9, 2022 at 13:27
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    $\begingroup$ The three seeded answers say "Please upvote this answer if you agree and downvote if you disagree", but I'd like to point out that the number of votes aren't always the best guide to developing policies. Community consensus is often better established by the quality of the arguments put forward. See for example the part where it says "but we're really looking for a well-thought out discussion here, not just a simple 'yes or no' poll" here. $\endgroup$
    – Nike Dattani
    Commented Feb 9, 2022 at 21:59
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    $\begingroup$ Plenty of food for thought in this thread at Meta Stack Exchange: How do sites moderate self-answered questions?. $\endgroup$
    – user158
    Commented Feb 13, 2022 at 13:32

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It is okay to post an answer to your own question if this answer was found after the posting of this question.

Please upvote this answer if you agree and downvote if you disagree.

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It is okay to post a question you know an answer to and immediately post an answer to it, as means of documenting that knowledge.

Please upvote this answer if you agree and downvote if you disagree.

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    $\begingroup$ I see nothing wrong and in line with sharing knowledge in that form. Voting will take care of bad questions or answers. $\endgroup$
    – Joachim Breitner
    Commented Feb 9, 2022 at 17:35
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    $\begingroup$ I'm downvoting because the "ask, research harder, self-answer " seems a far better work cycle, while also permitting the OP to answer their own question. $\endgroup$
    – Pedro Sánchez Terraf
    Commented Feb 10, 2022 at 12:04
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    $\begingroup$ @PedroSánchezTerraf If you've already got half-way through writing a question, and you find the answer, I don't really see the difference. We lose a useful Q&A pair, and lurkers lose a learning opportunity, because somebody found the answer half an hour earlier than they might otherwise have done? $\endgroup$
    – wizzwizz4
    Commented Feb 22, 2022 at 15:55
  • $\begingroup$ @wizzwizz4 I do not understand your observation. Btw, I upvoted for the the other answer $\endgroup$
    – Pedro Sánchez Terraf
    Commented Feb 22, 2022 at 17:23
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No options were given for "It is not okay..." and at least 8 people have already voted on the three seeded answers, during the last 8 hours, so I'm not sure if this answer will get a chance to stand on a level-playing-field. The question and the three seeded answers appeared to me, like they were giving the impression that immediate self-answers will certainly be allowed, and that the discussion is only about when it will be allowed.

But I wholeheartedly agree with Guy Coder: If someone asks a question and then after several days of research, finds the answer: I highly encourage them to share that knowledge in a self-answer because the answer could be useful for future visitors who might have the same question. If the asker answers immediately, it means that they already knew the answer to the question that they asked, and I think at the very least the ISA (immediate self-answer) ought to be made a community-wiki, for various reasons that I can discuss in more detail if necessary.

I also agree with Guy Coder's other comment: Stack Exchange is not a place for us to simply dump all our knowledge about the site's topics. If that were the case, I could ask and ISA (immediately-self-answer) a thousand questions here within a week, and even if the content was very high in quality and got plenty of upvotes, most people here would not like that.

This is a summary of my opinion on the issue:

  • Case (1). Asker discovers the answer to their own question after doing plenty more research (perhaps guided by the community's comments on the question): Self-answer is encouraged!
  • Case (2). Asker already knows the answer to the question they're asking: Writing a question and an immediate self-answer should be limited (e.g. don't do this all day every day, and consider making the immediate-self-answer a Community Wiki).
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    $\begingroup$ You can express your opinion as "It is not okay..." by downvoting the answers... $\endgroup$
    – Wojowu
    Commented Feb 9, 2022 at 21:54
  • $\begingroup$ Sure, but what happened here is still sub-ideal in my opinion. $\endgroup$
    – Nike Dattani
    Commented Feb 9, 2022 at 21:55
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    $\begingroup$ I think a thousand high-quality Q&A pairs would be a great asset for any site, whether or not they are self-answered. The immediacy of the given self-answer becomes less and less relevant with time. Of course, one shouldn’t flood a site with any kind of activity, not just Q&A self-answers, but that’s a separate restriction IMO. $\endgroup$
    – user158
    Commented Feb 9, 2022 at 22:44
  • $\begingroup$ @TheAmplitwist I don't deny that it would be a great asset, but there are drawbacks too. Also, why should the ISA not be made a Community Wiki? $\endgroup$
    – Nike Dattani
    Commented Feb 9, 2022 at 22:48
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    $\begingroup$ @NikeDattani I’m not convinced that any restrictions need to be placed on immediate self-answers (apart from generally applicable ones, such as (1) the question being a well-formulated one that could stand on its own without the answer, (2) not flooding the site with this activity in a short interval of time, etc.). So, I don’t think they need to made CW. To pose the question back to you, is there any advantage to having these self-answers as CW in terms of allowing others to contribute/maintain it via edits, or is it just intended to stop the OP from gaining rep? $\endgroup$
    – user158
    Commented Feb 9, 2022 at 22:55
  • $\begingroup$ @TheAmplitwist Your suggestion about "rep-hunting" is a good reason to make them CW but it's more complicated. Most good citizens I know in this network, would in most potential ISA-type cases, include as part of the question, something like "I'm aware of the papers [here] and [here] which answer the question, but I wonder if there's any others?". I also agree that questions that can't stand on their own without the answer should be highly discouraged, along with flooding the site, but I think most questions that can be ISA'd are not the best questions on their own, but not obvious enough. $\endgroup$
    – Nike Dattani
    Commented Feb 9, 2022 at 23:08
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    $\begingroup$ @NikeDattani But then isn’t it the case that the usual quality-checking standards on SE already take care of low-quality, low-effort postings? Why make special rules for edge cases, that can be handled on a case-by-case basis on Meta if needed? $\endgroup$
    – user158
    Commented Feb 9, 2022 at 23:16
  • $\begingroup$ But I should add, I think it might be a good idea to avoid self-answering immediately at least during the private beta, and maybe even a few weeks into the public beta, just to not put off others from contributing to a question when they see an answer already present. However, I will also add that this is my first time participating in a private beta site, so you can take my suggestions with your preferred dose of NaCl. :) $\endgroup$
    – user158
    Commented Feb 9, 2022 at 23:18
  • $\begingroup$ @TheAmplitwist About the "usual quality-checking standards", this is what I was trying to address when I wrote "but not obvious enough" at the end of my last comment, but I ran out of space and didn't want to write 2 separate comments. I do not think the "usual quality-checking standards" are sufficient. The answer to your new question about why we should try to establish policies rather than addressing each case separately on Meta, it's because (1) by the time you discuss it on Meta, the problem is already there and then might need to be deleted, which sucks $\endgroup$
    – Nike Dattani
    Commented Feb 9, 2022 at 23:23
  • $\begingroup$ for people that invested in answering the question, or editing it, reviewing it, etc. (2) getting people to participate in Meta is not easy. Just watch and see how much the Meta activity here reduces over the next 6 months! You raise another good point that self-answering can discourage others from answering, which is one of the reasons why it's good to include the answer as part of the question body in many cases. Finally just as you're not convinced we should have restrictions, I'm not convinced ISA's shouldn't be CW. Why? For rep? $\endgroup$
    – Nike Dattani
    Commented Feb 9, 2022 at 23:26
  • $\begingroup$ @Wojowu Regarding your first comment on my answer here: people have a much greater tendency to vote up than down, so saying "It is okay" and asking for downvotes to indicate if a user thinks it's "not okay", would probably yield a very different result compared to saying "It is not okay" and asking for upvotes to indicate if a user agrees, but anyway: the raw vote count isn't what's supposed to drive policy-making, so much as the quality of the arguments put forward. $\endgroup$
    – Nike Dattani
    Commented Feb 10, 2022 at 4:43
  • $\begingroup$ Also, some people can upvote but not downvote. The rep requirements are different. $\endgroup$
    – Nike Dattani
    Commented Feb 13, 2022 at 22:16
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    $\begingroup$ You are aware that I delete almost all of my comments daily. So the links to my comments no longer link to the comment. $\endgroup$
    – Guy Coder
    Commented Feb 18, 2022 at 11:32
  • $\begingroup$ @GuyCoder I wasn't aware! I'm aware now! $\endgroup$
    – Nike Dattani
    Commented Feb 18, 2022 at 12:41
  • $\begingroup$ "I could ask and ISA (immediately-self-answer) a thousand questions here within a week ..." - Could I find that information anywhere else? If I could search and find many results then you are simply copying wholesale, if it's rare treasure unavailable anywhere then it certainly has some value. --- The problem with Community Wiki for ISA is that the downvotes don't penalize the author, and lead to an automatic ban - a manual ban becomes problematic because if it's not plagiarism it's allowed to ISA; there's a Checkbox encouraging such activity and MSE policy in favor of it. $\endgroup$
    – Rob
    Commented Mar 28, 2022 at 8:05
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It is okay to post an answer to your own question as an example of the kind of answer you are after.

Please upvote this answer if you agree and downvote if you disagree.

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    $\begingroup$ It is almost a rule without exceptions that information important to Readers who would be willing to post Answers should be placed in the body of the Question. $\endgroup$
    – hardmath
    Commented Feb 10, 2022 at 13:51

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