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I'm relatively new to Stack Overflow and already have experience with getting both a question and an answer deleted.

I understand why my question was closed, but the closing happened too fast. The first time I looked at my question after posting it, it was already closed; I didn't get the chance to respond.

The deletion of my answer was done by mistake. The deleter wrote that I should have deleted the answer by myself to avoid bothering the moderators. That was offensive, IMO.

I suggest implementing a time period, e.g. one day, during which questions cannot be closed. That way, authors would have the chance to explain the causes of their answers.

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  • 4
    Are you referring to your "Maximum Number of Type Parameters a Human Being can Understand" question, or your three deleted answers on this question?
    – user102937
    Commented Feb 23, 2012 at 0:08
  • A time limit on deleting new questions might be reasonable, for some of the reasons why it might be deleted (if it's a clear spam post, or something, obviously would be excluded), but poor questions should be closed ASAP, and can be opened upon improvement.
    – Nightfirecat
    Commented Feb 23, 2012 at 0:26
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    Please note, that everything happens fast on Stack Overflow. Answer happen fast--sometimes unbelievably so---on good questions. One of our on-going problems with new users is that they figure it will be good enough to check back in a few hours to see if there have been any comments (a perfectly reasonable behavior on most on-line forums); here resulting in frustration from the user base that they won't answer questions or fix problems.
    – dmckee --- ex-moderator kitten
    Commented Feb 23, 2012 at 1:45
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    The crucial point is that questions are closed quickly, but not deleted for a while. That prevents an influx of answers while the person who asked the question has a chance to improve it and make it constructive/on-topic/whatever. Then, it can be re-opened and there won't be a flood of useless answers left in the meantime. If you don't fix the question while it's closed, it will eventually get deleted.
    – Cody Gray
    Commented Feb 23, 2012 at 2:52
  • @RobertHarvey Yes that are my related issues.
    – brgerner
    Commented Feb 23, 2012 at 8:38
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    And again frustration: 15 down votes for my serious question. I have waited several days before I wrote it because I was not sure whether meta is the right place and whether this question would also been deleted. Ok I could just leave StackOverflow but it is a great and very useful side - besides some issues.
    – brgerner
    Commented Feb 23, 2012 at 8:55
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    Votes are different on Meta: see meta.stackoverflow.com/faq#vote-differences for most people voting, it probably simply meant "I disagree with this suggestion"
    – Pekka
    Commented Feb 23, 2012 at 10:10
  • @Pekka'sReputationBordello thanks, I'm not aware of it.
    – brgerner
    Commented Feb 23, 2012 at 11:12

1 Answer 1

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Closing needs to be swift - Stack Overflow gets 4,000 new questions a day, most of them crap (I do not necessarily mean your question; I haven't seen it). Not being able to close crap straight away would create chaos.

But I agree a closed question doesn't need to be deleted straight away, and telling an OP to delete to spare the mods' time is pretty offensive if the question was asked in good faith. Consider editing and undeleting your question - it might gain enough reopen votes to go back into business.

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    While I agree with this answer, the "telling an OP to delete" portion was in reference to an answer (one of three posted to a question). I suspect brgerner could've used some advice on how to edit.
    – Shog9
    Commented Feb 23, 2012 at 0:11

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