What have I done wrong? Flamed for asking a question? [duplicate]

Question

Just look at what happened here, very simple question:

https://stackoverflow.com/questions/21386037/how-can-i-take-take-text-and-display-it-in-an-image-in-asp-net-c-sharp?noredirect=1#comment32254569_21386037

Answer 1

The down votes and the close votes really reflect 2 different issues.

First the close votes.

Your post attracted 5 close votes but the decision was split between at least 3 different reasons as the close reason only had 2 voters that selected it:

"Questions asking us to recommend or find a tool, library or favorite off-site resource are off-topic for Stack Overflow as they tend to attract opinionated answers and spam. Instead, describe the problem and what has been done so far to solve it."

There was also at least 1 possible duplicate close vote (plus one close as a duplicate flag on a different question). Only a mod can tell us the specific close reasons selected, but I'd guess there was at least 1 (or maybe 2) votes to close as "unclear what you are asking" or "too broad".

In the end, a majority of close voters did not select the specific close reason, but it was only a plurality. Unfortunately, due to the way close vote conflicts are resolved, this was the reason it was selected.

I have a feeling this closure was a direct result of the community is still adapting to the removal of a specific close reason that would have likely been the close reason if it still existed. Sometimes the community is searching for a close reason to what they see as a bad question, and you end up with a good mix of different close reasons.

Bad close decisions happen all the time. There's really no way to avoid them, but the community is self correcting, and bad closures can easily be reversed, although sometimes they need a little help via editing. In this case, despite your unconstructive attitude, the process worked as designed, and the question was reopened and it was reclosed as a duplicate, like it should have been originally.

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Now for the downvotes.

I don't see a problem with the downvotes. Without the fluff, your question boils down to "I have to create an image with text, how do I do it" without evidence of any effort or research of your own. The community has decided that questions like that are not of good quality and tend to downvote them. Had you included some effort on your own, you probably could have avoided most of the initial downvotes.

Some of the more recent downvotes were due something we have dubbed the Meta Effect. Simply speaking, the extra attention you have drawn to your post by asking this question has drawn extra eyes on your post which resulted in more downvotes. I can't say for certain, but some of those extra downvotes might have been due to your attitude here. As Bart has mentioned, trying to get help by insulting the community usually does not usually end up going in your favor.

Stack Overflow is not a site for everyone. We don't accept any programming question under the sun. A large part of the reason of the popularity of the site is the quality of the questions and the answers, and the community is very aggressive in moderating posts to maintain that quality. If you want to ask someone to write your code for you, or do your research for you, then this might not be the community for you.