How do we work against overzealous duplicate markers?

Question

I recently posted a question, which included an "X is not a duplicate"

Immediately, two responders flagged it as a duplicate of that exact question, and I got a comment of "It absolutely is a duplicate".

When I pointed out what the answer to the other question was, and again stated it was not a duplicate, the duplicate flags were removed, without comment or apology.

A further "duplicate" technically had the right answer, and very clearly written, but asked a different question, using a different(and inappropriate) search term - callbacks - and did not have the relevant tag - settimeout. (I had specifically excluded answers which were about the callbacks search term).

In my comment on the original SO question, I went on to say "The problem is the same, but the description of the problem is explicitly about callbacks. It was not tagged as a settimeout question. Context and findability matter in a knowledge management system. If you want people to find questions which are not tagged with the topic at hand, and which themselves state they are about a different topic - you need to start editing the questions meta-information. I agree - the less-upvoted answer to that question is ideal and clear - it is also poorly findable for the context. SO is about relevant, findable, clear and useful answers."

It makes it increasingly difficult to ask clear model questions, which will be usefully searchable and filterable with clear and intelligible answers, which are not overly specific to an edge case of the more general question.

Any suggestions as to how we can help better, clearer, more generic questions and answers get added into the SO knowledge base?

The whole point of this issue is that we have duplicates which have different context and applicability, or which are using technologies relevant now when the original questions have very specific answers about technologies of yesteryear.

Answer 1

I would quote one of your comments from that question:

The problem is the same, but the description of the problem is explicitly about callbacks. It was not tagged as a settimeout question. Context and findabilty matter in a knowledge management system. If you want people to find questions which are not tagged with the topic at hand, and which themselves state they are about a different topic - you need to start editing the questions meta-information. I agree - the less-upvoted answer to that question is ideal and clear - it is also poorly findable for the context. SO is about relevant, findable, clear and useful answers.

Overzealous or not, that duplicate seems to have given you a useful answer, right?

You bring another problem, people sometime don't add the correct tag, give bad question title, etc... As an open community we can help to edit such questions. We can make a difference.

For the overzealous flagging I see it another way. Two community members did research on SO at the time you wrote your questions to find you an answer, isn't that a good service?

Some general advice too would be to put the notice "Not a dupe of xxx" at the start of your question. That would show you did some research and often the end of the question gets less attention.

Answer 2

Without really knowing the specifics, you brought up two significant points in your examples which I think need to be addressed:

1. When I pointed out what the answer to the other question was, and again stated it was not a duplicate…

   You don't choose answers as duplicate targets; it's the question that is (or is not) a duplicate. Pointing to the answer is mostly irrelevant: That answer didn't help you, yes, but what you want to do here is explain why your question is not a duplicate, and why that answer isn't an answer to this question.

   This may require you to clarify the focus (of your own question, or even the proposed duplicate) to obviously differentiate the two questions. If that answer didn't answer your question, what's different about your question that'll give you the answer you want, rather than it just being what essentially is a duplicate question where you somehow expect different results?

2. The problem is the same, but…it is also poorly findable for the context. SO is about relevant, findable, clear and useful answers

   Here, I think you're missing the point of duplicates. The proposed duplicate was poorly findable, fine. Despite it being a perfect answer to your question, you didn't know to search for it there. By marking your question as a duplicate, you and future users now have an easier time finding this answer, because the dupe link points them right to it.

   You want the community to "start editing the questions meta-information", well, duplicate targets are one of the ways that the community effectively does this: Now that answer can be found not only with the original search terms, but also whatever new search terms you introduced when you wrote your question. Two people had this same problem, two people found the same solution, and now there's two paths for future users to follow when they're searching for it themselves.

   This sounds like the system working exactly as intended to me.

The fundamental issue is: Do answers on the duplicate answer your question? If so, good, problem solved. If not, figure out why not and fix that. Just saying "Oh, by the way, such-and-such isn't a duplicate" without elaboration really doesn't help.