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I've got an active question, but I will be away until the new year. Is it OK to add a comment saying I'll be away or is it rude?

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I always appreciate it when someone does this. I think that you should stick around for at least 20 minutes after posing a question or answer that might need clarifying. After that I would think it's really fine to walk away.

If you asked a really dramatic question or something that might need clarifying I would consider it rude if you immediately left a comment saying: "Ok I am leaving you guys to interpret that however you want. Won't be back for two weeks!" Barring that I wouldn't consider this rude in the slightest.

I always appreciate when someone overcommunicates in this way and lets other users know what is going on.

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    Just to ... overcommunicate my position here: "overcommunicate" in the answer above doesn't mean "TMI" but more like "You are in absolutely no obligation to let people know that you'll be away from SO/SE for the holidays/ever. They can get over it and be patient. "
    – Mason
    Dec 25 '18 at 20:37
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It is not rude in any way to say you will be away. In fact, if you will be away for a long time, it's a good thing to do in a comment, not in your question. It is not a necessary part of a question, and it will probably be edited out. In a comment, however, it will be kept and read.

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    And will be deleted when no longer relevant
    – endolith
    Dec 25 '18 at 22:45
  • @endolith How are comments deleted when they are no longer relevant? At math.se usually comments just end up littering up the pages (atleast seems to me) indefinitely. Is this just a math.se phenomenon? The only mechanism I know of for this is flagging comments as no longer relevant. Does this keep effectively keep other subsites clean? Or maybe Math.Se needs to step up the flagging comments game?
    – Mason
    Dec 25 '18 at 23:00
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    @Mason either the comment can be flagged or the OP can delete the comment when they get back. One of those tends to happen on most posts.
    – Pika the Master of the Whales
    Dec 25 '18 at 23:01
  • @Mason theoretically, the way SE was supposed to be used, comments clarify an answer, and, once clarified, their content is edited into the answer and they are deleted to improve SNR for readers. Obviously the sites don't adhere to this rigorously, but often you can edit an answer to add content from comments, then flag those comments as "no longer necessary"
    – endolith
    Dec 26 '18 at 5:39

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