Reward linking questions

Question

Reward linking questions to leverage and organize existing knowledge

There is already so much knowledge stored inside the Stack Exchange network. The chance is high that an answered question relates to a new one. And it will only increase:

The longer a knowledge domain is covered by SE, the more basic and simple questions will have been answered. Automatically new questions tend to become more niche and sophisticated over time. But they don't pop out of thin air; they build upon established first principles and prior art. And when answered turn to part of that themselves.

In summary, the present knowledge will become always more important in relation to new questions and of course in general through its sheer extent. To benefit users the most, it should be accessible in the easiest way possible. The web came up with hyperlinks for that, which have a special instance on SE as linked questions.

To make the collective knowledge of SE more accessible, linked questions are the web's native, low barrier way. They create the eponymous navigatable web of wisdom and give context without search. There should be an incentive to create more of them to emphasize the wiki like character of the network.

How is this different from Reward finding duplicate questions?

This is another topic. Duplicate questions are alternative phrasings of an existing question. Linked questions are other questions related to an existing question.

The mechanisms, consequences and dynamics behind are completely different:

Aspect	Linked question	Duplicate question
Trigger	Answer/comment with current site link	Flag existing question
Appearance	List item on the right	Top center redirect
Relation	1:n	1:1
Consequence	More context available, more interconnection	Question closed
Incentive dynamic	Depends on implementation	Built in Fastest Gun in the West

See also: It's time to reward the duplicate finders on Meta Stack Overflow. — 41686d6564 stands w. Palestine, Apr 23 at 16:36
Another aspect is growth dynamics, allegorized in the balloon model: Learning knowledge is like an expanding balloon and its growing surface is new questions. There will always be more new questions, but still much more total knowledge: When enlarged, the volume of something grows faster than its surface. A consequence of this in biology is Bergmann's rule or why penguins are larger at the South Pole than in Africa. — cachius, Apr 23 at 20:19
1. Somewhat similar, except that the Rep goes to the Q linked to: '"Should questions that are "Linked to" earn extra "Rep", á la "Street Cred"?"'. 2. Adding +1 to the dupe after a certain # of repetitions: "Should duplicates add to the duplicated question's score?". 3. The most similar: "Can you get reputation when people follow links to questions or SO sites?", but again the benefit is directed at the other end of the link. — Rob, Apr 25 at 1:35

cachius · Accepted Answer · 2022-04-23 16:12:42Z

0

I propose to reward 2 extra reputation when an answer or comment* with a linked question receives an upvote, once per question.

*Conceptually not the comment but the act of linking is considered rewarded. It's only that the technical means to do it is via a comment.

answered Apr 23 at 16:12

cachius

1316 bronze badges

5

Nice idea, but it needs some form of quality control, and I think rewarding finders of good dupes has a higher priority.
– PM 2Ring
Apr 23 at 18:22
1

Re "...extra reputation ... receives an upvote": No, this goes against the principle that it is always users that (actively) award reputation points (by upvoting, approving suggested edits, bounties, etc.), not the system itself. This would cause too much inflation in the reputation point system.
– This_is_NOT_a_forum
Apr 24 at 7:42
The linking is very important, but mechanism for achieving it should be something else.
– This_is_NOT_a_forum
Apr 24 at 7:48
This would completely destabilize the current reputation system. Please don't.
– Mast
Apr 24 at 9:17

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Reward linking questions