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I like the question and was thinking more on it... so I decided to expand on part of my comment on the question into this answer.

My first thought with most of these is, "What have other Stack Exchange sites done in this situation?" I wrote a meta-question about a somewhat-similar topic of summary-like questions. I especially liked this answer from hardmath about how Math.SE handles some of those "canonical" topics.(Aside: His particular example is fasinating and blew my mind. :)

I think there's value in letting good answers to such topics "happen organically," even though that's somewhat less satisfying in certain ways than getting some good, fundamental answer to some good, fundamental question committed into the annals of the Internet(s). That said, I saw some confusion (partly my own) about a topic, so I wrote a self-Q/A about What do the terms extraction and strength mean? My goal there was to clear up some terms that I didn't understand and that were being used somewhat inconsistently or imprecisely. Especially in those cases, I'm certainly in favor of penning a good Q/A.

On the other hand, I think having some "softball" questions every once in a while, even if duplicate, is healthy. If a new user to the site gets hooked by giving a solid answer to a question, that's a great "gateway" to this community. Having fundamental topics that are "still open" might be a good hook for a new user.

Another take on this is that some questions that are on-topic for the site might be already answered well other places. For example, if I search for how to make a cup of coffee in an auto-drip coffeemaker, I think I'd find a very large number of answers that are very adequate... therefore, they don't need to be "asked" here as such. That said, I'd be totally happy if someone earnestly asked something like that and got an earnest, helpful answer from this community. I hope we will be so lucky as to be "the" coffee reference site at some point in the future! :)

I like the question and was thinking more on it... so I decided to expand on part of my comment on the question into this answer.

My first thought with most of these is, "What have other Stack Exchange sites done in this situation?" I wrote a meta-question about a somewhat-similar topic of summary-like questions. I especially liked this answer from hardmath about how Math.SE handles some of those "canonical" topics.(Aside: His particular example is fasinating and blew my mind. :)

I think there's value in letting good answers to such topics "happen organically," even though that's somewhat less satisfying in certain ways than getting some good, fundamental answer to some good, fundamental question committed into the annals of the Internet(s). That said, I saw some confusion (partly my own) about a topic, so I wrote a self-Q/A about What do the terms extraction and strength mean? My goal there was to clear up some terms that I didn't understand and that were being used somewhat inconsistently or imprecisely. Especially in those cases, I'm certainly in favor of penning a good Q/A.

On the other hand, I think having some "softball" questions every once in a while, even if duplicate, is healthy. If a new user to the site gets hooked by giving a solid answer to a question, that's a great "gateway" to this community. Having fundamental topics that are "still open" might be a good hook for a new user.

Another take on this is that some questions that are on-topic for the site might be already answered well other places. For example, if I search for how to make a cup of coffee in an auto-drip coffeemaker, I think I'd find a very large number of answers that are very adequate... therefore, they don't need to be "asked" here as such. That said, I'd be totally happy if someone earnestly asked something like that and got an earnest, helpful answer from this community. I hope we will be so lucky as to be "the" coffee reference site at some point in the future! :)

I like the question and was thinking more on it... so I decided to expand on part of my comment on the question into this answer.

My first thought with most of these is, "What have other Stack Exchange sites done in this situation?" I wrote a meta-question about a somewhat-similar topic of summary-like questions. I especially liked this answer from hardmath about how Math.SE handles some of those "canonical" topics.(Aside: His particular example is fasinating and blew my mind. :)

I think there's value in letting good answers to such topics "happen organically," even though that's somewhat less satisfying in certain ways than getting some good, fundamental answer to some good, fundamental question committed into the annals of the Internet(s). That said, I saw some confusion (partly my own) about a topic, so I wrote a self-Q/A about What do the terms extraction and strength mean? My goal there was to clear up some terms that I didn't understand and that were being used somewhat inconsistently or imprecisely. Especially in those cases, I'm certainly in favor of penning a good Q/A.

On the other hand, I think having some "softball" questions every once in a while, even if duplicate, is healthy. If a new user to the site gets hooked by giving a solid answer to a question, that's a great "gateway" to this community. Having fundamental topics that are "still open" might be a good hook for a new user.

Another take on this is that some questions that are on-topic for the site might be already answered well other places. For example, if I search for how to make a cup of coffee in an auto-drip coffeemaker, I think I'd find a very large number of answers that are very adequate... therefore, they don't need to be "asked" here as such. That said, I'd be totally happy if someone earnestly asked something like that and got an earnest, helpful answer from this community. I hope we will be so lucky as to be "the" coffee reference site at some point in the future! :)

I like the question and was thinking more on it... so I decided to expand on part of my comment on the question into this answer.

My first thought with most of these is, "What have other Stack Exchange sites done in this situation?" I wrote a meta-question about a somewhat-similar topic of summary-like questions. I especially liked this answer from hardmath about how Math.SE handles some of those "canonical" topics.(Aside: His particular example is fasinating and blew my mind. :)

I think there's value in letting good answers to such topics "happen organically," even though that's somewhat less satisfying in certain ways than getting some good, fundamental answer to some good, fundamental question committed into the annals of the Internet(s). That said, I saw some confusion (partly my own) about a topic, so I wrote a self-Q/A about What do the terms extraction and strength mean? My goal there was to clear up some terms that I didn't understand and that were being used somewhat inconsistently or imprecisely. Especially in those cases, I'm certainly in favor of penning a good Q/A.

On the other hand, I think having some "softball" questions every once in a while, even if duplicate, is healthy. If a new user to the site gets hooked by giving a solid answer to a question, that's a great "gateway" to this community. Having fundamental topics that are "still open" might be a good hook for a new user.

Another take on this is that some questions that are on-topic for the site might be already answered well other places. For example, if I search for how to make a cup of coffee in an auto-drip coffeemaker, I think I'd find a very large number of answers that are very adequate... therefore, they don't need to be "asked" here as such. That said, I'd be totally happy if someone earnestly asked something like that and got an earnest, helpful answer from this community. I hope we will be so lucky as to be "the" coffee reference site at some point in the future! :)

I like the question and was thinking more on it... so I decided to expand on part of my comment on the question into this answer.

My first thought with most of these is, "What have other Stack Exchange sites done in this situation?" I wrote a meta-question about a somewhat-similar topic of summary-like questions. I especially liked this answer from hardmath about how Math.SE handles some of those "canonical" topics.(Aside: His particular example is fasinating and blew my mind. :)

I think there's value in letting good answers to such topics "happen organically," even though that's somewhat less satisfying in certain ways than getting some good, fundamental answer to some good, fundamental question committed into the annals of the Internet(s). That said, I saw some confusion (partly my own) about a topic, so I wrote a self-Q/A about What do the terms extraction and strength mean? My goal there was to clear up some terms that I didn't understand and that were being used somewhat inconsistently or imprecisely. Especially in those cases, I'm certainly in favor of penning a good Q/A.

On the other hand, I think having some "softball" questions every once in a while, even if duplicate, is healthy. If a new user to the site gets hooked by giving a solid answer to a question, that's a great "gateway" to this community. Having fundamental topics that are "still open" might be a good hook for a new user.

Another take on this is that some questions that are on-topic for the site might be already answered well other places. For example, if I search for how to make a cup of coffee in an auto-drip coffeemaker, I think I'd find a very large number of answers that are very adequate... therefore, they don't need to be "asked" here as such. That said, I'd be totally happy if someone earnestly asked something like that and got an earnest, helpful answer from this community. I hope we will be so lucky as to be "the" coffee reference site at some point in the future! :)

I like the question and was thinking more on it... so I decided to expand on part of my comment on the question into this answer.

My first thought with most of these is, "What have other Stack Exchange sites done in this situation?" I wrote a meta-question about a somewhat-similar topic of summary-like questions. I especially liked this answer from hardmath about how Math.SE handles some of those "canonical" topics.(Aside: His particular example is fasinating and blew my mind. :)

I think there's value in letting good answers to such topics "happen organically," even though that's somewhat less satisfying in certain ways than getting some good, fundamental answer to some good, fundamental question committed into the annals of the Internet(s). That said, I saw some confusion (partly my own) about a topic, so I wrote a self-Q/A about What do the terms extraction and strength mean? My goal there was to clear up some terms that I didn't understand and that were being used somewhat inconsistently or imprecisely. Especially in those cases, I'm certainly in favor of penning a good Q/A.

On the other hand, I think having some "softball" questions every once in a while, even if duplicate, is healthy. If a new user to the site gets hooked by giving a solid answer to a question, that's a great "gateway" to this community. Having fundamental topics that are "still open" might be a good hook for a new user.

Another take on this is that some questions that are on-topic for the site might be already answered well other places. For example, if I search for how to make a cup of coffee in an auto-drip coffeemaker, I think I'd find a very large number of answers that are very adequate... therefore, they don't need to be "asked" here as such. That said, I'd be totally happy if someone earnestly asked something like that and got an earnest, helpful answer from this community. I hope we will be so lucky as to be "the" coffee reference site at some point in the future! :)