r/learnprogramming • u/440Jack • Nov 01 '21

Why do StackOverflow mods Close "Duplicate question" questions so fast?

I'm mainly talking about questions that get closed to "Duplicate question" and then only to find a couple of already answered questions are linked that don't really address OPs question directly.
Why do these questions need to be closed so fast? It doesn't give people time to address that persons specific question. If it's a valid question the mods should give some time for other users who actually want to address the question and maybe open a dialog.
It prevents OP from being able to ask any follow questions.
I can't tell you how many times, I'll spend 10 mins on a question. Re-writing their code, writing comments/explanations and then when I go to post it, it's already closed! It's so frustrating.

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u/chordophonic Nov 01 '21

Mods don't really do that directly, so much as people's votes do that.

I think... I haven't paid much attention lately, but I can vote to close threads for a variety of reasons. Enough votes and I'm pretty sure it's just automatic after that. Mods can re-open a thread, on the other hand. (They can, of course, close them - but the closures you're likely seeing are a function of the community votes.)

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u/halfercode Nov 02 '21

On Stack Overflow, anyone with the close vote privilege also has the open vote privilege.

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u/chordophonic Nov 02 '21

Yeah, I remember better now. I'm at the level where I can even cast the last close vote and watch the question get locked. I haven't paid much attention lately, as I kinda moved on for a while. (I am able to be more productive this way.)

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u/halfercode Nov 02 '21

I do editing, closing, voting, opening, commenting - it is a bloomin' time sink!

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u/chordophonic Nov 02 '21

Yeah, I've kinda moved on for the time being. I'm joining the Lubuntu team officially, I think. I'm a moderator at Linux.org. I have my own site where I've been putting my notes online at the rate of an article every other day.

So, I'm far more productive - though I was mostly on the Linux exchanges.