Why ask for answers to questions you already have the answer to?

There are some great answers here and I really don't have a lot to add. I'll paraphrase a couple of points that I've mentioned in the past when this question has come up. 1) The most important thing to Mahalo Answers is the quality of the questions.

Great answers are of course important, but in this "chicken before the egg" paradox, I contend that Mahalo Answers thrives on questions that are interesting, reflective of the community, and honest. By honest I mean questions that honestly need answers. Contrived questions don't work.2) Some people want to talk.

The easiest way to start a conversation here on Mahalo Answers is to ask a question. Sometimes, folks don't have an interesting question to ask, so they talk about the community or make up questions. Communication underlies the Internet and is important everywhere.3) Some people want to "give back" to the community.

These folks are recycling M$'s by asking questions with a tip. That's great because it encourages people to become involved in the site.4) Some people are meeting a requirement. Conundrum is the current example of this.

Some folks (myself included) are asking questions because we're receiving money to do so. Any effort in this "meeting a requirement" category has been engineered by Mahalo to increase traffic, engagement, contribution, signups, etc. These are all important because the bigger Mahalo grows, the more interesting it becomes.0) I'm not a fan of contrived questions. I do however realize that they're very important.

I find myself answering fewer questions and I wonder if that's partially because I don't want to spend time answering questions that don't truly help someone.

There are many reasons people MIGHT ask questions that they already know the answer to, yes might had to be capitalized because it is a might, I do not know for a fact….. Some people, not naming names, like to help others earn money (not specific people earn money just everyone in general). Some like to just know facts, Some just want to know what other people have to say about the matters. Some people simply enjoy asking questions.

Wanting a second opinion, maybe in hope for a more detailed answer than what you already know. I was actually thinking about this a few days ago. That a lot of the questions seem silly, that people already know the answer to.

Oh my gosh, I know I hate when the asker corrects me on my answers and basically gives me the correct answer. It is like why did they even ask in the first place. It is kind of silly.

Yes, many people look for an answer that they want to hear instead of what other people really have to say about the subject. Some people just want to hear what they want to hear and hate hearing what other people have to say when it is not what they want to hear. I agree that a lot of those questions are pointless to answer.

I also think questions that have like a dozen answers that are great answer, is pointless to answer. Also, questions like that are kind of hard to pick a best answer for. But we all must realize that when people ask questions that are kind of personal, they want people to be nice about it.

I am sure most of us are but not everyone is. To answer personal questions, if you answer them at all, in my opinion it is best to be sensitive yet tell them the truth about what you think in a kind way. Make sure you are not belittling anyone.

I don’t think Mahalo will become a Trivia site. At least I hope it does not. But I do find it silly that people ask questions that have already been asked.

Especially Twitter questions, now Conundrum, great more questions that Might go unanswered. But hey if it does become a Trivia site, more people would be earning money, that would be good for the people, but bad for Mahalo, I think…. Im not sure.

But I think a lot of the money would be going to people answering pointless questions would be a bad thing. But then again maybe not, maybe it is a good thing. It all depends on how you look at it I guess.

I agree, I enjoy helping people and I think it is silly to have questions that have silly answers, meaning answers of no real use. But then again you never know, they could be real answers. But like the Twitter questions, most of the Twitter users never even log on to Mahalo.

Or at least there are a lot of questions from users that have never been to the site. So basically it is like answering a question that not many people care about if anyone at all. But then again I like to answer old questions to help clear Mahalo out.

There are tons of them, just sitting there. It does kind of make Mahalo cluttered, that’s why I am glad to see people answering them and cleaning them out. Ok, well I can go on for days but I think I got my point across, well points lol.

I hope you can understand what I am saying. (^_^)V.

I haven't noticed this happening a lot myself. @silverhammer.... sometimes you might be seeing something that is not actually there. I know with one of my questions you thought I had a preferred answer or knew the answer already, but that wasn't in fact the case.

I did have an idea of what I thought was probably the answer, but I was looking for a convincing analysis to either prove or disprove my hunch. Maybe that is a more general pattern in what you are interepreting as people asking questions they know the answer to. There's a big difference between having a sense for what you think the answer probably is and actually knowing it for sure.

What I have noticed though is that a lot of the ConundrumLand questions are not so much things that people already know the answer to, but made up scenarios that would most likely never happen or which the asker doesn't really care about. It's part of Mahalo's efforts to promote ConundrumLand I guess, but not entirely satisafactory. I asked a question about that here: http://www.mahalo.com/answers/mahalo-answers-community/are-you-finding-the-large-number-of-questions-from-conunumdrumland-problematic-any-ideas-for-how-to-handle-them-better.

I could go on a guessing game and list every reason why I think people ask questions that they already have the answer to, but I will not. Many good reasons have been given in the other answers to this question. I would like to focus on how, when or even if we are to respond to these questions.

I would propose that if a question does not interest YOU, don't respond. If YOU suspect they already know the answer and would be wasting your time, don't respond. If YOU feel it is a silly question that shouldn't have been asked, don't respond.

Leave these questions for those that are interested, don't feel it is a waste of their time, and isn't silly. As to when to answer a question? Answer questions YOU are interested in, YOU feel are of benefit to to you, others, or the person that asked, or YOU feel is worthy of your time and effort.

And always, when answering a question, be courteous, thoughtful, and considerate. We never know all the reasons behind a question. What seems simple to one could be a revelation to another.

Also, these questions and answers can be referred to way into the future. We always want the best answers (knowledge) to be available to those that seek. I suspect questions and answers like you see from Conundrum, Twitter, or even Mahalo will be viewed for what they are.

Some serious, some thoughtful, some entertaining, etc. Of course rude, foul, or offensive material hopefully will be deleted. In summary, I say, spend your time asking/answering questions of interest to you. Don't worry about other people's motives.

Do your best and enjoy!

It's just for the fun of it... also to be sure that your answer is correct. Think about it this way what if you were on the game show call millionaire an they ask you for the $1,000,000 million dollar question "how many k-9 teeth does the human mouth contain? " A.2 B.4 C.6 D.8 now you think the answer is A.2 but you not sure.

You use your "ASK THE AUDIENCE" lifeline an 90% of the audience say the answer is B. 4 now what option will you go with? Of course your gonna go with the audience because that goes back to the saying were majority rules... if you an 4 of your friends wanna go out.

One say lets go to the movies the other say lets go to a football game yawl vote an 3 of yawl sed the football game an 2 vote the movies yawl gonna go to the foot ball game rite? Well hope this explanation answers your question.

Sometimes it's because you already found the answer, but it just doesn't seem right. You feel like that can't be the right answer, you must be missing something. For instance, I recently asked this question: mahalo.com/answers/fiction/did-tim-curry... I already knew the answer, but it just didn't seem right to me that there would be 3 missing books from the series.

I thought someone else might formulate a better search or know of a better place to look. I was also sort of hoping that there would be a different answer because I wanted the series to be complete. As it turns out, the real answer was the one I had already found on my own.

I wasn't trying to mess with anyone, just looking for a second set of eyes.

I think most people who ask question they already have answer to, do it because they want to play like teachers finding out if someone could answer the question. Although I thought mahalo was not design for asker to play like teachers. It would be more fair if people just ask question they really don't know the answer to.

Since that the true meaning of ask a question.

Sometimes people may want additional information on the subject, or need/want help with a project. Another reason is to help bring knowledge into Mahalo. Remember, the Mahalo brain is growing as we answer and ask questions.

Frequently, when I go on to a site and take over page management, I see that the Mahalo questions and answers section has nothing to do with the topic page. In order to populate this section with questions in the appropriate topic, I ask relevant questions within the subject area of the page. In some cases, I know the answer or I have an opinion, but I do not see the asking of the question as irrelevant to my purpose.

There are large areas where the knowledge base of Mahalo is deficient and I think that we should probe members of the community to increase its utility to users. If the answer is insufficient, I vote no best answer. So It is important for me to get a considered, intelligent response.

Because it takes creative energy and time to make these questions, I believe there should be incentive points for asking the questions.

I did with a couple, to allow a chance to give some Money to other mahalo members, as well as have fun sharing about some things I am interesting it that other might be.. All the Casey Jones questions I posted I know the answers to. I enjoy sharing about Casey Jones the railroad folk hero from TN... So I asked a few questions to share about him with others.. as well as to see curiously how fast they could find the right answers.. there is still one unanswered. So I did it to spread knowledge and interest, other times its just fun to lead other into interesting trivia facts, history or topics, by asking a question.. that you already know the answer to.

- DNatureofDTrain.

You ask questions to find out what kind of crazy anwsers the online community will throw at you.

I have answered similar question mahalo.com/answers/social-issues/why-doe... here. You may take a look. * My other add-on humble opinions: On trivia: 1.

I think Mahalo Answers will be both a “trivia site” and “question and help site”. 2.It will still be OK as long as both camps of peoples can get “info” that they want at ease, be it “trivia” or “useful”. 3.

It’s sometimes difficult to classify or judge.4. If we don’t want it to be a trivia site, one of the ways is to ask more non-trivial questions. * On “sincerity” of question: 1.

There is incentive (points, thus ranks) in the system for peoples to ask a lot of questions and rate. Ask- for-the-sake-of-asking will be here as long as there is this incentive. 2.

Know-and-still-ask may not mean insincere as there is no THE ANSWER in question. Sometimes we get insightful alternative views even we think we know the answer. 3.

Even if question is “insincere”, as long as the answer is insightful, it’ll still be useful to the world. It’s useful to answerer too as he gains knowledge while searching for answer. He can use the info on his own website, blog, article etc.. * On “the asker is only fishing for a specific answer”: 1.

This is true sometimes but it's difficult to judge. One way is to avoid these askers in the future. I agree with you the difficulty of getting non-trivial, answerable questions.

It will be good if we can subscribe new questions by category, people etc.. To efficiently get trivial questions, look for: 1. Tipped question : if peoples tip $ to ask a question, most likely it isn’t trivial. 2.

Question with interesting votes: community thinks it isn’t trivial.3. Popular question: if many peoples answer, most likely it isn’t trivial.4. Compile a list of Mahaloians who ask non-trivial question; add into your friend list To efficiently get answerable questions (depends on own knowledge base), look for: 1.

Questions in categories 2. Compile list of peoples that usually ask questions you can answer; add as friend.

For me, it's all about perspective. If I know the answer to a question, but there may be another angle I might have missed, I'll ask the question. This helps me to form the best opinion about a particular subject and when I am asked the same question, I can give a fully thought out, well researched answer.

To get a second opinion. It's always good to double-check something that you aren't sure of.

Even when I ask a fully real question I have to correct most of the answers because so many answers are just plain bad. I've pretty much given up asking questions for the purpose of learning an answer. I can only think of a couple where I tried an got a helpful answer.

On the other hand, I often ask questions to start discussions. In that case I, well, discuss any answers that come along. It doesn't mean I know the answer to start with, but rather that I either have an opinion or I look up what the answerers have claimed and dispute it.

Sometimes I ask questions to generate interest in my pages. And of course, I often ask questions to get the popularity higher of my favorite tag, beer. I like doing this because I like beer, and also it keeps the tag within one click so I can easily look for questions about beer.

For me only. I just want to make sure that my answer is right as long as other people do the same thing as me! Of course there are many other reasons for this question,like I am not sure of my question or something like this.

I cant really gove you an answer,but what I can give you is a way to a solution, that is you have to find the anglde that you relate to or peaks your interest. A good paper is one that people get drawn into because it reaches them ln some way.As for me WW11 to me, I think of the holocaust and the effect it had on the survivors, their families and those who stood by and did nothing until it was too late.