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To the question of whether a title-only edit on an old question is always bad: no. Here's an example of another old post (6 yrs old), where I approved a title edit only: http://superuser.com/review/suggested-edits/625545.

To the question of whether a title-only edit on an old question is always bad: no. Here's an example of another old post (6 yrs old), where I approved a title edit only: https://superuser.com/review/suggested-edits/625545.

I submit that nothing is likely to really improve a question like this in terms of its utility, perhaps with the exception Twisty points out in a comment that making it clearer that it is irrelevant might help readers ignore it faster. But regardless of what might be possible with sufficient editing, a trivial or cosmetic change like described in this scenario will probably not provide any real benefit. Worse, engaging in this kind of serial trivial edit proposals on old questions eats up the time reviewers have available. If the edits are approved, they flood the main page, wasting readers' time and shortening exposure for new questions. So there is a benefit to the site and to users in general to reject non-useful edits so as to not encourage them and to educate new editors on useful priorities.

I submit that nothing is likely to really improve a question like this in terms of its utility, perhaps with the exception Twisty points out in a comment that making it clearer that it is irrelevant might help readers ignore it faster. But regardless of what might be possible with sufficient editing, a trivial or cosmetic change like described in this scenario will probably not provide any real benefit.

Worse, engaging in this kind of serial trivial edit proposals on old questions eats up the time reviewers have available. If the edits are approved, they flood the main page, wasting readers' time and shortening exposure for new questions. So there is a benefit to the site and to users in general to reject non-useful edits so as to not encourage them and to educate new editors on useful priorities.

• A canonical question. This is a site standard that will be frequently referenced. In this case, I would say that virtually any change that polishes it in any way is probably useful and benefits the site.

• An example at the other extreme: an ancient thread about a problem specific to one version of some long-obsolete software. Nobody uses the software anymore, the problem was fixed in a subsequent release, none of which is currently available. Maybe there's some historical value in case some hobbyist is dabbling with it. It attracted several marginal answers that offer conflicting and mutually exclusive solutions, so even if someone is interested in the question, the thread isn't a good resource. Even at the height of the question's currency, it attracted little general interest. It has been harmlessly buried on the site for years.

  We could talk about potentially deleting it, but that's a different matter. For this hypothetical example. maybe that would happen later, or maybe a decision is made to leave it alone. But in this example, we have a new user who figured out that he can run a site search on a common misspelling or slang term to identify a bunch of easy edits. This long-dead question was in the list and he has proposed an edit to fix that.

• How old is the question and when is the last time it had any activity?

  Note that age is not a criterion, only an indicator in the sense that the older a question is, the more likely it is to have age-related factors that might make it currently irrelevant.

• Is it still relevant (is the software or hardware still in use; are answers applicable to current versions if it is; etc.)?

• How useful was it when the question was fresh (votes, views, favorites, comments)?

  If a question attracts little interest when it's fresh, it's rare to attract a lot more interest or usage when it's old. But if the subject matter is still relevant, look at whether the reason it might have attracted little attention was due to problems that can be fixed with an edit.

• Are the answers useful and consistent or did it attract a motley collection of low-quality or conflicting answers?

  If the question is unlikely to attract new answers, and the existing ones aren't useful, what's the sense in making the question easier to find?

• To what extent could the question use improvement and how much of the obvious improvements does the edit accomplish?

  If the question needs a lot of work but the edit fixes only one item of low-hanging fruit, the editor should be encouraged to do a more thorough job. That encouragement, or lack thereof, will affect the quality of their future edits.

• Does the edit improve the question's utility?

  • Might the edit attract new answers?

  • Might improving the question make it a significantly better resource if the information is "timeless"?

Consider that the question was specific to the OP and the thread wouldn't generally be helpful to other users today. The original title wasn't helpful for searches, which was maybe a good thing in this case. The new title is more precise for the question, but still generic. Now we have a bumped question with a current date and a title that could seem to apply to different, current issues. So a currently irrelevant question that was previously buried, may now be wasting time for people who see an apparently current question and think it might be applicable to them. Not every improvement is really an improvement.

The question attracted 14 upvotes, 8 favorites, and almost 13K views. There is an accepted answer that attracted 18 upvotes. There has been recent activity. The question could use a little polish, but has no issues that prevented it from being useful. The title was awful, but the thread managed to be useful and attract a lot of readership despite it. This thread is a resource that appears to still be relevant, and just a title edit made it more useful.

• A canonical question. This is a site standard that will be frequently referenced. In this case, I would say that virtually any change that polishes it in any way is probably useful and benefits the site.

• An example at the other extreme: an ancient thread about a problem specific to one version of some long-obsolete software. Nobody uses the software anymore, the problem was fixed in a subsequent release, none of which is currently available. Maybe there's some historical value in case some hobbyist is dabbling with it. It attracted several marginal answers that offer conflicting and mutually exclusive solutions, so even if someone is interested in the question, the thread isn't a good resource. Even at the height of the question's currency, it attracted little general interest. It has been harmlessly buried on the site for years.

  We could talk about potentially deleting it, but that's a different matter. For this hypothetical example. maybe that would happen later, or maybe a decision is made to leave it alone. But in this example, we have a new user who figured out that he can run a site search on a common misspelling or slang term to identify a bunch of easy edits. This long-dead question was in the list and he has proposed an edit to fix that trivial issue.

• How old is the question and when is the last time it had any activity?

  Note that age is not a criterion, only an indicator in the sense that the older a question is, the more likely it is to have age-related factors that might make it currently irrelevant. Old just means look closer.

• Is it still relevant (is the software or hardware still in use; are answers applicable to current versions if it is; etc.)?

• How useful was it when the question was fresh (votes, views, favorites, comments)?

  If a question attracts little interest when it's fresh, it's rare to attract a lot more interest or usage when it's old. But if the subject matter is still relevant, look at whether the reason it might have attracted little attention was due to problems that can be fixed with an edit.

• Are the answers useful and consistent or did it attract a motley collection of low-quality or conflicting answers?

  If the question is unlikely to attract new answers, and the existing ones aren't useful, what's the sense in making the question easier to find?

• To what extent could the question use improvement and how much of the obvious improvements does the edit accomplish?

  If the question needs a lot of work but the edit fixes only one item of low-hanging fruit, the editor should be encouraged to do a more thorough job. That encouragement, or lack thereof, will affect the quality of their future edits.

• Does the edit improve the question's utility?

  • Might the edit attract new answers?

  • Does the edit make it a better resource if the information is "timeless"?

Consider that the question was specific to the OP and the thread wouldn't generally be helpful to other users today. The original title wasn't helpful for searches, which was maybe a good thing in this case. The new title is more precise for the question, but still generic. Now we have a bumped question with a current date and a title that could seem to apply to different, current issues. So a currently irrelevant question that was previously buried, may now be wasting time for people who see an apparently current question and think it might be applicable to them. Not every improvement is necessarily an improvement.

The question attracted 14 upvotes, 8 favorites, and almost 13K views. There is an accepted answer that attracted 18 upvotes. There has been recent activity. The question could use a little polish, but has no issues that prevented it from being useful. The title was awful, but the thread managed to be useful and attract a lot of readership despite it. This thread is a resource that appears to still be relevant, and just a title edit made it more useful.

###Bottom line

There is a reason why users are required to reach a certain rep level before making unreviewed edits and reviewing other edits. Reviewers are expected to exercise their own judgement on each proposed edit based on the standards and norms learned on the way to reaching that rep. There are differences in philosophy and opinion on most matters. That's why reviews, and voting on things like post status, are based on multiple users. If there were simple, hard and fast rules that applied universally, that wouldn't be necessary; any single user reaching the rep threshold could determine compliance.

Rather than automatically accepting every edit that doesn't appear to harm the post, or automatically rejecting every edit that doesn't attain some abstract objective, it's more important to consider the context of each post and the merits of each edit. Then apply your judgement as to whether you think it is an improvement. Many cases are "you know it when you see it", and opinions will vary.