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I recently posted this question: Disable advertisements on Skype?

Since then, it's received four off topic close votes. Why are they voting this as off topic? It's within the scope of the site as defined by the help center, but others seem to believe otherwise. One even flagged it as belongs on WebApps, as ludicrous as that is. Is this just a case of bad flagging?

Edit: To clarify, three votes claim the question is not within the scope defined by the help center, one claims it is off topic and belongs on WebApps. I fail to see how any of these are correct (especially considering the volume of Skype related questions on Superuser).

Edit 2: If this question: How to disable the skype ads (advertisement)? is valid, why is mine not? If it is a duplicate, it needs to be flagged as one. I would, personally, say it is not a duplicate as I have already tested all the solutions in the answer section and none yielded results.

Edit 3: It's been reopened. Thank you to those that voted to reopen. I'd still love an answer if there is one to be had. Perhaps it can help improve my flagging skills if there is something truly wrong with the question I posted.

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  • 2
    And now it's on hold with little to no explanation why. Can someone please explain this to me? Nov 18, 2013 at 13:29
  • 1
    Clearly, the Powers That Be don't like you. Change username and avatar. Nov 18, 2013 at 13:46
  • 3
    Reopened. And I wasn't the only one, three others voted before me.
    – Daniel Beck Mod
    Nov 18, 2013 at 14:18
  • Skype is not a web-app, so it would be inappropriate to migrate to Web Applications.
    – ale
    Nov 18, 2013 at 16:54
  • @AlEverett Yes, well, I assumed that. Still fails to explain why my question was so hastily flagged down by five users. Nov 18, 2013 at 16:58
  • 4
    It appears to me that flagging is especially hasty on superuser, and flaggers almost never care to explain their actions.
    – A. Donda
    Nov 18, 2013 at 18:43
  • 1
    An identical question not having your desired answer does not merit posting a duplicate of that question. Nov 18, 2013 at 18:59
  • 4
    @OliverSalzburg Actually, the question I linked is similar, but unrelated as it addresses a different group of ads in Skype that can easily be disabled from the settings. Nov 18, 2013 at 19:02

2 Answers 2

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People make mistakes and add the initial close vote.

Other people see that mistake and think that the first people were right and add more close votes.

If you get this situation there are several things you can do.

If the post has already been closed:

  1. Make an edit to the question. This will automatically add it to the reopen queue where the closure can be reviewed.
  2. Go to the site's chat room and see if you can find enough people who agree with you to vote to reopen.
  3. Raise a question on the site's meta site (which is what you did here).
  4. Flag the question for moderator attention - on high traffic sites this shouldn't be necessary and adds to the moderator workload, but on lower traffic sites it might be the only way to get the post reopened.

If the post hasn't been closed yet then your only option is to flag it for moderator attention, but before you do consider whether you can wait for it to be closed and then reopened "naturally". In this case the moderator can close and then reopen the question immediately if they think that's the best thing to do. NOTE: They are not obliged to do this.

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The question spends 95% of its text explaining one possible solution to the problem. The sole description of the problem is one word, "issues". There is not even an attempt to explain what those issuer are. I would, and did, vote to close the question as "unclear what you're asking".

How can we help you fix issues when we have no idea what those issues are?!

Maybe someone reading that question experienced the exact same issues and has a great solution. But how would they know?

It's a classic example of an XY question, where there's enormous discussion of one possible solution to a problem but no discussion whatsoever of what the problem is.

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