Why was this question deleted instead of closed?

Question

I've found this question and voted to close it.

For those who can't see deleted questions, here is the original text:

Which One is Best News Paper App?

Because there are so many newspaper apps available in the world. so, which one is best for reading newspapers

Although very low quality (software recommendation, too broad, opinion based ...) it seemed to me to be a honest question, which we generally close and not remove from the site by deleting it.

So I've written a comment to explain the issues and redirect OP to the help center. Just a few seconds after I've posted the comment, the question was deleted and locked by "Community" (according to my understanding, removed by a moderator).

Why was this question removed, instead of closed? How can I identify those in the future?

I've to note I agree with the deletion of this question. The purpose of my question is to better understand how low quality questions are managed and help preventing to waste my time writing useless comments.

Answer 1

There is evidence that this was posted as a seed for someone to spam their product at us. The format of the question is suspicious and follows a pattern that moderators are familiar with: a leading question that is blatantly off topic and far too vague.

There isn't much that distinguishes it from normal low quality software rec questions. It just feels like a seed to a mod.

There is little that you can do apart from what you had intended to do. You were doing exactly what you should have done in this case, the only difference is that a moderator looked into it at the same time.

Answer 2

It looks a lot like a spam seed to me. By deleting it quickly, it is taken out of circulation so the prospective spammer hopefully realises it's a waste of time.

It's fine to assume people have good intentions and comment. Don't worry about the occasional spammer we put out of our misery.

Answer 3

If the reason for closing questions is they can be re-opened in the future, once they've been improved, there needs to be some way a question can be improved.

This is at this most fundamental a software-rec question, even if it isn't spam. It's never going to be anything more without a major reworking of the question. Now, if the user wants to put that time/effort in then they can do, but it's no harder to ask a new question (which would come without the negative rep a software-rec question may of already gained) than it is to edit this one.