@Ramhound Yes, this is true, but it is probably not in the best interest of a healthy community (it likely contributes to the reason why SE has the reputation it has). As part of a chat session, however, where you spend your time helping someone in depth, it is customary and acceptable (and often appreciated!) for the recipient of the help to say thank you (I always do). And upvoting helpful answers (and questions) is certainly desirable as well. I'm interested in a few of your thoughts on the topic... would you perhaps be open to a short chat in the near future?

@harrymc Perhaps sometimes. But often it's experienced community members that show the least gratitude. I've had community members pull me into chat and ask all sorts of questions, and after spending my time helping them, they offer not even a simple courteous "thank you for your time". If they know how to ask detailed questions in chat, I imagine they know how to type "thank you" in chat. :)

Gratitude is something seriously lacking by some Super User community members. I've spent over a half hour of my time (via answers, comments, and chat) helping some community members, and they don't even offer a simple "thank you" in response. Sometimes, even after they say the answer solved their issue, they don't even take 1 second to click the upvote button, which takes zero effort. The result is that I tend not to spend my time posting many answers these days. I prefer to help people who appreciate and value the time and energy expended by those of us who provide help.

@u1686_grawity What prompted my question is the large number of questions improperly getting flagged as hardware recommendations. I wasn't sure if my understanding of a hardware recommendation was incorrect, or the flags. It appears it is the flags.

@JourneymanGeek I wholeheartedly agree... they aren't fantastic questions, but questions asked by people seeking help nonetheless. Perhaps the real meta question is "why do we get a fair number of these questions". Unfamiliarity with manuals? Where to find them? How to read them? Not knowing what type of information is contained within them? Laziness? Loneliness?

@Mokubai Yes, I'm just using this as an example (the actual question actually had other issues, so I didn't link to it because I didn't want it to get picked apart here). For this type of simple question, I like your idea regarding helping them figure this out in general (by linking to the relevant SU Q/A). But does that then mean it's a duplicate? Hmmm... I lean towards "yes", but need to give it some thought. Feel free to write an answer.