The Social section does include both serious answers and the other kind.

It is not about being limited at all. You as the user are in full control.
The location of your question determines the type of answers you want.

Lets say your cat is sick and you want to know more information. In this situation you likely want serious responses over unhelpful ones such as “Get a new cat”
The General area is where you might want to post because the guidelines do not allow for off topic or unhelpful responses.

If you want a lot of responses and do not mind if users do a bit of chatting then Social is where you want to post.

So really it is about the variety of responses you are interested in getting. If you just want a straight answer or discussion that remains focused on topic or a casual conversation.

Great question.

I don’t see why you shouldn’t be able to put into more than one category. You would however, have separate unique answer sets predicated upon which tab was utilized to access the question. See ya….Gary/wtf

I think the only difference in the answers would be the more relaxed answers in social. I think if you placed the question in social and said you wanted serious and fun answers (as some people have) you would get the same answers as if it was in both places.

Write the site owners. I agree, the separation serves no real purpose.

@perspicacious I disagree. I think it serves a good purpose and it gives people the choice of which kind of answers their questions receive. I know a few people that didn’t like the fact that their questions weren’t taken seriously when that is what they were hoping for when they posted them. Now, there is a way to post a serious question and know that it will get serious answers. Or, if you want more laid back chat with your answer, you can post it in social. I think it serves a major purpose by giving users a choice.

I’ve been annoyed a couple of times when I wanted some serious answers and people started joking by third or fourth answer. That would usually be it for your thread.

@Dog

You stated that the question asker is in full control of which section their question gets put.

That’s not entirely correct. At least not based upon actual experience. If a mod decides it’s in the wrong section, you’re SOL from what I can tell.

There was a recent Q posted where someone was seeking naming suggestions for a new cat.

It made perfect sense to me that it was in General since it was clear they didn’t want jokey or off the wall responses.

However, it was yanked and not allowed back on for the longest time (thus effectively derailing it) until I made a semi-stink about it as I couldn’t for the life of me figure out WHY it was yanked.

The explanation was that it belonged in the Social section.
I’ve read through the guidelines and aside from some generalized descriptions about the sections, there is NOTHING that would indicate that such a Q was somehow inappropriate for General. Nothing at all. According to the guidelines, placement is determined by the asker according to the type of ANSWERS desired, not the content of the Q.

What if the asked didn’t want a bunch of off topic nonsense but wanted actual workable name suggestions ? Evidently they aren’t allowed that judgement of their own because someone else had the opinion it must go in Social.

Simply for guessing wrong at where to put it, this Q was yanked. Not moved to another section, yanked completely.

So, in reality, you can decide where to put your Q as long as you’re prepared to get it yanked if a mod disagrees with your placement. If you guess wrong, tough luck.

I have seen far more less serious Q than that one in General. The one which springs to mind is “Why do Rice Krispies go snap crackle and pop? I’m sure there are plenty more.

So, the person is hardly in full control. And because criteria are not clearly spelled out, it’s basically a crapshoot as to whether you can guess where to put your question.

As long as you’re willing to gamble, then you can have the illusion of full control.

I have yet to see a Q get kicked out of Social, so that’s how I’ve solved the guessing game for myself.

But, with all due respect, telling people they’re in full control is a bit disingenuous. It clearly conflicts with the reality of what is ACTUALLY DONE.

I’m not saying that the powers that be don’t have the right to do as they please. But just be upfront about it.

You’ll get both serious and less serious answers in Social, so it is pretty much like posting in both places anyway.

@Buttonstc The member is in full control of the type of question they ask. If you want strictly serious answers, you generally write a serious question. In your example, a question title like “Name suggestions for my new kitty!” is less likely to get serious responses than, say, “Can you suggest some cool, elegant and/or cosmic type names for my new cat?”. In fact, of the first five answers the “kitty” question received, three of them were jokes. That’s why it was better suited for Social. And some questions are never suitable for General. Simple polls, for instance.

The Rice Krispies question was a serious effort to understand the reason they make noise.

By the way, the Kitty question was not “yanked completely”. It was returned to the member to either edit it or put it in the social section. It was eventually put back up in the social section, but not because you raised a stink about it. You’ll have to remember that the system was new to everyone (even the mods) at that time, and took some getting used to.

All that said, I do think the guidelines could use some refining. It’s a process.

If you sharpen a pencil too much, you end up with no pencil.

@gailcalled GA

Hmm. Good question. If only you knew one of the site founders so you could ask them…

@gailcalled- And if you try and sharpen a pen you end up with a busted sharpener.

Post in both places. Post in general, then reword your question a few days later and post in social. There is no rule against that.

BTW I don’t think their programming is set up to do A and B or A and B and C, I think it is just set up to do A or B

@AstroChuck: I must be slow-witted tonight. I didn’t get the joke.

@anartist Actually, we’d count that as a duplicate question unless it was reworded so much as to not really be the same question at all.

@gailcalled, if it is my pencil, it should be my choice how much I’d like to sharpen or not sharpen it.

@breedmitch,...nice really nice.