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This question is not constructive (and has been closed to that effect) and is not particularly useful, sets a bad network precedent, has no useful tags (the reason this question even came on my radar to be pondered) and is unlikely to ever be rehabilitated, given the number of answers.

I don't have delete powers on Stack Overflow, and so can't see if it has delete votes, but given the upvotes and views, I'm willing to believe it would take intervention to reasonably be deleted. I'm told it needs four more delete votes.

Therefore: Meta, should this Question be deleted (or locked), or is it worth keeping around?

share|improve this question
2  
Reminder: delete votes have been capped at 10 now - so no more "impossible to delete without moderator intervention" questions. This one isn't even at the cap though; at this point, it would take only 6 more votes to dispatch it. So discuss "keep for historical reasons" vs. "let the community delete it if they wish". – Shog9 Mar 14 '12 at 15:53
    
I was not aware of that. Thanks for the update @Shog9. Additionally, I can't VtD so it doesn't really matter for me there, but there should be enough Stack Overflow 10k coming by they could as a community choose to delete it. – jcolebrand Mar 14 '12 at 16:06

I have to disagree with Adam's response in giving this question a historical lock.

From the question (emphasis mine):

This question is not constructive (and has been closed to that effect) and is not particularly useful, sets a bad network precedent, has no useful tags (the reason this question even came on my radar to be pondered) and is unlikely to ever be rehabilitated, given the number of answers.

Note the highlighted sections:

  • Not particularly useful - This is true, and it shows, with less than 2K views in three years, if it was useful, then the view (and vote) count would be much higher.
  • Sets a bad network precedent - While the historical lock says outright that these questions are a bad example for the network, we need to be sure not to have too many, otherwise, we contradict ourselves and the lock reason becomes ineffective in warding off similar questions. The lock should only be applied to the truly exceptional cases and by the first point, this is not one of them, IMO.
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1  
I'd agree more with this answer if that archive was up....I do hate removing non-spam content – Adam Rackis Mar 14 '12 at 16:02
1  
HAHAHA - that question is tagged vague - those were some crazy times in SO's history – Adam Rackis Mar 14 '12 at 16:03
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Here you go casper, a chance to catch me in the meaningless rep rat race: meta.stackexchange.com/questions/125618/burninate-the-vague-tag (downvote wasn't me) – Adam Rackis Mar 14 '12 at 16:07
1  
There he goes, there goes speed racer .... – Tim Post Mar 15 '12 at 12:03

This question has no place on Stack Overflow proper for the reasons you list. So why not give the cool new locked question feature a chance to shine?

Instead of breaking links with a deletion, can we lock this question and put an historical notice on it?

share|improve this answer
3  
Locked is highly valid. I didn't really consider that. I'm gonna edit the Q to that extent. – jcolebrand Mar 14 '12 at 15:46
2  
This is how you did it... Ok, time to find some useless meta post to answer, maybe this one. – casperOne Mar 14 '12 at 15:54
    
@casper - send the link so I can downvote it... – Adam Rackis Mar 14 '12 at 15:55
    
Just answered here - Mutually assured downvoting? – casperOne Mar 14 '12 at 15:59
    
@casperOne - agree. MAD – Adam Rackis Mar 14 '12 at 16:01
3  
Why would you lock it, if it doesn't belong here? Make a case that the content is too valuable to delete. Respectfully, preserving links is not a compelling reason to frame junk (if it is junk). – Robert Harvey Mar 14 '12 at 16:03
1  
@Robert, correct me if I'm wrong, but locked stuff by definition doesn't belong here. It's old content that's no longer on topic, isn't it? like this – Adam Rackis Mar 14 '12 at 16:05
    
@RobertHarvey I asked because I don't know, but my first suggestion was straight up deletion. – jcolebrand Mar 14 '12 at 16:05
    
@AdamRackis: Questions are locked because people find them valuable, despite their off-topicness. Unlike fine wine, aging doesn't make a question better; some questions are so uninteresting that they don't get the necessary views for close or deletion. – Robert Harvey Mar 14 '12 at 16:08
    
@Robert - well I find wine gross, but I think I still get your point; this is definitely a borderline case. I prefer to keep non-spam content, but I won't cry much if this one gets deleted. – Adam Rackis Mar 14 '12 at 16:09
    
+1 for historical lock: it doesn't do any harm to keep historically-locked questions around now that they're no longer polluting the question lists. Broken windows are harmless if people rarely see them. – Jeremy Banks Mar 14 '12 at 16:24
1  
@JeremyBanks: Why not let the community decide, with their delete votes (or abstention)? – Robert Harvey Mar 14 '12 at 16:28
1  
@RobertHarvey Without the historical status it's still listed on the site. Like the people who advocate deletion, I agree that we don't want that. If we could vote to lock as historic I'd do it. – Jeremy Banks Mar 14 '12 at 16:33
    
Instead of breaking what links? It's linked by one duplicate on SO. Both of them have fairly low views, and a Google search for the URL doesn't turn up anything notable (just a few sites that scrape content). Nothing of value will really be lost if this question gets deleted. – Bill the Lizard Mar 14 '12 at 17:49
    
@Bill - I just assumed there might be some links to it. This question is extremely mediocre, so I won't cry if it gets deleted. I just prefer to lock it and stick it in the attic where it's not hurting anyone. But that's just me. – Adam Rackis Mar 14 '12 at 17:51

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