This response is honestly part of the problem though. I understand not wanting many duplicate questions, and wanting a well written question/response style. How

This response is honestly part of the problem though. I understand not wanting many duplicate questions, and wanting a well written question/response style. However, different people approach differently problems differently. For every person who asks a question there are likely several others who didnt bother to post or were intimidated by the requirements to even get involved in SO. It seems like it’s been gamified to the point that it excludes newcomers. A newcomer shouldn’t have to know the subtleties of the guidelines. When I go to the library and ask the librarian a question they don’t reprimand me for the formulation of my question. They don’t refer me to the weekly research/reference class (which is great by the way). They try to help me find what I’m looking for. Sometimes I find questions on SO through google that are dupes, but if it weren’t for that dupe I may never have found the original with the search terms that I used. This isn’t to say that SO’s rules are wrong, I just believe that there are those who are more concerned with the decorum than the functionality. Unfortunately it feels like those users outnumber the functional ones.