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We currently have three off-topic reasons:

  1. Requests for illegal materials
  2. Reading recommendations
  3. Unannounced future events

I feel that all three are reasonably used today, and I've noticed another trend which isn't completely new, but I start noticing it more and more.

I propose a fourth off-topic close reason,

  1. This identification request contains too little detail to be answered. Please refer to these guidelines and add more details to your question.

I know this falls under the subset of "Unclear", but I think a close reason specifically for that, with the appropriate links and explanations is a good idea. It's not always clear to users what we expect of them in these types of questions.

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3

You make a good case for this, and have done well with the existing off-topic reasons - go ahead and add a fourth.

6

Yes, I completely agree with this proposal. I've often felt uncomfortable closing id requests with too little detail for the reason "Unclear what you're asking", because I don't think it's unclear at all—they want to know what this anime they remember is. The unclear part is how anyone is supposed to recognize it with the amount of detail provided, but that's not the same as being unclear on what the actual question is.

For a while I was giving "Too broad" as a reason to close these kinds of questions. That made more sense to me for a lot of these, because with the lack of detail, the description could apply to a huge number of shows. There was one question asking for a show where the characters put up barriers before a battle to contain the damage; a bunch of us chimed in with comments saying "Nanoha!" "X!" "Shakugan no Shana!" until one of us randomly stumbled on the answer; when three such different shows are all plausible answers to a question, it seems pretty broad to me. But that does misinterpret the meaning of "too broad", and the community rallied behind "unclear" in any case, which, as I said, doesn't seem quite right either. A new close reason would solve this, and also help new users by giving them something to search for on meta or in the help center when no one bothers to leave an explanatory comment.

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