I've been getting less and less comfortable with the way people have been considering nodes of late, so I thought I'd speak up. As far as I'm concerned, there are two good reasons to consider a node (modulo legal reasons, which almost never come up for real): retitling a poorly-named node and deleting a true duplicate.

Retitling Nodes

If you're going to consider a root node for a change of title, please suggest a better title. If you can't come up with something better, you probably shouldn't hit the "moderate" button.

I've found a couple of good discussions of "good" titles:

• Composing effective node titles
• How To Ask Questions The Smart Way by esr

Deleting True Dupes

If you're going to consider a duplicate for deletion, please make sure that:

• it's a real duplicate, and not just a similar node by the same person, perhaps rephrased slightly. Not everyone notices that they can edit SoPWs the first time they post, and deleting their "better" nodes isn't exactly a pleasant thing to do. (Not that I've noticed this happening all that much, but IMO deletion is a pretty extreme response to having "clutter" nodes floating around.)
• you post a link to the duplicated node. [id:// is your friend. Examining the duplicated node will also help you ensure that:
• the duplicated node hasn't already been considered.

Other Considerations

As far as I'm concerned, consideration is a heavyweight tool for content control, and should be used sparingly. Changing or obscuring the author's words is not something that I'm comfortable with under the best of circumstances (insert typical free-speech++ screed here). I think we're pretty conscious of the dangers, and whenever I vote "keep" on a "DELETE: violates community standards" consideration I see a lot of other "keep" votes.

I have no great problem with "move to (foo)" considerations, but I haven't seen any recently.

There are a number of great nodes on the subject:

• What is consideration?
• How do I use the power of consideration responsibly?
• Remember, before you consider, please, Please, PLEASE:
• On Responsible Considerations (thanks Enlil)
• Consideration overhaul?

Finally: If you're wondering whether or not to consider something, please don't. If you're wondering how to vote on a considered node, please don't vote. As far as I can tell, not considering a deserving node is much less harmful than considering an undeserving one.

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