> if a question can be answered with a braindump, either from facts or from (highly agreeable) experience, and doesn't look like homework, it's probably a good fit of the site's model.
Hmm. It's probably my fault and not yours, but this clarified little for me. At least, it doesn't make me feel confident that if I have a question, I'd be able to tell if it's one that would get a reasonable response on SO.
Perhaps So would be better served if they separated out the "Q&A" from whatever entries they feel are worth being preserved, rather than combining the two.
Doing that might make interacting with SO less unpleasant or more helpful, and then the particular ones that fit SO's model can be copied to a separate reference section.
What I do know is that SO as it is puts an awful lot of people off, including experienced devs who might otherwise be willing to help answer questions.
So if a question can be answered with a braindump, either from facts or from (highly agreeable) experience, and doesn't look like homework, it's probably a good fit of the site's model. But if the question requires many rounds of conversations like many threads you see in a forum, it's definitely not going to end well.