A lot of our questions (Especially HNQ questions) seem to get a lot of answers that repeat what others have said before, albeit with a different context. A good example is this question.
There are a few answers on there that seem to not help expand out the information further than that has already been posted. Does this matter? Should we do something about these? Do we care? Do we always want to have as many different points of view even if they are treading the same ground?
You have an XY Problem here. The most common cause of this symptom is the HNQ, which has spread across StackExchange but it affects "subjective" sites like Workplace more severely. The problem results from a number of positive feedback loops, as explained below:
HNQ → more views → more answers → HNQ → ...
When a question gets to HNQ, there is an exponential rise in number of views, which also leads to an increase in the number of answers. This sustains the "hotness" of the question and keeps it in the HNQ longer.
Advice question → HNQ → anyone can answer → more answers → HNQ → ...
Due to Bike Shed Effect, also known as Parkinson's Law of Triviality, everyone and his/her grandmother can give you advice on something. This is seen more commonly on a "subjective" site like The Workplace, as against ServerFault or StackOverflow.
When an advice-seeking question gets to HNQ, people find it easy to jump on the answering bandwagon. By contrast, some of the more "difficult" questions, such as those that require a thorough understanding of workplace practices, generally survive this HNQ onslaught.
HNQ → more drive-by voting (with upvote bias) → more upvotes on question → HNQ → ...
Due to the association bonus, many of the drive-by voters can upvote but not downvote, which heavily skews the vote count. While details of the "hotness" algorithm are not publicly known, we can reasonably guess that vote count is a factor.
HNQ → more drive-by voting (with upvote bias) → more highly upvoted answers → HNQ → ...
As a corollary of the above point, votes on answers to HNQ question are also heavily skewed towards upvotes. Answer upvotes seems to also contribute to the "hotness" score, thus keeping the question longer in the HNQ.
Subjective question → HNQ → Lengthy answer → Less likely to be read fully → More answers → HNQ → ...
Answers to subjective questions generally include a few paragraphs of justification. The chances of people reading through and understanding every answer before posting their own answer is inversely proportional to the number and length of the answers.
Currently, a question gets knocked off the HNQ in only a limited number of ways, such as aging or getting superseded by an even "better" question. When a question has multiple positive feedback loops in its favour, that is woefully inadequate.
The example question you posted "benefited" from a number of these loops: highly subjective (that is, capable of receiving multiple "correct" answers), easy to understand (anyone could offer advice), and one which drive-by votes could relate to well.
Downvoting, flagging, etc. can cure the symptoms, but that is action taken after the trouble has already started. A better solution would be a preemptive strike on the disease, before the trouble starts.
Taking down the HNQ feature, or changing the "hotness" algorithm, is not an option because problems that don't affect StackOverflow are of lesser importance to StackExchange employees, and some of them find "entertainment" in them.
Workarounds involve breaking some of those positive feedback loops. Once a question makes it to HNQ:
Protect it automatically. This breaks loops 1, 2, 5.
Protect it from drive-by voting. This breaks loops 3, 4.
Alternative workarounds involve forcing the question off the HNQ. When the question makes it to HNQ:
Regular users vote to close it as early as possible, which knocks it off the HNQ. Reopen it later once things cool down. Repeat as often as necessary.
Regular users downvote it heavily. Once the question gets knocked off the HNQ, edit the question and change your vote. I don't like this one bit, as it is extremely unfair to the asker to lose so much reputation because his question was picked up by a flawed feature called HNQ. Nonetheless, I leave it here for completeness.
These are extreme measures, but extreme problems require extreme measures. The sooner you take measures, the more likely you are to succeed. :)
I see this a lot as well, usually from new users and very often on old questions. When posting, the user should see a prompt reminding them not to repeat any of the many previous answers. My standard response is to downvote, flag for deletion, and add the following comment, with the optional bit in brackets:
This answer does not add anything new to the previously posted answers. Please remember to not repeat others, [particularly when resurrecting a question that is 2 years old.]
On a related note, would there be support for adding a custom deletion reason for repeating existing answers?
It looks like this question generated some interesting discussion, particularly around the HNQ list. Unfortunately, it doesn't look like any of the answers directly address the heart of the question. Namely, what should we do when a user posts a duplicate answer?
We have talked a lot about what we believe are the causes, but there isn't a clear answer to "what action should we take?"
I answered a question earlier today, and about 30 minutes later an established user with a great deal of reputation posted his/her own answer that is an almost word for word duplicate.
Reading the comments from David's answer, one might conclude that flagging is the appropriate course of action, but is there community consensus around such a notion?
Management science is not a field where there is one right answer. Because of that, a lot of instruction takes the form of cases.
That would make me say that duplicate answers with different contexts are useful because they gauge consensus and illuminate different facets of an issue.
Allow duplicates and let the best ones float to the top.
