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Is there any way we can tweak the wording of the off-topic reason used in this question (and other similar ones)?

In particular:

This question appears to be off-topic because it is unlikely to help anybody else

seems like a non sequitur to me, and I think it might confuse users.

My rep isn't high enough to see the close options on this site, but I would suggest something like:

Questions that are specific to one website are discouraged because they are unlikely to help future visitors. Examples include individual website reviews for SEO purposes and general website troubleshooting.

I'm also not sure how the author of this particular question would be able to improve it to make it suitable. Perhaps it would be beneficial to have a community wiki "how can I diagnose problems with my website's loading speed?" question that we could point them to instead.

(As an aside, I wish the "too localised" close reason still existed. I can kind of see why it was dropped from Stack Overflow, but on this site I think it's a much better fit than "off topic" for questions like this.)

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  • I concur. I think I voted for "too broad" however because it didn't seem specific enough and would likely invite speculative answers.
    – dan Mod
    Commented Aug 18, 2013 at 18:35

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Reset to default
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First off thanks for spending the time to feedback information that you believe can help us improve the experience for everyone.

So you would like us to consider changing

This question appears to be off-topic because it is unlikely to help anybody else. Examples include individual website reviews for SEO purposes and general website troubleshooting

to

Questions that are specific to one website are discouraged because they are unlikely to help future visitors. Examples include individual website reviews for SEO purposes and general website troubleshooting.

I think both messages tell the same story though your wording may be better and I'm sure the rest of the moderators will take a look at see if anything can be done to improve it, if required.

In response of the too localised I believe this reason had many problems with it, and the change came from the guys in black on the top floor of stack exchange. I believe the problems is that people with not so good English didn't understand. Hopefully John or Daniel will have their 2 cents as they have been moderators when I was still in nappies.

But again, thanks for forwarding suggestions to the team regardless of what we decide.

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  • I think this wording is better than what we have now.
    – Stephen Ostermiller Mod
    Commented Aug 19, 2013 at 1:44
  • Upon reflection, I think "Topics that are specific to one website..." would be better than "Questions that are specific to one website...". There are plenty of questions about a specific website that would still be on-topic.
    – Tim Fountain
    Commented Aug 19, 2013 at 11:34
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    I'm also leaning to "Issues that are specific to only one website", which narrows it a bit more. It's closer to what we actually don't want, which is 'fix my site'.
    – Tim Post
    Commented Aug 19, 2013 at 13:03
  • Yes, that's better I think.
    – Tim Fountain
    Commented Aug 19, 2013 at 14:56
  • Agreed that the concept is good but the wording can be better. I like the proposed change and if all are in agreement that one of us can change it shortly.
    – John Conde Mod
    Commented Aug 19, 2013 at 19:12
  • I added this to the list of close reasons but it needs another moderator to approve it (and then the old reason can be de-activated).
    – Stephen Ostermiller Mod
    Commented Sep 5, 2013 at 19:09

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