Please don't migrate obviously off-topic questions to ELL - it just makes things harder on the author

Question

This isn't a complaint about the overall migration of questions from EL&U. I think taken as a whole, the migration path is a positive thing. I have started to see a few real stinkers getting migrated though, so I want to do a little level setting.

While the proposed duplicate is closely related, this is a discussion and not something that has an answer. I'm not sure what purpose would be served by closing this as a duplicate of a far older question. Folks come and go from both sites and I think it is worthwhile to revisit the migration path every so often.

There is new information here that isn't in the previous post, and my message isn't "don't migrate garbage". I think that the folks that are migrating these questions are trying to help the author. I am trying to explain why migrating an off-topic question might not be the best way to do that.

When I wrote this post, I had just rejected migration of a question with this as entire content of that question:

is " Which cities did you go to?" a correct question?

Thank you.

Proof-reading is off-topic on ELL, just like EL&U. Migrating this question doesn't help the author of it. It just makes things more confusing because we can't put it on hold while we help the author bring it on-topic. When you see learners, feel free to send them our way with a comment, but please don't migrate one line "is this correct?" questions. They're problematic for two reasons - there isn't enough detail to understand why the author is unsure about the sentence's correctness, and they're of limited usefulness for future visitors.

The migration makes the ELL "on-boarding" process a little tricky because users don't automatically get an ELL account created. Often they end up creating a second account and then they get confused because they can't edit their question or comment on anything. It's not a good experience. If the question is OK to start with, most of the time the "on-boarding" goes a lot more smoothly.

If you're curious about which migrated questions are well-received and which aren't, here is a SEDE query that let's you examine migrated in a score range starting from a particular date. The default date of 09/22/2015 is when the migration path opened between EL&U and ELL (before that questions were migrated by moderators). Keep in mind that many of the really poor migrations won't show up in that query, because they've been rejected and roomba'ed by now.

This migrated question, for example, was well-received by the ELL community:

Does 'yield' still agree with 'the subject' in 'measures can be undertaken that yield/s positive outcomes?

It has a good amount of detail and is about something of interest to many learners. On ELL, enough context/explanation of what is confusing can make up for a lack of research. Ideally, questions would have both context and some demonstrated attempt at research (i.e. not just the statement "I googled and couldn't find anything"), but we can get by if they have one or the other. If a question has neither, please don't migrate it.

We've also started a community wiki answer on ELL's meta with links to a few questions that we think are good examples of questions with enough detail with the hope that illustrations of "good detail" will be more informative than trying to come up with a documented comprehensive guideline.

Answer 1

I personally try to whip questions that might be well received on ELL into shape by editing the post; fixing typos, tags, and maybe even their titles. If we all did something to make an ELL candidate question at least look presentable that would help enormously.

Proofreading questions should never be migrated. Bad questions or questions whose answers can be found in a dictionary should be closed for... lack of research. Yes, sometimes that reason is the "best" reason for putting a new question on hold. They should not be dumped at ELL. If a duplicate can be found, even better.

Unfortunately, good questions that are better suited to ELL tend to attract upvotes and answers on EL&U. Which leaves me to urge the mods to migrate good learners' questions faster, but only after some makeup has been applied and a proper pair of shoes have been provided.

Answer 2

When I vote to migrate, I am, quite literally, posting a new question on the new site. I have a duty to meet a site's posting guidelines whenever I post to it. Therefore I vote to migrate ONLY when I am reasonably sure the question meets the new site's posting guidelines and will stay open on the new site.

To put it another way, there's no point in migrating a question that will simply be closed on the new site and get bounced back to us.

To put it still another way, I avoid using migrate votes as a substitute for guiding the user to the best site for their question.

For example, when someone asks for writing advice, I have in the past closed the question off topic and left a comment with some guidance, such as:

For writing advice, take a look at these other Stack Exchange sites, depending on the context of your question: [academia.se], [writers.se], [literature.se], [workplace.se], [interpersonal.se]. If you are learning English, take a look at [ell.se]. If you want to try another site, ask for migration, or else delete here before re-asking the question on the other site. Also check out “Where can I ask for free proofreading? – Meta”.

Answer 3

I have to say that I'm guilty of answering some of these questions, simply because I forgot about the existence of ELL.

Obviously, the people who ask these questions are learners and non-native English speakers, so could (I feel) benefit from a little more help.

Leaving comments such as

Don't anyone dare suggest migrating this question to ELL.

Sends a negative and confusing message to the asker (especially when ELL might be confused with HELL).

The high-rep users who administer this stack are by definition (I'd hope) excellent English writers. It shouldn't be too difficult to set up some form of standard text that politely and clearly communicates the existence of the ELL stack and how they should go about getting their question answered.

Or maybe including this advice into a new VTC reason might accomplish this goal.

Answer 4

Part of the problem would seem to be the mere fact that migration is being treated as a flavor of closure. Why not promote migration as an option out of it's current position buried four levels down in the close tree, to a position of equal standing on the share/edit/close/flag list that appears under the question? That would go a long way to prevent the current 'fire and forget' situation of it being the final click of the task. If 'migrate' was one of the click 1 options, there would be ample opportunity to prompt the migrater to address the concerns of the target site.

Possible advantages -

1. Scoring can be kept separate from close votes.
2. Privilege can be separately managed. Perhaps it should be restricted to those who are registered on the target site, or else those not registered get to jump through a few more hoops. A separate reputation trigger is possible.
3. Get rid of the built in condescension, ie., it's not good enough for us but maybe it's good enough for them. That's not the right approach, but I feel that is what is being conditioned.

Edit: This is now made a separate meta, titled "Split migration off from the closure tree?"