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I flagged a comment as obsolete, as it asked a question on a post of mine, which I edited the post to address, and the asker accepted the answer (thus indicating that he accepted my response, I assume). So the original comment is now obsolete. However, there is another comment responding to that comment, which responds differently than how I dealt with it in my post, which will lose it's context if the original comment is deleted.

Should the original comment be removed, and with or without the follow-up?

(All this is in the context of the knowledge that the people at SE see comments as second class / temporary entities.)

In case they still exist, see them here.

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  • 2
    +1, great question, and one I've often wondered about, myself.
    – msh210 Mod
    Sep 30, 2014 at 19:47

1 Answer 1

Reset to default
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I think the comments have to go. They don't help the post (but rather, the old post), so they go.

That said, if the information is valuable then we should try to save it somehow. This could mean:

  • editing it into the post as an alternative (with attribution, I suppose)

  • making it its own answer

  • asking and self answering another question

  • posting it into chat or as an edit-description

or something else. Every case though is different as will be the best way to proceed.

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  • My one critique would be on the edit-description suggestion, as that would be effectively banishing it into oblivion for the practical purposes of most users. Unless that is your aim.
    – Y     e     z
    Oct 14, 2014 at 2:36

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