The key principle underlying our policy on collapsing is that people should make a page more helpful for people who are interested in the question.
Given this principle, Quora may collapse answers for the following reasons:
- Doesn't answer the question. The answer should respond to the question asked. The answer should not misinterpret the language of the question and/or respond to a different question. It is OK if an answer challenges an important premise in the question instead of directly answering the question, as long as the answer clearly makes the page more helpful (and includes meaningful explanation) for people who are interested in learning the answer to the question.
- Is a joke. Answers that are jokes generally make the page less helpful. Humorous answers are allowed if they make the page more helpful to someone who is sincerely interested in learning the answer to the question; otherwise, they are not. To be considered helpful, a humorous answer should include a meaningful explanation. Answers to survey questions are subject to these rules. Survey question answers will be treated as joke answers if (1) they are not plausible given the conditions described in the question and/or (2) they appear to be primarily intended as a joke. An answer may be collapsed as a joke answer if it violates Quora's rules against meme pictures and humorous images in answers. Joke answers with more than 50 upvotes require the consensus of at least three moderators before being collapsed.
- Violates Quora's images policy. Image-only and video-only answers, and answers that contain Meme images are not allowed on Quora. Answers are not allowed which: (1) include a meme picture and/or (2) are short and include a humorous image or video that isn't very helpful to someone interested in learning the answer to the question, or (3) include only an image.
- Should be a comment. A response to another answer on the page should be moved to the comment section of that answer. Clarification or commentary about the question should be moved to the question comments.
- Needs to be in English. Quora is English-only for now so that most users will be able to find and understand its contents.
- Relevant affiliations need to be disclosed. To help people interpret the views expressed in this answer, any relevant affiliations should be included in the answer text or the author's bio. For example, if a user writes an answer about his own company or product, the answer (or topic-specific bio) should make clear the user's affiliation with the company. This disclosure can be brief and does not need to be set off separately, as long as it is clear. A relevant affiliation is any involvement that a reasonable observer would think is important for interpreting the views that the user expresses in an answer.
- Other / Needs improvement. Examples include: (1) being unintelligible or having severe problems with grammar or spelling; (2) not being a sincere attempt to make the page a better resource for someone who wants to know the answer to the question; (3) no longer being relevant; or violating other policies and guidelines such as the Be Nice, Be Respectful policy.
- Very bad formatting. Answers with very poor formatting are not allowed and will be collapsed. Very poor formatting distracts from the content of the answer on the page. This is likely a result of one or more of the following problems: (1) Poor use of spacing or paragraph breaks; Bad spelling, capitalization, or grammar; (3) Use of "text-speak"-style language; (4) Poor use of formatting tools such as boldface, italics, etc. Answers will not be collapsed for a small number of formatting issues. To have a badly formatted answer uncollapsed, the edited answer needs to be clearly well-formatted.
Note
- Answers that say "We don't know" / "We can't know" ("WDK/WCK") are allowed on Quora under certain conditions, but there is a presumption against such answers. Such answers are allowed if all of the following is true: (1) it is clearly plausible that the question can't be answered, even by someone knowledgeable about the topic, (2) the answer includes significant and meaningful explanation for why WDK/WCK is the right answer, resulting in the answer becoming a clearly helpful and reusable resource, and (3) the answer is clearly not aimed at being jokey. Note: in deciding whether a WDK / WCK answer is helpful, Quora Moderation will give more leeway to people with clear subject matter expertise.