Should we encourage consolidation of similar answers?

Question

For example, [YYYY].[MM].[DD].[hh][mm] vs. [major].[minor].[revision]

In particular, I'm referring to a "burst" of answers submitted within a few minutes or so, when the question has just been asked within the hour and appeared on everyone's screen.

Normally, this is less likely to happen on questions which require thoughtful answers, because the time taken to prepare an answer will make it less likely for a "burst" to happen.

Should we shorten the time interval for checking "Another answer has been submitted, click to refresh" especially when answers are short?

Answer 1

When something like this happens, it's an indication that there's generally something wrong with the question. Good questions, at least on Programmers.SE, shouldn't be so easy to answer that they'll suffer the "fastest gun in the west" problem as we have general guidelines in place that insist questions invite long, detailed, and thoughtful answers.

In this specific case, it so happens that the question in practice covers identical ground as an earlier question, so I've closed it as a duplicate.