Hello everyone!

Today we will be implementing a change to the submission rules, and will no longer be allowing questions which are asking for the specific instance of the 'First' or 'Last' iteration of a thing or phenomenon. These have been some of the most problematic questions that we get in this subreddit, and after some very lengthy discussion within the mod team, the decision has been made to add the following to our Rules Page:

No 'First'/'Last' Questions

Questions which specifically ask for the first or last known instance/example of an object/phenomenon/etc. will be removed. Past experience has shown these questions aren't well suited to /r/AskHistorians. Such questions often end up with speculative answers, either because the first simply wasn't recorded by history, or because answering the question requires historians to have detailed knowledge across numerous eras and specialties. Alternatively, if the question is answerable, it often doesn't lend itself to the detail and context we expect from answers on this subreddit. As such, these questions are banned.

We still welcome questions which ask about rises and falls in a general sense, so we request that users keep their questions focused on origins or declines. For example, a question such as "Who was the first person to kill someone else with a gun?" is a problematic one to answer - we may not even know the answer - but "What do we know about the early development and use of firearms?" covers the same ground, without the same issues.

For those who nevertheless are specifically looking for 'First'/'Last' answers, we do run a "Short Answers to Simple Questions" thread every other Wednesday where these questions are still allowed.

The wording of the rule should hopefully be somewhat self-explanatory as to its reason and application, but this is /r/AskHistorians, so we're going to break it down a little bit more for you below.

The most important thing to be aware of is that this rule will be applied fairly narrowly. The intent is to target a very specific class of questions which are quite ill-suited to the format of /r/AskHistorians. A question which, to use the example from above, asks "Who was the first person to kill someone else with a gun?" is going to be a problem whether there is a known answer or not. If we don't know, the threads quickly fill with speculative responses, or "The first one I know of" answers, which end up removed. If we do know - and this puts aside the additional issue of 'absolute' first versus 'first known' - the question can be answered in a mere sentence, i.e. "Liao Bao was the first person to be shot with a firearm, in 1257." But that simply creates more problems, as it comes in conflict with the rules and aim of the subreddit. An answer which would be allowed to stand would be one which at the very least provides background and context for his death. Taken together, this results in many threads which are the proverbial graveyard, and a disproportionate number which never receive an answer.

Generally speaking, our stated policy has always been to try and maintain a light touch with how questions are formulated and asked. As with the Example Seeking Rule, we do at times need to strike a balance when a specific type just becomes too troublesome - and that is what we are doing here. Our intention is not to entirely prevent these questions in a broader sense, but to ensure that they are better focused to comply with the format of the subreddit. As is made clear in the wording of the rule, and as will also be explained in the Removal Macro deployed in conjunction with enforcement, we want to encourage people to think about what the underlying topic of their question is, and strongly encourage people to resubmit the question to ask about the broader milieu. To return to the example, an answer to "What do we know about the early development and use of firearms?" would quite possibly include the answer to the original formulation if it is known, while certainly avoiding the speculation about that fact if it is not.

Conversely, when it comes to 'Last' questions, similar problems of course can crop up, but there is the additional issue of 'Fading out but not yet gone'. Something might have gone out of general use a long, long time ago, but still sees use in some limited form today, resulting in answers which blow past the 20 Year Rule. By having questions focus on 'Decline' instead of 'Last', it allows the questions to briefly touch on continued use to the present (which is allowable under the 20 Year Rule!) without entirely blowing by it and focusing solely on that (Which isn't!).

So in short, we want 'First'/'Last' questions to focus on the broader origins, development, declines, and falls which underpin what would make those examples the first or last of their kind, which in essence does nothing more than to bring these questions in-line with how they are moderated anyways. If you are having trouble asking a question in this way though, the mod team is always standing by to offer some advice, so don't hesitate to reach out.

Now that all being said, we realize that while some people ask these questions because, well, it can be hard to ask a question about a topic you don't know about, there are also people who ask these questions because that literally is all they really want to know. To be perfectly frank, those situations can be rather frustrating for the mods, and rather off-putting for the flairs. When the answer to the question is going to be the first result of putting the question title into Google, it leads to the feeling that little thought was put into asking the question, which in turn leads to the irony that the simplest questions are often the ones which go unanswered. Or put another way, "Who was the first President of the United States?" might have 50 comments all saying "George Washington" but they will all be removed, while "Why was George Washington elected as the first President of the USA?" might have only one comment, but it will be visible and explain why he became the president.

So we can't know why a given question is being asked like that, but while laziness is likely the answer for some, we'd like to believe that most of them are because while the question might be quite specific and not call for anything in-depth as a response, it being asked here is purposeful, as the user still wants more than whatever Google tells them. So to this end we are going to try to be accommodating, and if anything, actually make the subreddit a little more friendly towards these types of questions. In conjunction with the implementation of the rule, we are also going to be making the "Short Answers to Simple Questions" a more permanent feature. We ran this last month as a test run, and it worked reasonably well, as well as gave us some insight into the kinks we need to iron out. We're going to put it into the rotation of regular features, alternating on Wednesdays with the "What's New" feature, starting later this week on the 7th. The hope is to be able to provide a space for reliable answers to questions which otherwise wouldn't be a good fit for /r/AskHistorians, and not just 'First'/'Last', but also plenty of other questions about simple facts or figures.

So that is the sum of it. We're restricting specific questions about 'First'/'Last', and implementing a "Short Answers to Simple Questions" Feature to complement this rule. Our hope is that the two in conjunction will both improve the quality of threads in the subreddit, as well as increase the breadth of coverage that the subreddit offers. It is doubtful that every question you might have about this new rule has been covered, however, so if there is anything that remains unanswered after reading through here, please don't hesitate to ask here.