I like receiving links to previous questions that are relevant, I do think that if the comment is solely a link to a past askhistorians thread there should be some amount of original thought added to the comment. It's incredibly frustrating to find comments like this as the top comment in a thread. Nothing is being added, there is no commentary it's pure link. If this was any other source it would be moderated out for being an answer that consists solely of a link.
Per r/askhistorians rules
Do not just post links or quotations
Do not just post links to other sites as an answer. This is not helpful. The expectation is that a user is posting to this subreddit because they are looking for the type of answer dictated by the rules in place here. Please take some time to put the links in context for the person asking the question. Avoid only recommending a source – whether that's another site, a book, or large slabs of copy-pasted text. If you want to recommend a source, please provide at least a small summary of what the source says. (This does not apply to questions that are only created to request sources.) Linking to past /r/AskHistorians questions is allowable, but please take the time to include a username ping for the user who answered in the previous thread.
Hiya OP, as a long-time thread linker, here's my perspective. I link because
I don't add commentary or a tl;dr because
So that's what's up. In this subreddit, linking threads is seen as a valued service to OPs, expert users, and the moderation team.
I think you're missing the point.
The pertinent parts of the rule you quoted are (emphasis mine):
Do not just post links to other sites as an answer.
Linking to past /r/AskHistorians questions is allowable ...
I'm not sure how to make that any clearer, but possibly explaining the intent of the rule will help.
The goal of the "no links or quotations" rule is to stop people from Googling the question and dropping in the first link that comes up, which is often to Wikipedia or Quora or another un-allowable source here; or just dropping in a block quote from Wiki or the like.
We disallow that because we want answers to be original work and provided by people who can follow up on the question.
The point of explicitly allowing previous answers here (and pinging the user who answered) is that those are answers that are, generally speaking, up to our standards, and ones where the original answerer has the ability to see their answer's been referenced and stop by if they like.
We actually are in the process of awarding flair to FAQ Finders who do this on a regular basis -- our OG FAQ Finder is u/Searocksandtrees, who is an invaluable member of our moderator team.
It's not practical for you to expect a brand-new answer to every question here, especially not ones that have been asked and answered in the past -- we get questions about PTSD in the ancient world, or why Rome fell, or did feudalism real, about three or four times a week. Answering them with links to the FAQ is absolutely fine.
It's incredibly frustrating to find comments like this as the top comment in a thread.
I'm tremendously sorry that people offering their unpaid labor to provide a link that answers the question for you is frustrating. I would recommend doing some self-examination about why this frustrates you.
The link to popular questions and answers is literally right underneath the "Rules" side tab, under the "Resources Tab". This is a great place to start looking if you think your question may have been answered. If not, post away.
I'm confused as to what you are perturbed about regarding redditors being helpful and linking past answers, giving a brief explanation of what they are linking, and (if possible) tagging the user who provided the previous answer?
I understand that people want more information right away but the fun of history, IMHO, is to read the entire context of an answer and not read a TL;DR just for brevity's sake.
As someone who posts previous answers regularly to help out the numerous posts on this sub, I know I need to follow the rules, as provided by the Mods. Aren't all posts moderated anyway? If a previous answer post doesn't fit the criteria then a mod would delete it.
These posts aren't supposed to add commentary because the user is letting the post creator know that someone much more knowledgeable has already answered their question.
For a few days I agreed with you. Then I provided some TL;DR^1. Two people asked questions caused by my brief TL;DR rather than the linked-to articles, which explained the points that they were asking about.
As /u/jschooltiger mentioned in their reply, there was a later [Meta] Become a FAQ Finder! (details on our new FAQ Finder flair application process, and some search tips). My example is why I suggested
helpfully and courteously explain what they are linking to, rather than simply dropping the link with no contextual information.
If I may suggest an amplification: the explanation should just give the general subject of the thing being linked to rather than try to summarize any points or arguments.
E.g., "In [link], /u/Georgy_K_Zhukov addressed Hitler's attitude towards macaroni. In [link], /u/hillsonghoods wrote of the use of macaroni in World War I trench warfare." But not details about the macaroni picture submitted to the art school, macaroni germ warfare, the forged Protocols of the Elders of Macaroni, et cetera. I've recently concluded that a summary may be incomplete or inaccurate. Or it may lead someone to read it as a TL;DR and skip the links, and thereby get an incomplete or inaccurate impression.
and /u/hillsonghoods made a modification for that.
^1 I'm referring to my top answer in "Was Hitler angry that Japan attacked Pearl Harbor? I know Germany had its hands full at the time, and I would think they would have preferred the US not directly enter the war. So what was Hitler's reaction to Japan's attack?. The original version is at https://www.removeddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/7t67zp/was_hitler_angry_that_japan_attacked_pearl_harbor/dtaoxf0/ . The current version, https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/7t67zp/was_hitler_angry_that_japan_attacked_pearl_harbor/dtaoxf0/, is after I edited my reply just to address this problem.
I will often come across repeat questions, and many times I have simply linked back to old answers I have written. I hardly ever bother with additional commentary, but I will offer to answer any follow up questions or clarify anything that is confusing. For instance in this thread.
It seems as though you are talking about a different situation, where 3rd parties are linking to old answers by others.
Of course, the rules do request that such links include username mentions to the original authors of the linked comments, so that they can offer additional commentary or answer follow up questions.
I think that set up is fine. I don't think it is always necessary to add commentary about old posts, particularly if someone is a non-expert sharing the answers of an obvious expert.