Q:

Discouraging answers to off-topic questions

Should we discourage answers to off-topic questions?  I know a lot of members like to answer any and all questions, even when they are off-topic.  For a question such as this , I think that answering will just encourage more (test/certification) questions, and presumably we don't want that.
I'm tempted to downvote just to discourage answers.  How do others feel about this?

A:

I understand the sentiment, but I also see that people are just eager to help others, which is a good thing. Also, for some people it may not be clear that the question will be voted off topic at the moment they answer.
So I don't think downvoting the answer is the solution here, since a downvote would suggest that it's a bad answer, while it may be a very good answer to a question which happens to be off topic. It also discourages people to answer questions which are on topic.

