But the Lounge section isn't local to any specific area. It's for airy holding-forth for social bonding, not about location-specific productive conversation.
If there were location-specific "general discussion" subforums (like e.g. ISG tends to have), then sure, I'd maybe have posted this thread there.
But this thread really is specifically a 411 thread, isn't it? It's not a prompt for people to just say whatever; it's specifically a request for people to contribute advice on a specific subject. When people do that, the thread then becomes a resource for people who want an answer to the same question. That's what the 411 subforum is for, AFAIK: threads that gather up intel on a specific subject, specified by a prompt in the title.
Whether or not the person who started the thread needs the information they requested, is kind of irrelevant, isn't it? Someone probably needs the information.
It's like how, on Wikipedia, editors will sometimes make a new, blank page on a topic and link to it from other pages, even though they don't personally know anything about the subject, and so don't have anything to fill the page with. They're suggesting to other editors that it would be a useful topic for someone with that knowledge to cover. They're pointing out a gap in coverage; noticing a void that would be helpful to fill. Even if that information wouldn't be personally helpful to them.
(But like I said, this is a really stupid debate to be having. I'm only typing right now because I'm constitutionally incapable of not having the last word if physically possible; not because I think this meta-conversation is at-all a productive use of my time or yours.)
