I'm not sure about chasing hot topics, but...
I'm a relative newbie to this SE site and have learned a lot by reading posts but have yet to ask any questions myself. Part of this is because it does seem like a lot of posts get closed for being duplicates and I'm afraid of being admonished because my question has been covered elsewhere, even if it is specific to my situation. For example, if I was to ask a question about what is better - paying down my high-rate consumer credit card or paying down my lower-rate school loan - would it be closed because others have asked a similar question?
(I wonder about this with a lot of the non-programmer SE sites where it's harder to pose a question that has a definitive answer. Seems to me the nature of this flavor of SE site is more discussion/opinion than answer.)
My two cents... now back to lurking!