<p>I've been wondering the same question lately for old, off-topic questions, after reading <a href="https://stats.meta.stackexchange.com/questions/6608/unanswered-questions">this other thread</a> and stumbling upon a couple of old, probably off-topic questions. (NB: I think it's a bad idea to close old questions just because they're old – they may be still relevant to other people than the person who originally asked the question).</p>
<p>A problem I see is that starting a &quot;vote to close&quot; (VTC) process on an old question gives additional work to people who review the VTC queue. An answer to the other thread mentions that there are few people reviewing the queue. So, in my opinion, it raises the question as to whether it's a good use of reviewers' time to attract their attention on inactive questions. Is an old and inactive question really a problem, even if it's off-topic? Shouldn't the effort concentrate on active, more visible questions?</p>
<p>On the other hand, one advantage of closing an old question is preventing new answers from appearing. If the question is unanswered, closing also prevents the community bot from bumping it up. In short, closing an off-topic question prevents it from becoming active again and appearing on the home page. So closing has an eventual benefit, as the question will become a problem soon or later.</p>
<p>A compromise I've been thinking of is checking if the review queue is &quot;congested&quot; with a lot of questions to review, before starting a VTC process on an old question. Probably not a very satisfying solution; but in any case, I'd like to hear other opinions about it, as I may be misjudging the situation.</p>
