<p>My sense (purely anecdotal) is that the very existence of a "homework" tag tends to promote less-than-congenial responses to perfunctory questions.  Instead of providing a welcome and some hints--which should be our first reaction--some community members seem to prefer writing comments like "if this is homework, it should be tagged as homework!"</p>

<p>We could be friendlier.</p>

<p>I have therefore changed how I personally respond to questions that smell like homework: I still treat them as such in my comments and answers, but I don't demand that they be tagged.</p>

<p>(In the interests of full disclosure, I do become decidedly less friendly towards questions that appear to abuse the site or the goodwill of the community: but that's not a matter of whether the questions are related to homework or not.)</p>
