Asking question is the most common and effective method of learning, but as Eric Raymond explained, you have to do your homework before asking the question. Basic understanding of the question and materials are very important. Even some hackers happen to pass-by and give you a free pass that doe not mean it the pass you need. As you search for answer in the web or asking anyone, there is always a chance that this give answer may or may not be the correct answer. Human error is a big part of society, and it something that simply cannot be avoided. The only your own experience and work you put into can demanded a answer is the correct answer or not. As you search through StackOverflow, you will see a lot of not so smart question and plain answer. For example, there is a user who wants to add the first 2 numbers in array and posted the code he worked on. Following Eric guideline, this question is a not so smart question but a lot of hacker answered his question anyway. However, as you search through all the questions in StackOverflow you will notice that there is not a single ‘perfect’ question that follows all the Eric’s guideline completely. What important is not the question, but work and method you use to obtain it.
To answer the question; No, there are no free answers. To obtain the answer you seek, you do not need a smart question, but you need a lot of work. These work including putting the question in the right place, giving all the details, and manipulating the right person. Comparing to wasting time looking answers, lives are simpler if the answer will just fall off the sky. In many cases as you can see in StackOverflow, all user just want a simple yet correct answer. They did not follow all the guidelines given by Eric but every question has some elements of it. What we need is not a smart question, but a smart way to get the correct answer. No matter which ways you take, it always takes effort.