Well I just saw a second Meta question expressing strong ill-will for this site after first witnessing this, seemingly well-trodden, battlefield. Given that I am already weary of it, I can only assume that others are much more so, but bear with me.

The problem

Breaking this down into as simple a a description as possible:

A substantial number of users are arriving here with a different/false understanding of what this site is for; this results in a lot of closed questions and consequent animosity.

There are two parts to this:

1. People wanting this site to be something it's not; i.e disagreeing with / not understanding the site's objective
2. People disagree with the site' enforcement; i.e. thinking that valid questions are being downvoted.

I would like to discount the second option as a valid grounds for debate since it seems to have been quite categorically answered by MichaelT's answer to a previous Meta question. Even if there is the odd question that is within scope that is getting voted down, this is a smaller problem compared to item 1.

There have been comments about poor communication when down-voting and some quite bitter words about specific users; I don't care about any of that because I think that it is all a symptom, not the cause of this phenomenon.

How can we better communicate the site's purpose?

Below are my current thoughts as to every possible solution, along with my thoughts as to why they are good/bad.

Change Name

BAD because it was already rejected by SE top brass and for seemingly valid reasons; namely, there isn't an alternative name that narrows the definition whilst staying true to this site's purpose.

Add Sub-title

GOOD providing that the right wording could be found. Sub-titles are less restrictive than the main name so they can be a little longer and they can be very effective at refining the definition of the site to a perspective user; they are more likely to read a sub-title than a specific page that defines what is/is-not on topic.

Add Blurb

NEUTRAL because I don't know how viable it is or if it would be read. The idea would be to add a small blurb that is actively displayed to the user before they post a question. Ideally with a greyed-out background and a 'let's begin' button.

Change Scope

BAD because the site's scope appears to have been modified to its current form for valid reasons; namely to ensure that the site remains useful to programmers.

Change enforcement

NEUTRAL because I think it is separate to the current topic. To my eyes, fixing the problem of lots of off-topic questions being posted here would naturally result in people being less trigger-happy with the border-line on-topic questions.

So... thoughts, ideas, scathing indictments... let the games begin.