Is it appropriate to translate monolingual answers to "hot" questions in order to improve their usefulness to the wider internet?
If so should it be
- As an edit to the existing answer?
- As an additional answer?
The community will probably decide by itself which question/answers should be translated.
As for how to do it: translated answers should have the same relevance as original answers, so vote counts must be the same. I'm pretty sure that translation in an additional answer is out of the question.
I tend to think it appropriate and even very useful, and not only on "hot" questions. And since it would be an improvement of the question, edit seems the most obvious way.
As an exemple, consider this question I asked as if I was an English speaker.
Note that the (in my opinion) best answer is in French only. I didn't accept it (yet) however because I feel that if I really was a native English speaker, I might not be able to understand it fully.
If we encounter this kind of situation, would it not be logical to make sure the best answer is also in English? I think the "edit" route is the best here rather than separate answers; but whatever way we go, it will be a lot of work (I've already given up translating my own responses most of the time).
So far, I've been writing my posts on Meta in both languages. It takes a lot of work.
I foresee that bilingual posts will be rare exceptions.
Pour l'instant, j'écris mes messages sur Méta dans les deux langues. C'est beaucoup de travail.
Je pense que les messages bilingues resteront exceptionnels.