Still regarding the "verbose" answer side (I'm talking about it because some of my flashcards on anki are like that, as I illustrated on another thread).
I can understand if you say that writing too much stuff may be unnecessary (but I'm not of that opinion), but I can't see it as being "counter productive".
Having everything you need ready in the answer field is a useful tool when you need it, but otherwise it can just be ignored without any downsides, I think.
I would also like to stress again the fact that searching for and entering those information and definitions in the cards is in itself a very instructive process, in which you can learn a lot and get new hints for your future cards.
Anyway, in my case (the only one I can speak for) the really verbose cards are rare. I only enter the very least amount of information that is necessary for me to understand perfectly the sentence. So some sentences have 1-2 words that I initially don't know, so I input those 1-2 definitions in the answer field. Those definitions I choose among those of given by 3 dictionaries (Sanseido web dic., DS kanji sono mama and Challenge, in this order of priority), looking for the one that I understand better and with the fewest unknown words. Then I enter the definitions for those other unknown words. If all the definitions I find are too complicated for my current level, I just enter the english definition.
A lot of my cards have just the pronunciation and no definitions at all (the ones with only grammar value), while usually they have 1-2 definitions in total. Only roughly ~15% hold more than 3 defs.
I just felt like sharing the logic I'm using, sorry for being boring.
