> I think this interpretation is more intuitive because it doesn't make any assumptions about how you get your information.

Do you mean “interpretation” or “alternative problem”.

Because if it’s an “interpretation” of the original problem you’re indeed making assumptions to fill the unspecified information.

If you mean that it’s an alternative problem which has a definite solution I agree. It’s a different problem and its relevance to the original one is to illustrate that additional assumptions were required.

I mean the original problem can be interpreted in both ways. You have to ask the questioner for more information to remove the ambiguity.