webapps went into public beta today. gaming went into private beta today. GIS will be out soon enough. The point in the democratic process we're pushing is s

webapps went into public beta today. gaming went into private beta today. GIS will be out soon enough. The point in the democratic process we're pushing is so the site doesn't have seven questions on day one and someone checks it out and goes "Gee neat..." and never comes back again. The 400 people committed to the GIS proposal have committed "to visit at least three times per week, to ask at least three questions during the beta phase, and to answer as many questions as I can for at least three months." That's a pretty good head start for a site where you want expert answers to your questions and you want them fast. We're still tweaking the specifics of how much commitment a site needs, but we're certain it's more than a link on a few websites the first day. The design of the software goes a long way, but in order for these sites to not fall flat they have to give answers fast, and they have to attract experts. You can't make that happen by just launching a URL; we're working full time on making sure we figure out how to do that.