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Does the root cause of all these problems with quora come down to being vc funded and needing high revenue numbers and growth rates? Imagine quora was a site dr

Does the root cause of all these problems with quora come down to being vc funded and needing high revenue numbers and growth rates? Imagine quora was a site driven by the community... It's a conundrum, only a vc funded site can reach such scale, have great growth etc but when the time for monetization comes, everything starts going downhill. A site driven by a foundation for example, rarely ever gets to any sort of scale. How can this problem be solved?

zenexer 8y ago
I do get a sense that they put more effort into marketing and growth than actually fostering a solid knowledge base. However, an interesting point was raised in another comment: comparable sites that focus on quality often come across as unwelcoming because they have strict guidelines. I'm not sure it can be entirely blamed on the fact that they're VC-funded--to some extent, it seems they're more interested in being newbie-friendly than producing quality content.
hn_throwaway_99 8y ago
TBH, I'm actually quite impressed that Reddit has lasted as long as it has and is still as vibrant as it is. Yes, of course there are tons of cesspool and misogynistic/racist/tribal areas, but I've found that I still like and frequent my niche smaller subreddits, my city subreddit (tons of trolls there but they are always downvoted and good content bubbles up) and the larger "eye candy" subreddits like r/aww. My guess is that Reddit explicitly did not try to put VCs number 1 in their priorities, unlike, say, Digg.
- baroffoos 8y ago
  Reddit was ruined with the redesign. Its buggy and slow. I get stuck on a loading screen on mobile for about 20 seconds before the page loads and half the time just shows an error. The desktop version also keeps logging me out randomly and forgetting I opted out of the redesign.
  - hn_throwaway_99 8y ago
    I only use old.reddit.com, I agree I hate the redesign on mobile.
    - SOLAR_FIELDS 8y ago
      I still use i.reddit.com on mobile. Pretty fast, pretty good UX, and functionality wise has most of the non-power user features one needs. No ads either. I’ve tried to switch over the years to various apps as they’ve come up but in the end have always preferred the minimalist text with small thumbnails that runs quick on any browser.
    - paganel 8y ago
      I'm in the same boat here, hope they keep it up for a little longer. The new re-design is atrocious, almost makes the website unusable for me.
- throwaway567765 8y ago
  their current success is momentum from before they took VC money and because they're smart enough not to attempt a profit before their IPO. which would entail terrible things like mandated ads in their API or shutting down their API entirely. its only a matter of time before they have to pay back the hundreds of mil in the hole and shovel ads in every nook and cranny. theyre delaying it so they have enough userbase for the IPO
- codedokode 8y ago
  Recently Reddit began to insert a huge "you want to see this too" block into the comments section (at least for unauthenticated users). What an awful solution. People don't want to see our links in the sidebar so let's put them directly into content. They think that I am a monkey that came from Google search and is going to click links that they show to me.

zenexer 8y ago

I do get a sense that they put more effort into marketing and growth than actually fostering a solid knowledge base. However, an interesting point was raised in another comment: comparable sites that focus on quality often come across as unwelcoming because they have strict guidelines. I'm not sure it can be entirely blamed on the fact that they're VC-funded--to some extent, it seems they're more interested in being newbie-friendly than producing quality content.

hn_throwaway_99 8y ago

TBH, I'm actually quite impressed that Reddit has lasted as long as it has and is still as vibrant as it is. Yes, of course there are tons of cesspool and misogynistic/racist/tribal areas, but I've found that I still like and frequent my niche smaller subreddits, my city subreddit (tons of trolls there but they are always downvoted and good content bubbles up) and the larger "eye candy" subreddits like r/aww. My guess is that Reddit explicitly did not try to put VCs number 1 in their priorities, unlike, say, Digg.

baroffoos 8y ago
Reddit was ruined with the redesign. Its buggy and slow. I get stuck on a loading screen on mobile for about 20 seconds before the page loads and half the time just shows an error. The desktop version also keeps logging me out randomly and forgetting I opted out of the redesign.
- hn_throwaway_99 8y ago
  I only use old.reddit.com, I agree I hate the redesign on mobile.
  - SOLAR_FIELDS 8y ago
    I still use i.reddit.com on mobile. Pretty fast, pretty good UX, and functionality wise has most of the non-power user features one needs. No ads either. I’ve tried to switch over the years to various apps as they’ve come up but in the end have always preferred the minimalist text with small thumbnails that runs quick on any browser.
  - paganel 8y ago
    I'm in the same boat here, hope they keep it up for a little longer. The new re-design is atrocious, almost makes the website unusable for me.
throwaway567765 8y ago
their current success is momentum from before they took VC money and because they're smart enough not to attempt a profit before their IPO. which would entail terrible things like mandated ads in their API or shutting down their API entirely. its only a matter of time before they have to pay back the hundreds of mil in the hole and shovel ads in every nook and cranny. theyre delaying it so they have enough userbase for the IPO
codedokode 8y ago
Recently Reddit began to insert a huge "you want to see this too" block into the comments section (at least for unauthenticated users). What an awful solution. People don't want to see our links in the sidebar so let's put them directly into content. They think that I am a monkey that came from Google search and is going to click links that they show to me.