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Quora is simply turning into ExpertsExchange. I haven't found anything terrible insightful on Quora that I can't find at the top of an HN, Reddit or StackOverfl

by meritt 14y ago

Quora is simply turning into ExpertsExchange. I haven't found anything terrible insightful on Quora that I can't find at the top of an HN, Reddit or StackOverflow thread. Never quite understood the hype centered around it.

Tycho 14y ago
Have you ever tried, like, actually posing a question that you want the answer to?
- Johngibb 14y ago
  I have asked a bunch of questions on HN, and, like, actually gotten really good answers to them. Same with stackoverflow. Just because there are people on quora that answer questions well doesn't mean that they don't partake in questionable business practices and that you can find the answers elsewhere.
  - Tycho 14y ago
    HN is not a Q&A site, neither is Reddit. StackOvereflow is focussed on narrow topics (and moderated by Nazis). That leaves plenty of room for a site like Quora which is oriented around finding answers to questions you have on any serious topic. Other sites might have better matereial when you do a direct comparison, but that's like saying a book of essays by Richard Feynman is always more interesting than looking the same topic up in Encyclopedia Britannica.
    - chris_wot 14y ago
      Who knew that Nazis were so good at keeping question and answer sites so well moderated? I doubt even Godwin would have known.
    - rat87 14y ago
      Reddit is not a Q & A site but sometimes very good questions and answers pop up. Particularly in the http://www.reddit.com/r/askscience http://www.reddit.com/r/askscience subreddit.
    - philwelch 14y ago
      > HN is not a Q&A site, neither is Reddit. That hardly seems necessary. Any generalized discussion site can answer Q&A, since that's just a discussion format. That isn't true the other way around, hence the StackOverflow nazis.
    - singular 14y ago
      > HN is not a Q&A site, neither is Reddit. True, but both have Q&A 'modes', e.g. Ask HN and IAmA AMA.
sciurus 14y ago
Don't forget Ask Metafilter (http://ask.metafilter.com/ http://ask.metafilter.com/), going strong since 2003.
ChrisNorstrom 14y ago
Never quite understood the hype centered around it. It had tech celebrities. It was known as the place where famous silicon valley / tech people (from google to even microsoft) would answer questions in their gated community away from all the noise of Yahoo answers. Of course now Quora is just another Q&A site but back when it first started, I remember it well. It felt so exclusive. Registration wasn't open to the public. When a question was asked it was answered by people who mattered or were in the industry. The answers weren't nessessarily better but they felt like they mattered more because of who they came from. They used celebrity status to promote the site, then opened it to the public. Before they had something special. Now it's just another Q&A site. Looking back in hindsight, it might have been better to keep the exclusive gated community feel where only people with credentials (startups) are allowed in. How would the community keep itself exclusive? I thought about that last year and came up with this: http://www.chrisnorstrom.com/2011/02/invention-creating-and-maintaining-exclusive-communities-through-crowdsourcing/ http://www.chrisnorstrom.com/2011/02/invention-creating-and-...
- dkersten 14y ago
  I could never figure out how to actually search Quora to find answers to stuff. Maybe you have to log in to do this, but I don't want to create an account just to see if I like the sites content enough to create an account, so I never used Quora and likely never will, especially after reading the article.
- yuhong 14y ago
  Of course, best of both worlds would be better, though obviously not possible for every question.
deleted 14y ago
[deleted]

by meritt 14y ago

Tycho 14y ago

Have you ever tried, like, actually posing a question that you want the answer to?

Johngibb 14y ago
I have asked a bunch of questions on HN, and, like, actually gotten really good answers to them. Same with stackoverflow. Just because there are people on quora that answer questions well doesn't mean that they don't partake in questionable business practices and that you can find the answers elsewhere.
- Tycho 14y ago
  HN is not a Q&A site, neither is Reddit. StackOvereflow is focussed on narrow topics (and moderated by Nazis). That leaves plenty of room for a site like Quora which is oriented around finding answers to questions you have on any serious topic. Other sites might have better matereial when you do a direct comparison, but that's like saying a book of essays by Richard Feynman is always more interesting than looking the same topic up in Encyclopedia Britannica.
  - chris_wot 14y ago
    Who knew that Nazis were so good at keeping question and answer sites so well moderated? I doubt even Godwin would have known.
  - rat87 14y ago
    Reddit is not a Q & A site but sometimes very good questions and answers pop up. Particularly in the http://www.reddit.com/r/askscience http://www.reddit.com/r/askscience subreddit.
  - philwelch 14y ago
    > HN is not a Q&A site, neither is Reddit. That hardly seems necessary. Any generalized discussion site can answer Q&A, since that's just a discussion format. That isn't true the other way around, hence the StackOverflow nazis.
  - singular 14y ago
    > HN is not a Q&A site, neither is Reddit. True, but both have Q&A 'modes', e.g. Ask HN and IAmA AMA.

sciurus 14y ago

Don't forget Ask Metafilter (http://ask.metafilter.com/ http://ask.metafilter.com/), going strong since 2003.

ChrisNorstrom 14y ago

Never quite understood the hype centered around it. It had tech celebrities. It was known as the place where famous silicon valley / tech people (from google to even microsoft) would answer questions in their gated community away from all the noise of Yahoo answers. Of course now Quora is just another Q&A site but back when it first started, I remember it well. It felt so exclusive. Registration wasn't open to the public. When a question was asked it was answered by people who mattered or were in the industry. The answers weren't nessessarily better but they felt like they mattered more because of who they came from. They used celebrity status to promote the site, then opened it to the public. Before they had something special. Now it's just another Q&A site. Looking back in hindsight, it might have been better to keep the exclusive gated community feel where only people with credentials (startups) are allowed in. How would the community keep itself exclusive? I thought about that last year and came up with this: http://www.chrisnorstrom.com/2011/02/invention-creating-and-maintaining-exclusive-communities-through-crowdsourcing/ http://www.chrisnorstrom.com/2011/02/invention-creating-and-...

dkersten 14y ago
I could never figure out how to actually search Quora to find answers to stuff. Maybe you have to log in to do this, but I don't want to create an account just to see if I like the sites content enough to create an account, so I never used Quora and likely never will, especially after reading the article.
yuhong 14y ago
Of course, best of both worlds would be better, though obviously not possible for every question.

deleted 14y ago

[deleted]