Google Answers December 11, 2006 4:11 PM Subscribe
How #1 Beat Teh Google via Anil Dash.
A big part of me thinks that Matt beat Google only in the same way that Poland Spring beat Crystal Pepsi. Sure, one's now gone and the other's still around. Sure, on the surface they have some similarities (answers to questions, clear beverages). But I wouldn't consider either pair direct competitors.
posted by Plutor at 5:19 PM on December 11, 2006
posted by Plutor at 5:19 PM on December 11, 2006
On the other hand, the analysis of why Google Answers did badly and AskMe did well is still perfectly apt. A few months ago, I was doing similar thinking when I realized it's the same reason that YouTube is so much bigger than Google Video. Google Just Can't Do Community. I can't tell you why, and I don't think Anil goes deep enough to really answer that, either, but it does seem to be their deepest flaw, as a company. I wouldn't be surprised if they knew that, and why they bought YouTube. I'm sure they're hoping to get some of that institutional know-how and maybe a kickstarted sitewide community.
posted by Plutor at 5:26 PM on December 11, 2006
posted by Plutor at 5:26 PM on December 11, 2006
Dude, he totally said "that being said..." Afroblanco, summon the lynch mob!
posted by Eideteker at 5:30 PM on December 11, 2006
posted by Eideteker at 5:30 PM on December 11, 2006
Anil Dash is spot on with his analysis. AskMe is brilliant. However, it is starting to get too big such that there are so many questions that only the people who see them in the first six hours or so ever respond because after that they scroll off the front page of AskMe.
posted by caddis at 6:01 PM on December 11, 2006
posted by caddis at 6:01 PM on December 11, 2006
True, caddis. But what should we do?
posted by Burger-Eating Invasion Monkey at 6:04 PM on December 11, 2006
posted by Burger-Eating Invasion Monkey at 6:04 PM on December 11, 2006
"Google Just Can't Do Community. I can't tell you why"
I can, but it will cost you five bucks.
posted by mr_crash_davis at 6:12 PM on December 11, 2006 [1 favorite]
I can, but it will cost you five bucks.
posted by mr_crash_davis at 6:12 PM on December 11, 2006 [1 favorite]
Even though questions are on the front page less time, mightn't it be that there are proportionally more people looking at questions during any given hour?
posted by voidcontext at 6:14 PM on December 11, 2006
posted by voidcontext at 6:14 PM on December 11, 2006
I can, but it will cost you five bucks.
Nonsense, crash. It'll only cost them five bucks to tell you why you're wrong.
posted by cortex at 6:21 PM on December 11, 2006
Nonsense, crash. It'll only cost them five bucks to tell you why you're wrong.
posted by cortex at 6:21 PM on December 11, 2006
Goddamn I miss Crystal Pepsi.
posted by Baby_Balrog at 6:27 PM on December 11, 2006
posted by Baby_Balrog at 6:27 PM on December 11, 2006
You know, I was thinking about this today.
I paid $5 to impart *my* wisdom to you poor fools. As cortex said, I can get answers for free, it just costs money to answer. I still know know why it works, but it's genius.
Thanks for posting this.
posted by niles at 6:49 PM on December 11, 2006
I paid $5 to impart *my* wisdom to you poor fools. As cortex said, I can get answers for free, it just costs money to answer. I still know know why it works, but it's genius.
Thanks for posting this.
posted by niles at 6:49 PM on December 11, 2006
Eideteker: "Dude, he totally said "that being said...""
No, I didn't. That being said, I could have.
posted by Plutor at 6:57 PM on December 11, 2006
No, I didn't. That being said, I could have.
posted by Plutor at 6:57 PM on December 11, 2006
However, it is starting to get too big such that there are so many questions that only the people who see them in the first six hours or so ever respond because after that they scroll off the front page of AskMe.
Bingo. I just marked all last-24-h 90+ new posts 'read' in my RSS reader and as a consequence have begun to consider deleting AkMe from my subscriptions.
posted by mwhybark at 7:30 PM on December 11, 2006
Bingo. I just marked all last-24-h 90+ new posts 'read' in my RSS reader and as a consequence have begun to consider deleting AkMe from my subscriptions.
posted by mwhybark at 7:30 PM on December 11, 2006
mwhybark, I had to do that a few months ago. It was continually tapped out at 200 posts and I just never had the time to read them anymore. I might set up a feed for just those few topics I can answer.
posted by fenriq at 7:41 PM on December 11, 2006
posted by fenriq at 7:41 PM on December 11, 2006
Yeah, I really lament the "good old days" before all these newer members arrived.
posted by Roger Dodger at 8:09 PM on December 11, 2006
posted by Roger Dodger at 8:09 PM on December 11, 2006
But what should we do?
Kill NameThatTuneFilter, for starters.
posted by Alvy Ampersand at 8:24 PM on December 11, 2006
Kill NameThatTuneFilter, for starters.
posted by Alvy Ampersand at 8:24 PM on December 11, 2006
If it ain't broke, don't fix it.
It ain't broke yet, just straining at the edges. Some of us still love the name that tune(book, movie, whatever) filter, and the hive produces high value results on these questions.
posted by caddis at 8:37 PM on December 11, 2006
It ain't broke yet, just straining at the edges. Some of us still love the name that tune(book, movie, whatever) filter, and the hive produces high value results on these questions.
posted by caddis at 8:37 PM on December 11, 2006
But what should we do?
FWIW, I know damn well I can't answer every question on AskMe, so I don't read every question. I regularly check (if I used RSS: I subscribe to) the tags I might be able to answer questions in, and I scan the front page occasionally. Killing NameThatFilter is no good—that's my bread and butter!
Nice article (comments meh), pat yourself on the back Matt.
posted by carsonb at 8:53 PM on December 11, 2006
FWIW, I know damn well I can't answer every question on AskMe, so I don't read every question. I regularly check (if I used RSS: I subscribe to) the tags I might be able to answer questions in, and I scan the front page occasionally. Killing NameThatFilter is no good—that's my bread and butter!
Nice article (comments meh), pat yourself on the back Matt.
posted by carsonb at 8:53 PM on December 11, 2006
Metafilter: Members think highly of themselves.
posted by blue_beetle at 9:18 PM on December 11, 2006
posted by blue_beetle at 9:18 PM on December 11, 2006
Anil's spot on, as he is most of the time. The implication that (virtually) the only reason people are dropping the big five is to get into the AskMe Experience, while possibly also true, is too bad, though.
I might amend Matt's comment: "Google Answers is gone because Google isn't in the people business, they're in thecomputer programming advertising business (and they hire lots of clever coders to develop it)".
posted by stavrosthewonderchicken at 9:58 PM on December 11, 2006
I might amend Matt's comment: "Google Answers is gone because Google isn't in the people business, they're in the
posted by stavrosthewonderchicken at 9:58 PM on December 11, 2006
Even though questions are on the front page less time, mightn't it be that there are proportionally more people looking at questions during any given hour?
This was an argument about Wikipedia once it had started growing exponentially. Sure, it's more eyes looking at the site, both more potential crackpots and more people trying to do right, but I think it also makes for less of a sense of community.
No, I don't know what the solution is, if there is any. (And no, I don't believe you have to have the solution to point out a potential problem.)
posted by Tuwa at 10:30 PM on December 11, 2006
This was an argument about Wikipedia once it had started growing exponentially. Sure, it's more eyes looking at the site, both more potential crackpots and more people trying to do right, but I think it also makes for less of a sense of community.
No, I don't know what the solution is, if there is any. (And no, I don't believe you have to have the solution to point out a potential problem.)
posted by Tuwa at 10:30 PM on December 11, 2006
Google Just Can't Do Community. I can't tell you why, and I don't think Anil goes deep enough to really answer that, either
Yeah, this was basically written for a broader audience than the MeTa regulars, so I didn't get too specific because, well... yaaawn. But it does go a lot deeper, and I didn't want to belabor the point too much because I have friends at Google, too, and they're pretty clueful about community. They just aren't putting that to use yet.
The implication that (virtually) the only reason people are dropping the big five is to get into the AskMe Experience, while possibly also true, is too bad, though.
I went back and forth on that a bit while writing... I wasn't sure it's true, but it feels right, intuitively. And this is how I began my descent into truthiness.
Metafilter: Members think highly of themselves.
Ahem. Did I mention, 508?
posted by anildash at 10:56 PM on December 11, 2006
Yeah, this was basically written for a broader audience than the MeTa regulars, so I didn't get too specific because, well... yaaawn. But it does go a lot deeper, and I didn't want to belabor the point too much because I have friends at Google, too, and they're pretty clueful about community. They just aren't putting that to use yet.
The implication that (virtually) the only reason people are dropping the big five is to get into the AskMe Experience, while possibly also true, is too bad, though.
I went back and forth on that a bit while writing... I wasn't sure it's true, but it feels right, intuitively. And this is how I began my descent into truthiness.
Metafilter: Members think highly of themselves.
Ahem. Did I mention, 508?
posted by anildash at 10:56 PM on December 11, 2006
jessamyn and I were talking about pushing questions to once per 14 days instead of 7 days. That would likely push the average questions/month for most members down to 1, but it would encourage more sockpuppetry, which I secretly loath, especially when people do it to ask more questions and defeat the whole queue system.
posted by mathowie (staff) at 11:02 PM on December 11, 2006
posted by mathowie (staff) at 11:02 PM on December 11, 2006
I do not secretly loathe sock puppetry, I publicly hate it and would love to see all the sock puppets herded up and made into blankets for homeless people with skin conditions.
posted by fenriq at 12:10 AM on December 12, 2006 [1 favorite]
posted by fenriq at 12:10 AM on December 12, 2006 [1 favorite]
only the people who see them in the first six hours or so ever respond because after that they scroll off the front page
Do most folks here really stop reading questions on the 2nd page? I mean, if you're a regular AskMe reader who's gone for a day (or even - gasp - two), is the "older questions" link at the bottom of the front page that big a barrier? And is there really that much of a drop-off in good answers after a question falls to page two? I used to worry there was, but now I don't even notice, and wonder if the evidence is there.
pushing questions to once per 14 days instead of 7 days
Yeah, that would help. You could also try talking to the folks who consistently push the limit of allowable questions. It may be within the guidelines to post a question every damn week, but it's not very communal.
posted by mediareport at 12:54 AM on December 12, 2006
Do most folks here really stop reading questions on the 2nd page? I mean, if you're a regular AskMe reader who's gone for a day (or even - gasp - two), is the "older questions" link at the bottom of the front page that big a barrier? And is there really that much of a drop-off in good answers after a question falls to page two? I used to worry there was, but now I don't even notice, and wonder if the evidence is there.
pushing questions to once per 14 days instead of 7 days
Yeah, that would help. You could also try talking to the folks who consistently push the limit of allowable questions. It may be within the guidelines to post a question every damn week, but it's not very communal.
posted by mediareport at 12:54 AM on December 12, 2006
jessamyn and I were talking about pushing questions to once per 14 days instead of 7 days. That would likely push the average questions/month for most members down to 1, but it would encourage more sockpuppetry, which I secretly loath, especially when people do it to ask more questions and defeat the whole queue system.
Do it anyway and start penalizing people who do that (I'm sure you could set up some kind of IP filter pretty easily, no?). I rarely even browse AskMe these days because it just moves so incredibly fast.
posted by The God Complex at 1:44 AM on December 12, 2006
I get the feeling Google doesn't do community because, well, you don't have to log in, and identify yourself, and grab a username, and contribute to it to use it. You just go there to search for things (in fact you don't even have to go there - just type your query in Firefox's search box). And some smaller subset of that searching population has bothered to sign up for a Gmail account. And some subset of that has bothered to log into Google itself for Search History, and so forth. And some subset of that population bothered to browse through their beta projects and find Google Answers. And when they got there they found some dusky, uncared for, artificial corner of the internet filled with people just like themselves. Google's too big, and too distracted by other things, to draw individuals and identities into their world.
posted by Jimbob at 4:41 AM on December 12, 2006
posted by Jimbob at 4:41 AM on December 12, 2006
I might set up a feed for just those few topics I can answer.
Is this possible? I thought the individual categories didn't have feeds.
Matt, a reminder about that whole "adding the category name to the RSS feed" thing...
posted by blag at 5:08 AM on December 12, 2006
Is this possible? I thought the individual categories didn't have feeds.
Matt, a reminder about that whole "adding the category name to the RSS feed" thing...
posted by blag at 5:08 AM on December 12, 2006
Bingo. I just marked all last-24-h 90+ new posts 'read' in my RSS reader and as a consequence have begun to consider deleting AkMe from my subscriptions.
Sometimes I just go on a AskMe binge, especially if there's nothing else on (Bloglines).
posted by jimfl at 6:31 AM on December 12, 2006
Sometimes I just go on a AskMe binge, especially if there's nothing else on (Bloglines).
posted by jimfl at 6:31 AM on December 12, 2006
blag, its possible to set up a feed for almost anything (its magic!). I set up one last night just for Mac related questions by Adding http://ask.metafilter.com/tags/mac/rss to my Bloglines. Not for the categories though, how strange. Maybe its time to ask for a new pony?
posted by fenriq at 7:33 AM on December 12, 2006
posted by fenriq at 7:33 AM on December 12, 2006
fenriq: Yeah, I know about the tag feeds but what I'd really like is for each post to have the question's category included within the feed.
Since I'm British and therefore don't have emotions, the "Human Relationships" category doesn't interest me - I'd like to be able to run the AskMe feed through FeedRinse or similar and strip out anything with labelled with the "Human Relations" category.
Although the RSS feed contains a "category" tag, it's currently used to hold the user-submitted tags. Matt and I have discussed the idea of adding the proper category into the first "category" tag so I may remind him of the idea.
posted by blag at 8:57 AM on December 12, 2006
Since I'm British and therefore don't have emotions, the "Human Relationships" category doesn't interest me - I'd like to be able to run the AskMe feed through FeedRinse or similar and strip out anything with labelled with the "Human Relations" category.
Although the RSS feed contains a "category" tag, it's currently used to hold the user-submitted tags. Matt and I have discussed the idea of adding the proper category into the first "category" tag so I may remind him of the idea.
posted by blag at 8:57 AM on December 12, 2006
My take would be change the number of questions people can ask to two per month (or one per 14 days) and make end-running this with sock puppetry against the rules, timeout offense maybe. People have other places to ask questions if they're up against a wall.
I don't think Google does community as well because, imho, there's rarely a human face to any of their tools. Even though I know a ton of people who work there, I don't see them shine through any of their products. When I worked at Google Answers I never even knew the name of the people who ran the place, didn't even know if they were the same people from day to day. All their stuff is designed to scale a zillionfold -- and more power to them if it works -- but there's a loss of whatever affordances personalized interactions give.
posted by jessamyn (staff) at 9:22 AM on December 12, 2006
I don't think Google does community as well because, imho, there's rarely a human face to any of their tools. Even though I know a ton of people who work there, I don't see them shine through any of their products. When I worked at Google Answers I never even knew the name of the people who ran the place, didn't even know if they were the same people from day to day. All their stuff is designed to scale a zillionfold -- and more power to them if it works -- but there's a loss of whatever affordances personalized interactions give.
posted by jessamyn (staff) at 9:22 AM on December 12, 2006
I might amend Matt's comment: "Google Answers is gone because Google isn't in the people business, they're in the computer programming advertising business (and they hire lots of clever coders to develop it)".
Isn't MetaFilter in the advertising business, too?
it would encourage more sockpuppetry, which I secretly loath
Present company excepted, I hope.
posted by timeistight at 9:46 AM on December 12, 2006
Isn't MetaFilter in the advertising business, too?
it would encourage more sockpuppetry, which I secretly loath
Present company excepted, I hope.
posted by timeistight at 9:46 AM on December 12, 2006
jessamyn: People have other places to ask questions if they're up against a wall.
An excellent way to build community.
Seriously, though, I think 7 days is a perfect balance between "every goddamn day" and "so infrequently you eventually go somewhere else because every time you have a question you need answered you're on hold." A better solution, I think, would be to promote stiffer penalties for idle ChatFilter questions and the like.
First offense: Deletion and a stern warning.
Second offense: Deletion and a 7-day timeout (forfeit your next potential chance to ask a question)
And so on.
posted by Spike at 2:34 PM on December 12, 2006
An excellent way to build community.
Seriously, though, I think 7 days is a perfect balance between "every goddamn day" and "so infrequently you eventually go somewhere else because every time you have a question you need answered you're on hold." A better solution, I think, would be to promote stiffer penalties for idle ChatFilter questions and the like.
First offense: Deletion and a stern warning.
Second offense: Deletion and a 7-day timeout (forfeit your next potential chance to ask a question)
And so on.
posted by Spike at 2:34 PM on December 12, 2006
An excellent way to build community.
It's a balance between making the resource useful and making the resource so popular that it becomes less useful. Right now people are arguing, and I'm agreeing, that it may be suffering from its own success. One question a week was arbitraty and one every two weeks is similarly arbitrary. If the community can't bend a little to make sure that there is enough to go around. It's really hard to crack down on chatfilter, mix CD and name my fish threads without stricter guidelines which people have also been arguing against. I think either approach would solve the problem we're currently seeing.
posted by jessamyn (staff) at 2:49 PM on December 12, 2006
It's a balance between making the resource useful and making the resource so popular that it becomes less useful. Right now people are arguing, and I'm agreeing, that it may be suffering from its own success. One question a week was arbitraty and one every two weeks is similarly arbitrary. If the community can't bend a little to make sure that there is enough to go around. It's really hard to crack down on chatfilter, mix CD and name my fish threads without stricter guidelines which people have also been arguing against. I think either approach would solve the problem we're currently seeing.
posted by jessamyn (staff) at 2:49 PM on December 12, 2006
AskMeFi is one of the very sites that I will take the time to read, no matter how many questions pile up if I am unable to check in for a day or two. 200+ questions waiting? No problem - it really doesn't take very long to scroll through them all to figure out which ones are worth diving into.
posted by davidmsc at 2:53 PM on December 12, 2006
posted by davidmsc at 2:53 PM on December 12, 2006
If the main issue is front page clutter (which, I agree, is a problem and sometimes deters me from reading it), I've thought of a few more solutions. They're just ideas, I don't know how hard they'd be to implement with the existing framework.
1) For people who don't want to click through several pages of older questions to catch up, an option in preferences to choose between displaying the last 50, 100, or 200 questions.
2) For reducing overall clutter, an option for the asker to close a question when they are satisfied with the answers they've recieved. Closed questions would no longer appear on the front page, however they would remain in user favorites, posting histories, &c.
posted by Spike at 3:21 PM on December 12, 2006
1) For people who don't want to click through several pages of older questions to catch up, an option in preferences to choose between displaying the last 50, 100, or 200 questions.
2) For reducing overall clutter, an option for the asker to close a question when they are satisfied with the answers they've recieved. Closed questions would no longer appear on the front page, however they would remain in user favorites, posting histories, &c.
posted by Spike at 3:21 PM on December 12, 2006
Since AskMe is so damn pop, maybe it should expand into sections-tabbed with the big existing categories. Techie folks will hit the tech section and car buffs the auto section an so on. I know that's a big undertaking, but it would keep AskMe relevant and more concise with the answers that are given.
The problem of the volume of questions won't go away. Growth is good and to be expected. If I knew shit about coding or whatever magic Matt does, I would consider the organization aspect.
posted by snsranch at 4:31 PM on December 12, 2006
The problem of the volume of questions won't go away. Growth is good and to be expected. If I knew shit about coding or whatever magic Matt does, I would consider the organization aspect.
posted by snsranch at 4:31 PM on December 12, 2006
jessamyn: People have other places to ask questions if they're up against a wall.
Not a solution. One question every two weeks or even less is appropriate. Some people are serial trivial questioners. That, of course, was fine when AskMe was small. Now, not so fine. The problem is that sometimes after asking a question, another one might pop up soon. A hard limit just promotes sock puppets like Matt said. A better solution is to give folks a few freebies, say four a year, that can be used any time, even five minutes after the last question. I can't imagine that would be too difficult to code.
posted by caddis at 7:09 PM on December 12, 2006
Not a solution. One question every two weeks or even less is appropriate. Some people are serial trivial questioners. That, of course, was fine when AskMe was small. Now, not so fine. The problem is that sometimes after asking a question, another one might pop up soon. A hard limit just promotes sock puppets like Matt said. A better solution is to give folks a few freebies, say four a year, that can be used any time, even five minutes after the last question. I can't imagine that would be too difficult to code.
posted by caddis at 7:09 PM on December 12, 2006
A hard limit just promotes sock puppets
Not if using sock puppets to ask more than 2 questions a month gets a timeout for both accounts. That's not a difficult problem to solve at all, really.
posted by mediareport at 9:14 PM on December 12, 2006
Not if using sock puppets to ask more than 2 questions a month gets a timeout for both accounts. That's not a difficult problem to solve at all, really.
posted by mediareport at 9:14 PM on December 12, 2006
Reducing the number of questions is a great idea - can I change my previous suggestion from "Kill NameThatTunefilter" to "Kill All Sockpuppets On Sight"?
posted by Alvy Ampersand at 10:12 AM on December 13, 2006
posted by Alvy Ampersand at 10:12 AM on December 13, 2006
I'll join you on the sockpuppet hunt, Alvy! Let's root 'em out and beat them down!
posted by fenriq at 1:49 PM on December 14, 2006
posted by fenriq at 1:49 PM on December 14, 2006
I wasn't going to mention it, but since I seem to've volunteered to help, Alvy, I admit that fenriq is my sockpuppet.
posted by carsonb at 5:28 PM on December 14, 2006
posted by carsonb at 5:28 PM on December 14, 2006
You are not logged in, either login or create an account to post comments
AskMe is usually incredibly informative and interesting. Just don't ask about Harleys with loud pipes, you'll get a lecture instead of answers. (I got one answer, actually.)
posted by snsranch at 4:33 PM on December 11, 2006