Quora
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Quora [1] is a question-answer website, launched in 2010. The site was founded by two former Facebook engineers, Adam D’Angelo and Charlie Cheever and the company is based in Mountain View, California. Cheever stepped down from the company in 2012 and D’Angelo remains the sole CEO. Although it was founded after popular mainstream question-answer sites such as Answers.com, Yahoo Answers, Ask.com and Quora offers a very different experience. It is separated from other sites primarily due to its highly curated questions, complexity of answers and demographics of the user population. [2] While Quora has yet to reach the usage levels of sites such as Answers.com, it has made big waves in tech-hubs such as Silicon Valley, in India[3] and particularly among individuals who are interested in engaging in decorous online conversation. An important distinguishing feature of Quora is the authenticity of user profiles and presence of “verified profiles”, often belonging to famous and popular individuals. From CEOs Elon Musk, Mark Cuban and Mark Zuckerberg to actors Ashton Kutcher and Jason Bateman to politicians like Senator Cory Booker and President Barack Obama, Quora has attracted an eclectic user base. Given that it is a question-answer site featuring primarily user generated content, there are many potential ethical implications regarding the information that is presented.[1]
Contents
History
Quora founders Adam D’Angelo and Charlie Cheever were both former engineers at Facebook. D’Angelo was also the first Chief Technology Officer (CTO) and a former high school classmate of Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg. Sensing the need for a knowledge sharing website that offered an alternative to typical question-answer websites, D’Angelo resigned from his position at Facebook in 2008 to start Quora. [4] Cheever and D’Angelo first launched the site in June of 2009 and opened it to private beta testers in December of the same year. On June 21st, 2010, the company was open to the public. Around six months after the website went public, the website underwent a major spike in usage in late 2010. [5]
While this can be attributed to the typical growth life cycle of a company, popular technology media outlet TechCrunch also contributed to Quora’s growth. TechCrunch provides a lot of information regarding the Silicon Valley hub and the technology scene in general, and by being publicized on this platform, Quora was able to build its presence. [6] Given the outlets in which it was publicized and the background of the individuals who created it, the majority of the initial content on Quora was primarily related to the tech scene, start-ups, entrepreneurship, and the like. Although, content on Quora has become increasingly more diversified over the past few years, it still remains heavily popular among technology communities and questions related to these topics are most popular.
Funding
Quora was initially funded with over $160 million in capital. Surprisingly, it has no other current revenue model, although the executive team says that they are planning to change this business plan so that investors can gain more liquidity. [7] In 2014, Quora joined the Y Combinator start-up batch, which has been called the “world’s most powerful start-up incubator”[7] Through this, Quora was able receive another $114 million in funding from investors including Peter Thiel and Keith Rabois. Essentially, for the past 7 years, Quora has been running on venture capital funding. Recently, Quora has seen good growth, with over 80 million unique visitors a month. As result, a new revenue generating business model is in the works and it will most likely involve advertisements. [8]
Content
All content on Quora is completely generated by the user base. Questions are asked by users, answered by users, and there is also a user moderation and editing base. As a result, the content that is on the website is dependent on what the users would like to learn more about and have expertise in answering. Quora has been incredibly popular in Silicon Valley and among tech/startup communities and a lot of the content on the site is pertinent to this. However, there is a variety of other as well, ranging from discussions about films, sports, literature, travel, popular culture and a plethora of other categories. Quora is different from other question-answer sites in that many of the questions and answers are well thought out and meaningful, often crafted by individuals who have an interest in sharing this information. [9]
There are a variety of topics with different questions, and users have to be intentional about actively selecting which content they would like to view. Quora provides opportunities for users to customize their feed and accounts. For example, users are able to indicate their knowledge of different topics and this determines what answers are requested of them. This way, users are not flooded with questions they do not know about.[10] Additionally, users can also indicate their interest in different topics, and this determines which questions make up their feed. If a person is really interested in world history and tennis, many of the questions and answers in their feed will pertain to these topics. This helps narrow the focus and prevents users from seeing information about topics that they may not be interested in.
The fact that content is community generated inherently means that some topics will have more content associated with them, depending on user interest. As a result, it may challenging for users to find answers to extremely specific, mundane questions. Quora seems to cater more to discourse and questions related to gaining and disseminating advice and information. [10]
Community
The user base is an important part of any online community, particularly one with social interaction features such as Quora. The site features comprehensive, lengthy and well researched questions and answers, perhaps “because it has tapped into an interesting behavioral tendency of individuals to want to share their in-depth knowledge especially with those looking for it”. [11] Quora has a real names policy, which means that users are required to use their real, full name for their account. However, people do have an option to go anonymous for their responses if they are uncomfortable associating it with their identity. This enforcement of real names encourages people to remain civil and post content that can be traced back to them. Users must create a profile in order to interact on the site, which helps limit internet trolls who may just upvote/downvote or edit random posts. Users are able to “follow” other users and those people also have the opportunity to follow back. All Quora users also have a profile that will allow them to write a bio about themselves, indicate their interests, and it also shows prior questions and answers that they have been a part of. Unlike other question-answer websites like Yahoo Answers or Stack Overflow, where people are not really able to carve an identity for themselves due to the anonymity of usernames, Quora allows people to build a profile for themselves. If someone is interested in Shakespeare, they can follow other people that are also interested in this topic, thereby joining a smaller community of people with similar interests.
Users have to be at least thirteen years of age to make an account on Quora. Apart from that, there are no real restrictions on who can make an account, as long as they register with their real name. Many famous and prolific individuals such as Ashton Kutcher, Justin Trudeau, Sheryl Sandberg, Barack Obama, Mark Cuban, Hans Zimmer and Mark Zuckerberg [12] have all been active on Quora and responded to user questions. Interestingly, Quora seems to very popular outside of the United States, especially in India.
Ethical Implications
Real Names Policy
Quora requires users to sign up with their real, full names before interacting on the site. Answers and questions they post can be traced back to their account. However, if an individual is uncomfortable associating any content with their identity, then they are able to go anonymous.[13] Additionally, corporations aren’t able to register on Quora- only individual users. If an individual would like to say something that is not endorsed by their company, then they must make that explicit in the post. This real names policy has received a lot of attention, due to the possibility of certain groups being negatively affected and misrepresented. [14] Drag queens, transgender folk, Native Americans, and several other groups may have names that do not seem “real” yet are their identity. This is also brings into question the issue of free speech, if certain accounts are being taken down due to the name associated with it.
Content
Quora has a policy against hate speech and slurs cannot be used on the site, [15] unless it is to obtain a genuine definition for something. Additionally, certain accounts can be deactivated on this basis. Quora follows a general “Be Nice, Be Respectful” (BNBR) policy. [16] Interestingly, questions on Quora can be deleted if moderators deem them to be not interesting enough or not capable of eliciting responses. This raises the question of silencing people’s voices based on the opinions of a moderating team.
External Links
