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Layoffs hit Quora

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Re: Layoffs hit Quora

#241

Post by Andrew_nenakhov »

panorama wrote: post #198
Andrew_nenakhov wrote: post #170

Say what you want about how bad Quora content is, Quora has the most engaging email digest I ever knew. Every day they send me an email with some answers on topics I'm interested in, and I can't help but click on 6-8 of them from EACH email. The median CTR in any other of email digests recieved by me is zero.

I had the same interaction but one day their algorithm flubbed and sent me a question that had very obvious Avengers: Endgame spoilers in the title. I had to unsubscribe after that.

But you should have seen Endgame on the first weekend it was released! /s

Re: Layoffs hit Quora

#242

Post by lmeyerov »

skissane wrote: post #19
arexxbifs wrote: post #9

> a 10-year-old question-and-answer startup Has the word "startup" simply replaced "company"? I'm thinking we should at least draw the line at a full decade.

Often people use the word "startup" simply to mean "private company which plans on an IPO but hasn't had one yet" (as opposed to public companies, and private companies that have no plan to ever IPO) Sometimes a private company can take 10 or more years to reach the IPO stage. This is probably especially true for bootstrapped companies which can grow at a more steady pace than those VC-backed from very early on

Most enterprise startups take 7+ years, so yep!

Re: Layoffs hit Quora

#243

Post by ryguytilidie »

txcwpalpha wrote: post #64
arexxbifs wrote: post #9

> a 10-year-old question-and-answer startup Has the word "startup" simply replaced "company"? I'm thinking we should at least draw the line at a full decade.

I have recently interviewed at one of the largest, oldest educational institutions in the US, and also interviewed at one of the largest tech companies in the world. Both of them used the phrase “want to work at a startup?” in the job descriptions and both hiring manager said something along the lines of “we have a great startup culture”. At this point the word is meaningless to me. If anything I have noticed that “w…

I do consulting and have worked with clients ranging from 3 person seed stage startups to Intel and Nike, so pretty much the whole spectrum.

Really the only difference to me is that startup executives treat your time like it doesn't matter, 100% of the time. At bigger companies, we will schedule a meeting and talk about something. Many of my small inexperienced clients just send Slack messages one after the other at 6PM on a Friday that make no sense and clearly have no thought behind them beyond "this worked for my friends startup, lets try the same thing!!"

It just feels like 95% of startup founders I meet nowadays are so scatterbrained they can't communicate and will certainly never prepare for anything, all while expecting their employees to always be 100% prepared.

Re: Layoffs hit Quora

#244

Post by thr0w__4w4y »

Quora used to be OK, many years ago. I wrote a few detailed technical answers about C, C++ and embedded programming.

Then it basically became GeoCities or MySpace or whatever. Garbage, filled with ads and posters shilling their services and goods, just yucky. Plus, as others have mentioned, doing a simple search, going over to quora, and then being forced to login.

Re: Layoffs hit Quora

#245

Post by erikpukinskis »

thr0w__4w4y wrote: post #244

Quora used to be OK, many years ago. I wrote a few detailed technical answers about C, C++ and embedded programming. Then it basically became GeoCities or MySpace or whatever. Garbage, filled with ads and posters shilling their services and goods, just yucky. Plus, as others have mentioned, doing a simple search, going over to quora, and then being forced to login.

I stopped using it when they pulled the same “you can read this public user-provided comment, but if you want to read the NEXT one, you need to log in” shit that Facebook does.

Re: Layoffs hit Quora

#246

Post by gist »

geofft wrote: post #73
codingslave wrote: post #23

Any company that relies on SEO content is basically going to disapear. Google search and their new NLP technology is just extracting the question and answers from content like that on Quora, significantly reducing their page hit volumes. Not only that, other lower ranked content can be verified to be "true" using neural network based NLP, meaning that the value of content has gone down. Google stole the business of q…

> The content is simply extracted and stolen. How can we have a thriving internet when such monopolistic and profit driven practices stifle innovation and creation on the web? TripAdvisor, Quora, and Yelp are just as rent-seeking and profit-driven as Google. If I write a review on TripAdvisor or Yelp or answer a question on Quora, I, the author, certainly don't get compensated for it. If Quora fails and another compa…

> If I write a review on TripAdvisor or Yelp or answer a question on Quora, I, the author, certainly don't get compensated for it.

But you do get 'compensated' you get a good feeling from it.

Along those lines there are many things that people do in which they get 'compensated' not by money or that money isn't the primary motivator.

Jeff Bezos does not get up and go to work every day because he wants to amass more money 'be compensated for what he does'. Yes it's a by product but I would argue it's not what drives him. He does it for other reasons and has other motivations.

Another example - A woman who volunteers at a hospital and doesn't get paid a salary does it to keep busy and to feel good not for 'compensation'.

Not saying money isn't important. But nobody comments on HN and gets paid although some people have made money as a result of commenting but my guess is that is not what led them down that road or kept them at it. [1]

[1] I say this from personal experience having made (to this day) a boatload of money making comments in another place (really you have no idea). But 100% never did it for that reason at all.

Re: Layoffs hit Quora

#248

Post by StevePerkins »

txcwpalpha wrote: post #64
arexxbifs wrote: post #9

> a 10-year-old question-and-answer startup Has the word "startup" simply replaced "company"? I'm thinking we should at least draw the line at a full decade.

I have recently interviewed at one of the largest, oldest educational institutions in the US, and also interviewed at one of the largest tech companies in the world. Both of them used the phrase “want to work at a startup?” in the job descriptions and both hiring manager said something along the lines of “we have a great startup culture”. At this point the word is meaningless to me. If anything I have noticed that “w…

You have a "startup culture" (because there are sodas in the break room).

I am a "full-stack developer" (because I once worked through a React tutorial).

Recruiting and interviewing is a crapshoot, all around.

Re: Layoffs hit Quora

#249

Post by jammygit »

yamrzou wrote: post #55

I used to enjoy Quora, but it lost its charm and I quit once my feed became mostly filled with questions such as: - As a software engineer, what makes you roll your eyes every time you hear it? - What did your mother say that made your jaw drop? - What can I learn in one minute that will be useful for the rest of my life? Those open questions just feel clickbait-y, with no real value added. I occasionally see questio…

Every answer to a “recommend x” question is just self promoters pitching their own product too. It’s just advertising at that point, not real information

Re: Layoffs hit Quora

#250

Post by cryptozeus »

California Employment Development Department said the company had not filed the type of notice that is required for mass layoffs, suggesting the cuts in the state involve fewer than 50 employees.
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