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Thanks to Quora, now you can’t read anonymously

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101–110 of 191 posts

Re: Thanks to Quora, now you can’t read anonymously

#101

Early last year, when I was starting to get into using Quora, I stopped using it abruptly when I realised how limited their privacy features are. Basically, I wanted to contribute quite heavily to the Depression topic. I'm a sufferer and I wanted to be able to help other people. But on Quora you have a choice of answering a question either Anonymously or as yourself, the problem with answering as yourself is that all…

Why not unlink your FB account? I don't have FB linked to Quora.

Re: Thanks to Quora, now you can’t read anonymously

#102
post #9

Quora is in the same boat as FB (and to a certain extent, Twitter) They think that the experience of their largely 20-something staff is anything short of revolutionary. A bunch of kids running a digital media company with questionable morals and no connection to digital history. I will delete me Quora account. So far I have gotten little value from it. Time for it to have no data on me. Deactivated! Edit: I followed…

> anything short of revolutionary.

I think you mean nothing short of revolutionary.

Re: Thanks to Quora, now you can’t read anonymously

#103
I'm going to sound like a broken record here, but Quora users are the product, not the customer. Quora wants to make money and they can make more of it by showing everyone who is looking at what. If they can go to advertisers and say, "See, we know every single question people are interested in, so you can get better value out of your clicks! We show this information to everyone, so we have no problem letting you tailor your placements to exact criteria."

Then they can charge more. It's simple as that.

Quora was a darling. It was started from the inside. We didn't expect this one did we?

Why oh why do we keep creating content/value for random people we don't know when we could create a blog on our own website? When we could create a product that has value to us and others and benefits us in a direct and measurable way?

Creating that content is work. Answering those questions is work. It takes time. It takes energy. It takes concentration and value away from work that benefits YOU.

OMG, I'm doing it right now!

Re: Thanks to Quora, now you can’t read anonymously

#104
post #103

I'm going to sound like a broken record here, but Quora users are the product, not the customer. Quora wants to make money and they can make more of it by showing everyone who is looking at what. If they can go to advertisers and say, "See, we know every single question people are interested in, so you can get better value out of your clicks! We show this information to everyone, so we have no problem letting you tai…

I think it must also benefit you, otherwise you wouldn't be doing it, basic human needs are tapped by the quota model (and here on hn too), recognition, self expression, philanthropy etc. Thanks to the subtle game mechanics employed by quora (and hn) these needs are exploited to create a symbiosis, you help them create content that that they can use for their purpose and in return you get those needs met, and create habits around them thanks to the dopamine reward cycle.

Re: Thanks to Quora, now you can’t read anonymously

#105
post #16

Quora has gone the way of expert-sexchange, showing up in Google search results for interesting questions, but then overlaying/replacing most answers with blur and "sign up to read". Borderline SERP cloaking, to say the least.

I have always assumed this was what Quora is about, but I have never seen a Quora result show up in a Google search? Is this supposed to be the case for a company with that focus, or am I just not using the right queries?

Re: Thanks to Quora, now you can’t read anonymously

#107
post #7

I've learned to go with the flow and trust them when they make changes like this. My first impression is usually to want the 'old Quora' back but once I get used to them, the changes do nearly always improve the experience. I would imagine this will be the same. They are very skilled at interpreting needs and desires we didn't know we had and quickly correcting themselves the times they do make mistakes (like the rec…

very skilled at interpreting needs and desires we didn't know we had

This is basically the same line that I use when I'm mocking targeted ads and joking around with friends about how thankful they should be for them. If your edit wasn't there I would have guessed this was a level aka fooling someone w/ sarcasm or non-serious remark.

Re: Thanks to Quora, now you can’t read anonymously

#109
post #98
post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> This shit doesn't fly with Google. Not only does this shit fly but Google are doing it on their own websites. EDIT: I'm guessing you don't believe me. Try clicking on a Google Groups link. This article has another example: http://www.seobook.com/googles-youtube-caught-cloaking-spam-... Google repeatedly violates the "guidelines" they try to force on other webmasters.

> Not only does this shit fly but Google are doing it on their own websites. I am not claiming Google is benevolent. As I mentioned above, if a user searches for "rails select in query" and the user clicks on experts-exchange result summary showing partial answer only to be taken to the page where answers are hidden, the user failed to find something on Google. May be he will blame experts-exchange, but he will blame…

I just want to point out that search results like Quora or Experts-exchange, are definitely not going away. Some websites might be penalized here and there but I haven't seen any consistent efforts to stop them.

In fact, Google wants even more such results. See First Click Free: http://support.google.com/webmasters/bin/answer.py?hl=en&#38...

Oh and here are 240 million login-walled pages: https://www.google.com/search?q=inurl:groups.google.com/grou...

Re: Thanks to Quora, now you can’t read anonymously

#110
Headline: Thanks to Quora, now you can’t read anonymously.

Reality: Quora launched a feature called "views", announced to everyone upon logging in that it was automatically enabled, and is disabled with three clicks from any page on the site.

I wasn't particularly happy when I was opted in, and immediately turned it off. Then, after a few hours, I turned it back on and saw that it was actually a pretty useful feature to see how people were getting to my content. I noticed that a few of my followers were "connectors" of Quora, through which half or more of my views on an answer came. This, I feel, is useful and relevant information.

Yes, being opted into a less private setting is unsettling, but I trust Quora at least as much as any other company. This is the first time I've been opted into anything, their settings are incredibly easy to figure out and are granular, and I trust the people that run the site.

I'll add that this seems to bother non-users more than people who actually use the site regularly.

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