Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Quora collects $80 million in funding

cnet.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

31–40 of 110 posts

Re: Quora collects $80 million in funding

#31

Post by not_paul_graham »

yalogin wrote: post #11

Can someone explain how there a place for Quora? The only niche I can think of is generic technical advise. Stackoverflow answers all the tech questions but they are overly pedantic to the point of ridiculous when it comes to generic tech questions. Hackernews should have been the correct place for generic tech advise but we don't see questions of that nature here. May be as far as tech advise goes people from startu…

There is a place for Quora because it has helped build a community of users that provide extremely valuable advice / answers in a nicely presented format. I'd pay atleast $10 USD per month to save Quora if there ever was need for it.

Unlike reddit or yahoo answers, answers are often provided by real members as opposed to hollow or anonymous accounts and it also serves as a collective wisdom center for past experiences of other humans that you can refer to.

I'm unsure what the correct mix is, but Quora is at the sweet spot of:

twitter + r/askreddit + yahoo answers + ask HN

-> Want to know how to transition from engineer to a job at a VC firm? Well you have folks like Leo Polovets (Current VC, early Linkedin employee /Engineer at Google, Factual) provide extremely detailed answers that are well written and more or less permanent. You know the dude is qualified and is somewhat credible [0].

-> Want to know how Stripe got its name? Well you are in luck because Stripe CTO tells you exactly how [1].

-> Where else can you ask about the evolutionary purpose of menstruationand get a response from a PhD in Zoology? You know its on Quora [2] (unless you want to get trolled on reddit).

[0] http://www.quora.com/How-does-one-move-from-being-an-enginee...

[1] http://www.quora.com/Stripe-company/How-did-Stripe-come-up-w...

[2] http://www.quora.com/Menstruation/What-is-the-evolutionary-o...

Re: Quora collects $80 million in funding

#32

Post by smackfu »

yalogin wrote: post #11

Can someone explain how there a place for Quora? The only niche I can think of is generic technical advise. Stackoverflow answers all the tech questions but they are overly pedantic to the point of ridiculous when it comes to generic tech questions. Hackernews should have been the correct place for generic tech advise but we don't see questions of that nature here. May be as far as tech advise goes people from startu…

One of their killer features is the weekly email digest. Find questions that have good answers, and then promote them to users who have said they are interested in that type of content.

Re: Quora collects $80 million in funding

#33

Post by wpietri »

hitchhiker999 wrote: post #16

I have a q&a site with 4 million visitors a month - an ESL learning site. We have 2 employees, total cost https://siteanalytics.compete.com/quora.com/ they have only a million visitors a month??? - I'm guessing that must be wrong. My question: What in pickled f*s are these people doing with 80 million on a Q&A site? How far out of the reach of reality is this industry?

As an aside, I am delighted that there are 4 million people learning English from somebody who uses the phrase "pickled fucks". They are, and I mean this sincerely, in very good hands.

Re: Quora collects $80 million in funding

#34

Post by hitchhiker999 »

wpietri wrote: post #30
hitchhiker999 wrote: post #16

I have a q&a site with 4 million visitors a month - an ESL learning site. We have 2 employees, total cost https://siteanalytics.compete.com/quora.com/ they have only a million visitors a month??? - I'm guessing that must be wrong. My question: What in pickled f*s are these people doing with 80 million on a Q&A site? How far out of the reach of reality is this industry?

It is a really good Q&A site. I was a Quora Top Writer in 2012 and 2013, and I've also built a lot of web stuff and spent a lot of time studying web communities. Purely from a craftsmanship perspective, they've done an incredible job. The visual design, the interaction design, the writing and reading experiences, the social incentives, the notification system: all of it is top notch. That said, I have never understoo…

I do like their simple form and layout, they have indeed got an elegant site. Nice piece of UX engineering without a doubt.

There can't (in my v. humble opinion) be any realistic way of recouping 80 million from a Q&A site. They would surely need to be extremely aggressive at the least.

Re: Quora collects $80 million in funding

#35

Post by wpietri »

leobabauta wrote: post #4

I also really dislike their model of making you sign in to see more than one answer. Annoying your potential users is a bad policy.

Depends on the economics of your business. It could be more profitable to lose some of the easily annoyed if you can get the rest to come back on a more regular basis via email contact.

But yeah, that's a big bone of contention both inside and outside Quora. The people who write a lot on Quora generally hate it, because it limits their audience. The Quora management, though, believe it is strongly to their advantage. They've never published stats or even their full reasoning, but they are quite firm in their belief that their data shows it working for them.

Re: Quora collects $80 million in funding

#36

Post by yalogin »

pmorici wrote: post #18
yalogin wrote: post #11

Can someone explain how there a place for Quora? The only niche I can think of is generic technical advise. Stackoverflow answers all the tech questions but they are overly pedantic to the point of ridiculous when it comes to generic tech questions. Hackernews should have been the correct place for generic tech advise but we don't see questions of that nature here. May be as far as tech advise goes people from startu…

"Hackernews should have been the correct place for generic tech advise but we don't see questions of that nature here." In my experience HN isn't a great place to ask questions like that, at least not any more. I tried to post an "Ask HN" question about pricing hardware and working with re-sellers the other day. First, under a newly created account so I could share more details; that submission was immediately killed…

Its a shame. This is exactly the group of people that could guide you in the correct direction. But I guess that is a lot to share for companies. I for one would have loved to see answers to that question myself. Did you post it on Quora and did you get any responses there? If so can you paste the link here?

Re: Quora collects $80 million in funding

#37

Post by hitchhiker999 »

wpietri wrote: post #33
hitchhiker999 wrote: post #16

I have a q&a site with 4 million visitors a month - an ESL learning site. We have 2 employees, total cost https://siteanalytics.compete.com/quora.com/ they have only a million visitors a month??? - I'm guessing that must be wrong. My question: What in pickled f*s are these people doing with 80 million on a Q&A site? How far out of the reach of reality is this industry?

As an aside, I am delighted that there are 4 million people learning English from somebody who uses the phrase "pickled fucks". They are, and I mean this sincerely, in very good hands.

Lol, cheers! OFC The last person you want teaching English is a coder. I have many thousands of volunteers to help with that ;)

For the first 3 months of our site (before help came) 'grammar' was spelt wrong on the header.

Re: Quora collects $80 million in funding

#38

Post by wpietri »

hitchhiker999 wrote: post #34
wpietri wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It is a really good Q&A site. I was a Quora Top Writer in 2012 and 2013, and I've also built a lot of web stuff and spent a lot of time studying web communities. Purely from a craftsmanship perspective, they've done an incredible job. The visual design, the interaction design, the writing and reading experiences, the social incentives, the notification system: all of it is top notch. That said, I have never understoo…

I do like their simple form and layout, they have indeed got an elegant site. Nice piece of UX engineering without a doubt. There can't (in my v. humble opinion) be any realistic way of recouping 80 million from a Q&A site. They would surely need to be extremely aggressive at the least.

Yeah. Having served some time in the magazine industry, there's a common pattern there:

You decide to make something way better than the existing alternatives. Your smart and literary friends tell you it's a great idea, because they want something better too. You find inexperienced investors with the same vision, and present them with early samples that make them say, "Yes! This awesome! Let me invest in your vision." Then you start shipping, and the small fraction of the population that isn't satisfied with mid-market stuff signs up and praises you. You're not profitable, but everybody is so excited that you keep going, possibly for years, getting new investor money and never selling as much as you hope.

Basically, it's like making a quirky indie film and thinking it will be a $500m blockbuster because you and your friends love it so. My fear is that Quora's on exactly the same path. That this new chunk of money comes from an outsider, Tiger Global, worries me further.

Re: Quora collects $80 million in funding

#39

Post by pmorici »

yalogin wrote: post #36
pmorici wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Hackernews should have been the correct place for generic tech advise but we don't see questions of that nature here." In my experience HN isn't a great place to ask questions like that, at least not any more. I tried to post an "Ask HN" question about pricing hardware and working with re-sellers the other day. First, under a newly created account so I could share more details; that submission was immediately killed…

Its a shame. This is exactly the group of people that could guide you in the correct direction. But I guess that is a lot to share for companies. I for one would have loved to see answers to that question myself. Did you post it on Quora and did you get any responses there? If so can you paste the link here?

Yes, http://www.quora.com/What-are-some-important-things-to-keep-...

The gist of the answer was your relationship with a reseller should be one of mutual respect and shared success and typical discounts to a reseller should in the 20-25% range on the low end for an established product and perhaps as high as 40% if the re-seller will invest a lot in marketing and commit to buying very large quantities upfront.

Re: Quora collects $80 million in funding

#40

Post by not_paul_graham »

hitchhiker999 wrote: post #16

I have a q&a site with 4 million visitors a month - an ESL learning site. We have 2 employees, total cost https://siteanalytics.compete.com/quora.com/ they have only a million visitors a month??? - I'm guessing that must be wrong. My question: What in pickled f*s are these people doing with 80 million on a Q&A site? How far out of the reach of reality is this industry?

I know that $140 million sounds like a lot, but when they IPO after rejecting the 2 billion acquisition offer from Google, Goldman Sachs will peddle QUOR to institutional investors, and surely they will be able to recoup the $140 million investment + a 10x return if the stock pops.

On a more serious note, Quora users have a better profile for advertisers because they are likely to be in the top brackets for income and education and unlike an English Q&A site the topics on Quora are limitless. You could target ads at 20-40 year females that have a PhD and live in New York very easily.

Also from the looks of it the decision might not purely be for financial gains. Adam D'Angelo is apparently one of the smartest people around (as referenced by Mark Zuckerberg in some interview) and also independently wealthy so keeping yourself in his good graces might lead to future positive outcomes not entirely related to Quora.

Also Tiger Global is run by a youngish hedge fund manager born into old school money family and he probably pals around in the same circles as Zuckerberg, Adam D'Angelo, Charlie Cheever, other young SV entrepreneurs with FU money and this seems a lot like friends helping friends (this is just a hypothesis which might not be true).

It can also be that the investors know something compelling that we don't know or are hoping that Quora will be the next big social thing after Facebook / Pinterest / Twitter / etc.

Post reply on HN