Stack Exchange Raises $40M Led by A16Z to Boost Its Programmer Forums

Post by mandlar » Tue, Jan 20, 2015, 7:21 PM UTC

ajones wrote: post #12

thejosh wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Interesting, which is why the blog post above went on about the careers side of things. I'm sure $40 million would help to push out their Q&A side of things, but looks like they want to spend it on the careers side of things? I hope they get back those 100,000+ job postings :P.

Their careers business has the opportunity to be a revenue generator for the company. The starting cost for a job listing is $495 per 30 days and goes up to $1499 per 30 days. In my opinion, the profiles on Stack Overflow careers allow developers to present themselves much better than many other career sites. http://careers.stackoverflow.com/products/listings

Post by sanderjd » Tue, Jan 20, 2015, 7:25 PM UTC

Kalium wrote: post #99

jordanpg wrote: post #70

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is an ongoing religious war among avid SO users (don't know about the rest of SE) about what kinds of questions should be allowed. Roughly, there are two camps. Those who say that any well-formed, non-dup question of interest should be let in and those who think it's a stop of last-resort after checking all conceivable documentation and scouring the internet. I believe the latter viewpoint is pretty run-of-the-…

The latter group sounds like people who are sick of seeing SO being a place where people are rewarded for regurgitating documentation. I've some sympathy for that.

Post by Kalium » Tue, Jan 20, 2015, 7:28 PM UTC

sanderjd wrote: post #103

Kalium wrote: post #99

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The latter group sounds like people who are sick of seeing SO being a place where people are rewarded for regurgitating documentation. I've some sympathy for that.

This viewpoint only makes sense if you subscribe to the (very silly) ideas that there are a limited number of internet points available and that they matter. Why does it matter to you which people are being rewarded for what?

Post by exelius » Tue, Jan 20, 2015, 7:39 PM UTC

Kalium wrote: post #105

sanderjd wrote: post #103

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This viewpoint only makes sense if you subscribe to the (very silly) ideas that there are a limited number of internet points available and that they matter. Why does it matter to you which people are being rewarded for what?

It matters because people respond to incentives. If what you want to see encouraged is good answers to novel questions, you need a system that rewards that over copy-pasting from documentation. What do you think happens when the two are rewarded equally, but the latter can be done much more frequently per unit of time?

Post by mason240 » Tue, Jan 20, 2015, 7:40 PM UTC

jordanpg wrote: post #70

troymc wrote: post #28

I often ask a question on Google, get taken to a Stack Exchange site, and find that yes, they have my question, but some moderator closed it before it got answered. SE got my traffic, but I didn't get my answer. Isn't that broken?

There is an ongoing religious war among avid SO users (don't know about the rest of SE) about what kinds of questions should be allowed. Roughly, there are two camps. Those who say that any well-formed, non-dup question of interest should be let in and those who think it's a stop of last-resort after checking all conceivable documentation and scouring the internet. I believe the latter viewpoint is pretty run-of-the-…