
Why Not to Use Quora - Reedx
https://waxy.org/2018/12/why-you-should-never-ever-use-quora/
======
askafriend
All philosophical views aside, there are some really core issues that got me
to stop using Quora and unfortunately the case to stop using it is made by the
site itself:

* The content quality has deteriorated significantly since the site's inception. The content is far cheaper than before and far less interesting in very obvious ways.

* Moderation systems have not done a good job of growing the site as a community. The site has lost the character that drew many people to it in the first place.

* The machine learning models terribly over-fit to user signals, creating a frustrating experience.

These 3 core issues with the site are what got me to gradually stop using it
as someone who was initially an early adopter.

~~~
zenexer
I never found the quality to be anywhere near as good as Stack Exchange, even
when Quora first launched. Why anyone would knowingly use Quora over Stack
Exchange is a mystery to me; I suspect that most Quora users simply aren't
aware that Stack Exchange exists, since SE traditionally catered primarily to
a technical audience.

Edit: One of my biggest gripes with the platform is that it's always solicited
a large number of promotional answers. Anytime I end up on Quora, I'm usually
stuck scrolling through a long list of "Use my product, it's the best!"
answers. It appears to make no effort to discourage or remove such content,
and, for whatever reason, those answers tend to get heavily upvoted.

~~~
TheOtherHobbes
SE and Q do different jobs.

Q is better at "soft" knowledge - psychology, personal history, experience,
opinion.

SE is better for "hard" knowledge - clearly-defined problems with specific
solutions.

Having said that, I find SE very, very frustrating.

Given any problem, the answers invariably seem to include multiple takes with
distracting or irrelevant side points; show-boating comments, often nit-picky,
about very minor issues; just plain wrong answers that have been massively
upvoted; no account of chronology - later answers always have fewer votes than
older answers, even if they're better solutions; moderator show-boating with
questions closed for no good reason (e.g. when dupes aren't really dupes.)

SE's problem is that accretion wins over refinement. IMO it should have been
more like a Wiki, with a much clearer distinction between content - i.e. stock
answers, with comments - and debate about content.

I enjoy my Quora feed, but I treat it more as entertainment. I wouldn't use it
for anything mission critical. I actually agree with Q and not the WB comments
- comments about private experiences or opinions are the property of the
authors, not communal property, and authors should have the right to withdraw
them.

Also - FB isn't archived either. Do the WB people have the same negative
attitude to FB groups?

As for SE - sometimes I try to use SE for mission critical problems. Usually I
get a few hints from the answers, then end up having to solve the problem
independently.

~~~
rapind
Yes my biggest pet peeve with Stack Overflow specifically is that instead of
an answer to the question, you'll often see a lecture about how the poster is
doing it wrong. Usually this is because the responder didn't actually read the
question and is trying to get their internet points in before someone else
answers it.

It's not a bad idea to outline a different approach, but it's almost always
better to first answer the question and then add your opinion afterwards. I've
even seen questions where they poster will state "I'm not doing it the
accepted way because..." and still see useless responses saying "You should do
it this conventional way instead" etc.

I think this is just a negative of having a points reward system that
encourages answer sniping. However, without a points system you'd see far less
content. I've accepted it as a necessary evil, and overall I'm pretty happy
with the quality of SO content once you learn to filter out the nonsense.

------
rkho
I used to be a power user on Quora. It's how I learned about the coding
bootcamp that eventually became the catalyst for a huge career change in my
life.

I'd spend countless hours answering questions about my experiences and the
school I attended, with the intention of just helping give back to the
community.

Over the years, Quora became an relentless flood of "ask to answer" questions
that were already on the site, ones asking me to compare "X coding bootcamp vs
Y coding bootcamp" (like, how would someone know if they only attended one?),
or just ridiculous comments from entitled people who expected the world with
their questions.

I eventually deleted all of my answers and deactivated my account. It's just
no longer worth contributing to a site that's very obviously devolved to
"Yahoo Answers, with influencer spam"

~~~
robocat
Why delete all your answers?

~~~
shakestheclown
Personally, I've considered deleting all mine because quite often years old
posts will get flagged for spam or inappropriate material or some other rule
despite it being the top voted (and often only) answer. I used to reply and
send them their own rules back that they claim I violated and get 90%+ lifted,
but after a couple old answers got flagged in the same week and it locked my
account for x amount of time I stopped dealing with them. And often I'd have
to appeal the same post over and over again anyway. It would get blocked, I'd
get it reinstated, and then it would get blocked again so it was just
frustrating.

I used to be top 7 in a specific niche but it wasn't worth dealing with their
moderation appeals constantly. It's not quite as bad now that I am not in the
top lists.

------
sidkhanooja
Quora used to be good before 2012-13(?), what with its credit system and all.
You had a fixed pool of points to ask questions. Potential people who wanted
people to ask them questions could arbitrarily set their points, and these
points were deducted from questioner's pool, and added to the answerer's pool.

When this was removed, it was the beginning of the end. Clickbait, self-
promotion, rabid people-centric cults, unrelated answers (no person X, you
should not answer with a sob story for 'what's the weather like in Seattle
these days?'), no question details allowed, answers catering to the lowest
denominator, crappy feeds, and (imo) the worst - _fabricating_ actual
relationships, sob stories, and credentials (IIT/MIT/etc.) to garner more
views and become a top writer (w/e that's worth).

And the rabid and toxic community is nauseous, to say the least. No
enforcement of community standards means that every non-mainstream opinion (or
even an opinion that goes against the Quora mainstream) is lambasted as if you
had insulted the commenter's family.

Although HN's moderation policy may seem caged to some, it is the reason for
the quality of the community's discussions. Quora is a textbook example of
what happens when users are given freedom to do whatever they want to. It is
the reason why I deleted my Quora account happily (even though I had 1M+ views
on my answers, and I liked answering the most mundane of questions) - the site
is not worth the time you devote to it.

------
madmax108
I was a hardcore user of Quora till a few years ago. In fact I was in the top
50 or so most followed users back when the site was growing (mostly thanks to
a couple of my answers that ended up blowing up)

For me personally, Quora was special because the people on it were so
different from each other. My first few follows were a NASA engineer, a
published author, a student with radical views on theology etc.

But over time, with popularity, the site has devolved into a homogeneous
mixture of people with similar views on most topics, from the same strata of
society, mostly from the same country(/ies), with the same educational
backgrounds, same sense of humour (My friend used to joke that the average
writer on Quora is INTP Engineer from IIT who is working at a MNC but wants to
change the world through NGO-work).

I think the change came about when Quora stopped charging for asking
questions. This led to a flood of nonsense questions and a flooding of
experiential questions over factual ones (eg. What is it like to be an older
sibling vs. Why is the Attack on Normandy considered a turning point?). And of
course experiential questions have waaaaaay more people who want to share
their experiences on the same.

I think the day I lost hope entirely was when I was A2A "If Pakistan kidnaps
Sachin Tendulkar, what would India government's response be?" (Yes, I'm
Indian, but this question is silly in itself and the chest-thumping answers on
this were even sillier).

Today, I still use Quora, though the last answer I wrote was about 3 years
ago. I still have about 9K followers, but I follow a carefully curated list of
about 70 accounts. It's utility as a website to "share knowledge" is very
limited and I look at it today as essay-Twitter (Similar noise, similar
debating, but just like Twitter, once in a while something good shows up)

------
breck
> Contrast that with Q&A competitors Stack Overflow and Stack Exchange, which
> offers an API, a wealth of user-made tools and support community for it, a
> powerful Data Explorer for querying and exporting data, a liberal crawling
> policy, and doesn’t attempt to hide questions and answers behind
> authentication. They even proactively upload anonymized data dumps of all
> user-contributed content to the Internet Archive for posterity under a
> Creative Commons license.

I was unaware that Stack Overflow/Stack Exchange did this. I'm very happy that
I deleted my Quora account a couple months ago and that I've been contributing
more to the SE sites lately.

------
codedokode
I avoid Quora links in search results because it hides content from
unauthenticated users and I don't understand why I have to register only to
read the answers. Stackoverflow is so much better.

I wonder what is the motivation for the users to contribute to a site that
hides their knowledge from others?

~~~
mettamage
Control.

Or is that answer too simple? I think control, final answer. I don't know why
control though.

~~~
anonymouzz
Can you explain? Whose control over what?

------
burtonator
This applies to Facebook, Pinterest, Instagram, and every other major 'social'
platform today.

Data goes in - it doesn't come out. Can't explain it!

They're walled gardens.

What's frustrating is that users don't care. They simply do not care.

Their data leaks, it's sold to the Russians, and they keep coming back.

~~~
wDCzI78WRQaC1e3
My favorite is when a product bends over backwards to make it easy to import
data. And then pretends that it's never heard of the word 'export'.

Export data? Yes, it's very easy to import data!

------
mr_puzzled
Does the root cause of all these problems with quora come down to being vc
funded and needing high revenue numbers and growth rates? Imagine quora was a
site driven by the community...

It's a conundrum, only a vc funded site can reach such scale, have great
growth etc but when the time for monetization comes, everything starts going
downhill. A site driven by a foundation for example, rarely ever gets to any
sort of scale. How can this problem be solved?

~~~
hn_throwaway_99
TBH, I'm actually quite impressed that Reddit has lasted as long as it has and
is still as vibrant as it is. Yes, of course there are tons of cesspool and
misogynistic/racist/tribal areas, but I've found that I still like and
frequent my niche smaller subreddits, my city subreddit (tons of trolls there
but they are always downvoted and good content bubbles up) and the larger "eye
candy" subreddits like r/aww.

My guess is that Reddit explicitly did _not_ try to put VCs number 1 in their
priorities, unlike, say, Digg.

~~~
baroffoos
Reddit was ruined with the redesign. Its buggy and slow. I get stuck on a
loading screen on mobile for about 20 seconds before the page loads and half
the time just shows an error. The desktop version also keeps logging me out
randomly and forgetting I opted out of the redesign.

~~~
hn_throwaway_99
I only use old.reddit.com, I agree I hate the redesign on mobile.

~~~
SOLAR_FIELDS
I still use i.reddit.com on mobile. Pretty fast, pretty good UX, and
functionality wise has most of the non-power user features one needs. No ads
either. I’ve tried to switch over the years to various apps as they’ve come up
but in the end have always preferred the minimalist text with small thumbnails
that runs quick on any browser.

------
skilled
These are some good points. I find it particularly annoying that answers get
blocked out unless you're logged in. Stinks like a dark pattern from a mile
away.

And I agree with a lot of the comments made so far. The quality of answers has
detoriated a lot. In all fairness, this has largely to do with the fact that
so many people now see Quora as the 'go-to marketing platform'. As a result,
people write crappy answers in hopes that someone will click their
'educational and informative' links to full blog posts. And it's unlikely this
is going to go away, since moderating at this scale isn't possible without
losing a lot of money in the process.

Another thing that really annoys me about Quora is that the site promotes the
same people and answers almost exclusively. You have a lot of 'self-made
experts' who happen to have had exposure on a large TV network or something of
sorts, and all of a sudden their answers have become the gospel of knowledge.
This approach makes the site feel one-sided without any real depth to answers.

That being said, it's not all bad. I enjoy writing answers on topics I know
about (200k answer views in 4 years), and you can generally get someone to
answer something for you rather quickly.

------
ryanmccullagh
I used to enjoy browsing Quora about 4 years ago. Then It started showing up
in Google search results for any obscure thing I would search. Most of the
time I view a question, there is some type of product placement in the
answers. It's not of high value to me anymore. Stack Exchange is much, much
better, and even reddit.

How do these guys honestly have a real business? I know the founder was Zuck's
friend.

------
bachmeier
I haven't used Quora much over the years, so maybe it has an actual reason to
exist, but I was under the impression that it's a site with fake/barely real
questions, with answers by folks trying to sell something. I don't think I've
ever had a search result where I clicked on a Quora link and there wasn't an
attempt to sell/market something in one or more of the answers. Then you click
on other questions, and you're supposed to register. I've always assumed it's
a junk site.

~~~
dhimes
One of the original draws was asking a question and getting an answer from a
guru. Like asking a question on SO and having Torvalds politely respond. It
was actually a feature, not too far removed from Reddit's AMA.

------
AndrewKemendo
Honestly, in the last few years Quora answers are just terribly bad.

It's basically turned into yahoo answers but instead of the top answer being
vapid, it's vapid and an ad for some service.

------
moltar
To be honest, most hits on Google with Quora results are spam. I don’t see any
value, unless it’s tucked away in some industry specific topics that I’m not
interested in.

------
piyush_soni
I had decided to close my Quora account permanently when they just outright
denied the ability to read answers on mobile (even if you're logged in) to
force you to use an app instead. May be it's right time to do just that.

------
jasonwen
I have been a passive user on Quora for a while now. At one point several
years ago it forced me to sign up for reading an answer. This sucked.

However, I started receiving weekly digests, which included interesting
questions and answers. I enjoy reading those digests and learned a bunch,
professionally and personally from life experiences from other people. I never
interacted until this year. It's good Sunday afternoon reading material for
me.

Since I started answering questions this year (I became a top writer in
certain topics), I've seen the other side too. I usually do not answer
questions for pleasure only. I sometimes plug my business at the end of the
answer but always make sure I answer the question and add value. I usually
spend 1-2 hours on a question and I make Quora specific graphics to support my
answer. Sometimes I do need to do extra research so this is where the 1-2
hours come from. I can see not everyone can spend this amount of time if it's
not your business. The way I see it, people don't mind if you plug in your
business if you provide value first.

Generally I'm a bit more positive than the average commenters here, as I
received invaluable knowledge which changed and also solidified some of my own
views. I've never compared Quora with SE, probably due to my use-case as to
soak up experiences from other people instead of a source as factual
information.

The value Quora provides for each individual depends on the selected topics
when signing up and what you click-through in your digests. Somehow I ended up
with interesting life experiences topics and never technical topics. I like
airplanes but no aviation expert, but somehow I ended up receiving experiences
from travellers, pilots, and crew. I find those experiences amusing to read.

I suggest to try to read and follow some of the niche topics outside
programming, I think that's a better use-case for Quora.

------
thisisananth
I used to lurk on quora. Once I read an answer to anonymous question, my feed
started to full of those anonymous questions. I tried hard to curate my feed,
by closing the questions I didn't want to see. But I got the same kinds of
things still, albeit with different questions. Agree I saw some of those
questions, but it seemed as if I could no longer curate the feed with what I
wanted and the algorithm especially popular on quora feed couldn't be avoided.
So I started logging out and viewing answers of users I am interested in the
answers of by directly going to their profile. But quora started pestering me
to login if I viewed more than two questions, so I gave up and stopped using
the site. It is a shame as there are some good writers whose content is only
available on Quora as far as I know but now I cannot read it without reading
all the crap answers in my feed.

------
stevebmark
What? Don't use Quora because it's Quora, not because of lack of APIs. Anyone
can answer any question about anything. Like Reddit, Imgur, Wikipedia, this
crowd sourcing of information leads to constant liquid garbage. People like to
teach what they don't know and speak about nothing just to speak.

~~~
Nuance
Anyone can answer, but I’ve found the Quora system to be pretty good at
surfacing who knows about a given topic because of credentials attached to
names.

~~~
manigandham
Those credentials are just a textbox. You can say you're an expert in
anything.

~~~
Nuance
I believe there’s a verification process if you say you’re a PhD.

------
tw1010
Because every question is some variation of "What should I do to become rich
or financially independent before 30?". The whole site stresses me out, and is
probably counter productive if that's the goal I even wanted to achieve.

~~~
anjc
It shows questions based on what you've looked up previously. You must have
looked this up. I only see questions about research methodologies, for
example.

~~~
tw1010
I guess I'm stuck in a bad equilibrium/filter bubble then (which only hurts
Quora because I haven't been on the site for ages, precisely for this reason).

------
todd8
Quota and Stack Exchange fail me in a particularly noticeable way. A few years
ago I decided to really learn Java, I think this was around Java 7 time frame.
I’ve programmed now for over 50 years, so naturally I knew Java well enough to
read most of it even though I’d never developed with it.

This is where Quora and Stack Exchange seem like they would be very useful for
answering questions about say type erasure or why my Eclipse configuration was
giving me problems. What I discovered was that because of the almost universal
use of Java by universities, the answers to every basic Java question were all
over the place. So many questions, so many answers of questionable quality. It
was like strolling thought a College stopping random students and asking them
for help with Java. Somewhere, there is that really bright CS student
providing good advice, the problem is finding him.

For just slightly more difficult Java questions (like “what does this
Hibernate error message mean”) there might be no answers. Apparently, not to
many students are using Hibernate.

Anyway despite having to take Java related answers with a grain of salt, Stack
Exchange (and spin-offs) have been great for answering so many of my questions
(LaTeX is actually fun to use because of Stack LaTeX Exchange).

------
Noumenon72
Quora is one of my top Internet destinations at the moment -- you can find
anything from [why farmers don't use silos any
more]([https://www.quora.com/What-was-very-useful-when-it-first-
cam...](https://www.quora.com/What-was-very-useful-when-it-first-came-out-but-
is-useless-today/answer/Jonathan-Johnson-41?ch=99&share=b2364c7e&srid=OUaT))
to [true facts about Jeff Dean]([https://www.quora.com/What-are-all-the-Jeff-
Dean-facts?ch=99...](https://www.quora.com/What-are-all-the-Jeff-Dean-
facts?ch=99&share=bcf83cba&srid=OUaT)) to [how to compensate
salespeople]([https://www.quora.com/What-should-a-CEO-know-when-he-
designs...](https://www.quora.com/What-should-a-CEO-know-when-he-designs-a-
compensation-system-for-the-employees/answer/Stan-
Hanks?ch=99&share=43b79ec0&srid=OUaT)).

I don't care about getting my data out any more than I care about not having
transcripts of the conversations I had last month.

What I do care about is that Quora lets people delete comments on their own
answers, meaning they can just lie with no way of being shamed and there's no
point contradicting them.

------
rchaud
In my experience, Quora was a godsend in the early 2010s when we were all
still reeling from the prevalence of Yahoo! Answers results on the first page
of Google. Quora was new and contributors worked hard to provide high quality
answers.

Then people's worst instincts crept in. High profile users with lots of views
in popular topics realized they could use Quora as a "brand building vehicle".

Within maybe a year (2014?), Quora was a very different experience. What used
to be simple, to the point responses became lengthy, thought pieces peppered
with references to one's own website, ebook or online course.

Unsurprisingly, the replies to people's responses dried up around this time as
well. I remember seeing real discussions in the comments and the authors
constructively discussing issues with the commenters. I rarely see that now.
Usually it's just a display of view and likes.

There isn't really a Quora community anymore, just self-styled experts.

~~~
kkarakk
seeing what medium has become i truly think the methodology behind medium was
"you know quora? i think we can do the same with a better UX and more of a
focus on a western audience"

------
tjpnz
It's interesting that StackOverflow is mentioned. They make no secret of the
fact that they set out to kill Experts Exchange - they recognised early on
that locking up content was going to hurt their longterm prospects. They also
recognized that traditional online advertising wasn't going to work for their
kind of content and pursued other monetization strategies to supplement it.
Which is why I'm surprised that the founders of Quora continue to beat down
the same tired path that has killed so many startups before them. Do they
seriously believe that what worked for their previous company is going to work
for them at Quora. For a platform that's all about discussing big ideas they
seem surprisingly bereft of them on the business side.

------
NoPicklez
One part of the article that I really disagree with is the part about the
Wayback machine. As much as I believe it's important we retain the information
we put on the internet, I fully support that if I put something on the
internet and I am the creator of such content, I should be allowed to remove
that content I created if I wish.

This is closely aligned with the GDPR's "Right to be forgotten", yes this is
in relation to different information but I'm simply describing its intent. But
eventually, this level of control should be given to all of us who share
content on the internet. That we the curators of such content can ask of the
provider to take reasonable steps to remove such content. And that if a
provider wishes to restrict how widely dispersed its creators content travels
then that's fine. Just because something has been posted online, doesn't mean
it needs to travel far and wide.

Now yes, if I post something on the internet and I never touch it again I'm
happy for it to hit the Wayback machine. However, I believe it to be important
that if I did ever want that information I created to be removed, I'd have the
ability to do so. Now if the Wayback machine does not allow this replication,
then I understand why Quora do not allow them to use it.

If anything its a battle on both sides, a battle to provide control to the
content creators around the content they create. And a battle with trying to
archive everything that exists on the internet and making it publicly
available regardless of the content creators current wishes.

Don't get me wrong, if you post something online expect it to be on the
largest most accessible encyclopedia of information of all time. But times are
changing, and we are starting to implement controls to protect our digital
identity and the information we create online. My argument, is that if a
content provider wishes to restrict how far and wide the information I curate
on its service is spread, then there's nothing wrong with that. We should not
be shaming content providers who wish to provide as much power to the curator
as possible.

~~~
zenexer
You don't actually have the right to be forgotten, even within GDPR. That
provision was heavily modified before GDPR passed, and the final phrasing
doesn't really grant you the ability to erase all of your content from the
internet. (If I recall correctly, the term "right to be forgotten" was also
largely replaced with "right to erasure" in the actual text of the law, with
the intent of indicating that you had the right to erase certain content
stored in certain ways by certain services, but you couldn't truly be
"forgotten.") Remember, a lot of this information isn't actually personal, so
it's mostly not covered by GDPR anyway.

If you post something to the internet, it's permanent. Lawmakers can say all
they want, but someone somewhere is storing it regardless of laws, and it can
get out again at any time. From a security perspective, it's irresponsible to
provide people with the illusion that they can erase their tracks; they'll
believe they can truly eliminate all trace of what they said and prevent any
future consequences when that's clearly not the case.

~~~
NoPicklez
Of course, let's not get too wrapped up in the GDPR's actual text. It is
"Right to erasure" but is still known and referenced as "Right to be
forgotten" as well.

My intent was to put forth what it is describing, which is to allow the user
to request the erasure of their information and subsequently that provider
should then take reasonable steps to do so.

If that provider, chooses to keep content creators information more central to
itself and not allow it to be as widely spread. Then that's more power to the
curator and could be something that Quora wants to uphold.

On the same token, just because something has been posted on the internet
doesn't mean that the provider of such content is obligated to spread it as
far and wide as they want. They are allowed, to take efforts to restrict is
movement.

~~~
zenexer
GDPR is almost exclusively for personal content (as in: name, email address),
whereas most of the content on Quora isn't personal. GDPR makes no effort to
allow you erase that.

You can certainly take efforts to restrict its movement, as Quora has done
here. It's mostly futile, though, especially in this case. Archive.org might
not be willing to save it, but I guarantee plenty of comparable services are.

~~~
NoPicklez
Zenexer, again you fail to see what I'm trying to say.

I'm simply taking one of the GDPR principles and applying to them a wider
variety of information outside of just PII.

------
luord
Well, as far as Quora's excuse for opting out of the archive goes... It is an
admittedly great one.

------
Cyclone_
I really don't see why not choosing to archive their data for privacy reasons
is that big of a deal. I personally find it much better than having everything
stay forever. I've always found the notion that everything must be shared with
the whole world quite strange.

------
dandare
> Nearly every major online service has had a security breach: Facebook,
> Google, Twitter, Yahoo, Tumblr, Uber, Evernote, eBay, Adobe, Target, and
> Sony... Security breaches like these are a strong argument for using a
> password manager...

I don't recall a major password manager security breach, but I am afraid it is
only a question of time. And the consequences will not be just compounded,
they will be multiplied.

~~~
kokx
This is why most password managers use encryption to store your passwords.
They should never be sent to the provider of the password manager in plaintext
form.

And if you are still afraid of that, use a password manager which does not
store it's data on somebody else's server.

------
King-Aaron
I never signed up to Quora, but they made me an account and started sending me
notifications anyway. Several of my peers found the same thing.

~~~
smt88
Someone probably signed up using your email address. It happens to me weekly.

~~~
felipemnoa
Don't they verify that you own the email address?

~~~
smt88
Most sites don’t, at least outside EU. They have to let you unsubscribe, but
can otherwise email you all they want.

------
peter_retief
For me Quora has improved, I get really interesting answers emailed to me on
topics I find interesting, Roman history is one

~~~
cauldron
[https://www.theverge.com/2018/10/5/17940650/how-history-
gets...](https://www.theverge.com/2018/10/5/17940650/how-history-gets-things-
wrong-alex-rosenberg-interview-neuroscience-stories)

~~~
peter_retief
indeed

------
exotree
It’s a bit odd that the author did not seem to take on Quora’s legitimate
concern over a writer’s ability to edit or remove content from Quora and to
then see that reflected in Archive. There are consequences to that, sure. But
honestly that makes me want to contribute to Quora more.

------
dakial1
My experience with Quora is that it is a modern Yahoo Answers. Every time I
end up there (because it appeared in a Google results page) the answers are
always somebody trying to promote their product, page, etc related to the
topic at hand. Not an expert but a biased entrepreneur.

------
joelthelion
I don't like Quora. But I'm still looking for a good alternative.

~~~
haskal
A proper subreddit.

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tokyodude
I'm curious, doesn't the GDPR require sites allow users to download all their
data, in other words their questions and answers on Quora? The article claims
they don't allow this.

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robertsd247
I agree with this article 100%. I have posted answers on quora to only have
them disappear. There doesn't seem to be any rhyme or reason on posts,
moderation, and who sees what answer.

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anonu
I agree with the view... But how do you get non HN people to stop using Quora?
Ultimately it's that much larger audience that determines if it lives or dies.

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brogrammer2018
I am a bit late to the party, but I also dislike how Quora blurs the text if
you are not logged in. Sometimes I am incognito mode so this is a problem.

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firexcy
I followed the “Math” topic and found my feed filled with silly, primary- and
middle school- level homework questions.

That’s when I stopped to use Quora.

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farazzz
What is a good alternative to Quora?

I know of Stack Overflow/Exchange however you can’t ask open ended questions
there

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piyush_soni
I asked it directly to Quora, but they didn't answer (so wondering if someone
knows the answer here). According to GDPR, if I request them, they have to
delete all of my data they ever had - Is my understanding true here? I want to
do that, but I'm afraid if they'll actually do it.

------
MistahKoala
Has Quora not peaked already? I was a fan of it in the early '10s, but around
2013/14 it seemed to experience an influx of users who turned it into an
alternative to Yahoo! Answers. With no way of filtering them out, it seemed
pointless continuing to use it.

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techsin101
spammers with Indian sounding names killed it. Question how much is 3*3?

You'd get 40 answers spamming their website, 20 life stories of completely
uneventful event, and then answer 9 repeatedly posted like 11 times.

~~~
java_script
Holy shit I just logged in for the first time in years and on my homepage was
pretty much that. No life stories but way more than 40 answers.

[https://www.quora.com/If-14x-14-14-what-
is-x](https://www.quora.com/If-14x-14-14-what-is-x)

------
thecleaner
Just block answers by Indian users. It will be alright again.

~~~
system2
Sad but true, but it will never happen. Quora is traffic hungry and get
millions of visits (if not all) from India region. It is literally cancer at
this point.

------
cauldron
The Chinese copy of it "Zhihu(Did you know?)" has become a distribution center
of misinformation and misconception, a haven for "folk-science", all driven by
financial gains, why would "clever ones" waste time on the internet if they
can't make a buck out of it afterall, and if it's not a pragmatism populist
hangout, how can they make their most valuable eyeballs keep coming back.

But the sin of it is it makes you think your are "clever" too, and both the
website and the answerers are willingly fabricating, promoting and propagating
deleterious garbage.

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gurumeditations
Quora was great years ago, but now it’s just a glorified Yahoo Answers full of
Indians giving non-answers and fake stories in broken English.

~~~
cdogl
This bizarre racism seems quite off-topic.

~~~
stickfigure
On one hand I feel the same reaction you have to the parent, phrased this way
it sounds like he/she is denigrating a whole nation.

On the other hand, there was something that happened here that we should
probably talk about.

A few years ago some of the topics (especially human-relationship subjects)
experienced a sudden surge of content from people from India. I know many
smart and erudite Indians, and these new users... weren't. I don't know what
happened. Maybe Quora suddenly became a fad with the pre-teens in India? Kids
online are generally insufferable from all cultures.

The platform didn't digest this well. Quite a few topics that used to be
interesting suddenly became filled with garbage. I stopped watching many. Now
I seem to just get bombarded with WW2 trivia, which is ok I guess, but I kinda
miss "the old Quora".

It's an awkward subject but the parent's comment can't just be discounted as
racism.

~~~
shard972
> Kids online are generally insufferable from all cultures.

Hey man thats ageist! I know X kids that are probably smarter than the average
adult!

Maybe we should have a conversation on ageism now.

~~~
dang
Could you please stop posting unsubstantive comments to Hacker News?

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sonnyblarney
The other reason is that it's turning into Yahoo answers ...

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vtesucks
Quora logs you in automatically if you're logged in to google.

Also makes it extremely hard to log out.

Not to mention they have no respect for users.

~~~
scrollaway
I don't know how you think this is actually possible. It sounds to me like you
just logged in using oauth…

Edit: Hey, downvoters, it's not possible to just use Google's login mechanism
without prompting an initial OAuth flow at some point in time. If it is,
instead of proving me wrong here, tell Google how and you can make some good
money out of it.

As was said below, if you want, you can revoke tokens here:
[https://myaccount.google.com/permissions](https://myaccount.google.com/permissions)

~~~
vtesucks
I did, once. But after that one entirely new sessions, they automatically
"click" the sign in to google button behind the scenes and log me in with the
token.

Very creepy

~~~
AYBABTME
I don't like Quora, but... that's just how OAuth is meant to work.

~~~
ceejayoz
I will say I appreciate Facebook's approach to this - after 60-90 days, you
have to affirmatively _re_ confirm your initial authorization when they send
you through the OAuth flow.

