
I'd like to use the web my way, thank you very much Quora - johns
http://www.hanselman.com/blog/IdLikeToUseTheWebMyWayThankYouVeryMuchQuora.aspx
======
pg
I think Adam's mistake here is to go too much by the numbers. He presumably
has numbers that show that Quora ends up net ahead if they force people to
create accounts to read answers. He grew Facebook very effectively by
following the numbers. But he may not realize how different this case is from
Facebook's. It may well be that for a site like Quora, at this stage in its
life, users are not all equal. It may be a mistake to alienate the sort of
people Quora has been alienating by doing this, even if they end up
numerically ahead in the short term.

I'm one of them. Quora has now spent several years training me to be bummed
out every time I click on a link to their site. Every time it happens, I
dislike them more, and become more resistant to creating an account. I now
think of it as a site for other people, who are willing to put up with the
stuff they do. I'm pleased to find there are others like me.

I like Adam, but I wish he'd stop doing this.

~~~
mickhagen
Here comes the mob. Really? Are we all gonna throw up our arms because of
this? We use _their_ service, we consume, read and digest their content like
blood-suckers and now we get mad they're asking us to sign up? PG you've been
reading Quora for "several years" and you think it's unjust they are asking
you to sign up?

Quora has let us eat at their house for years and now all they're asking is we
take off our shoes before entering. Let's not forget, we're in their house!

As an entrepreneur, how will we ever convince users to actually pay for
products when the mob and pitch forks come out when they ask us to sign up?

We are so entitled it's sad. Really hope Quora doesn't bow down here. They
aren't asking for your first-born. If you wanna be a member of their
community, then be a member. Nothing unfair about that.

~~~
Katelyn
I agree with this argument, but not necessarily the tone of it.

Quora is a business as much as it is a consumer facing service with a strong
mission to uphold. But the reality is, if Quora didn't keep its numbers out of
the red and into the black by doing "annoying things" like forcing app
downloads or account creation, then they would run out of capital and cease to
exist. So, take your pick. Or better yet, just stop complaining.

Also, their mobile website isn't fully functional or in some cases usable. I
beta test it, and it's riddled with bugs and missing features. Frankly, a lot
of services today are skipping mobile web all together, and focusing on
driving app downloads to provide a richer experience.

Bottom line: Services valuable to end users are also running a businesses. We
must learn to give and take.

~~~
lusr
The StackExchange network does very well without resorting to any of these
tactics.

~~~
TeMPOraL
Exactly. Assuming what GP wrote would be true about Quora going out of
business, maybe it would be better to just let them die? At some point someone
will come who will strike the right balance between providing quality, earning
money and not being annoying. They will survive, and we'll be better off.
StackExchange network proves that it is possible in this case.

------
astrodust
Once Quora started blurring answers like Experts Exchange, I had no use for
it. You're holding user-contributed content hostage? Go away.

Complaining about usability on Quora is like complaining about not having
privacy on Facebook.

~~~
kintamanimatt
I forgot about Experts Exchange! I used to love them, but when they broke
their shit all I had was a medley of frustration and rage every time I bumped
into their site until they went away. Shame they screwed up so badly.

On a side note, what does Quora achieve by forcing people to view the data
using a native app rather than through the browser? It seems a little ...
pointless, or perhaps I'm being unduly myopic with regards to their strategy.

~~~
greglindahl
Quora is an iPhone-only app. Too bad for all those retina iPad users, you paid
for all those pixels in vain.

------
eliben
Interesting. Such tricks is exactly why Stack Overflow originally went against
Expert Exchange, promising never to hide user-contributed content, and
explicitly licensing it as Creative Commons.

Quora is its content. Its content is user contributed. Hiding such content
from other users is just plain evil.

~~~
martinced
StackOverflow does _modify_ user-contributed content and have very serious
moderators issues.

Which is why I'm sure there's going to be something new coming along one of
these days: something where users are in control of what they post (e.g. _not_
a wiki _unless_ the user who did post does accept _himself_ others' edits).

Collaborating to answer questions is fine. But modifying and closing questions
artificially (due to very serious moderators issues) isn't acceptable either.

So I'm waiting for the next big thing and I'm sure it shall come.

~~~
damian2000
The difference is that SO mods are actually trying to improve the quality of
the site, or at least that's their purpose. Whether people perceive them as
doing that in all cases, that's another issue.

Quora is hiding answers to make you sign up.

~~~
mmahemoff
Furthermore, SO makes it very clear when someone has updated a question, so it
couldn't reasonably be misattributed to you. (It shows the editor's avatar and
date.)

------
SquareWheel
My only experience with Quora has been Googling for a question, seeing they
"blurred" the answer, and immediately closing the tab. Was I really expected
to make an account? I don't have time for that, there's a dozen other search
results I could be checking instead.

My first and only experience with them, and I assumed they were just another
scummy ExpertSexChange type of site. We have open platforms, no need for this
nonsense.

------
halfninety
I have been hating Quora all along for this, and wondered whether this
constitutes cloaking (because they serve different content to Googlebot and
the user), which is against Google's TOS.

The following are excerpts from Google's First Click Free (FCF) program
page[1]:

    
    
        If you offer subscription-based access to your website content, or if
        users must register to access your content, then search engines 
        cannot access some of your site's most relevant, valuable content.
    
        Implementing Google's First Click Free (FCF) for your content allows 
        you to include your restricted content in Google's main search index.
    

Apparently Quora's answer to this is: "Wrong! We don't need to implement FCF
to get our restricted content into Google, we simply cloak!"

    
    
        To implement First Click Free, you need to allow all users who find 
        a document on your site via Google search to see the full text of 
        that document, even if they have not registered or subscribed to see 
        that content. The user's first click to your content area is free.
    

So clearly the program applies in Quora's situation, yet Quora doesn't follow
the program's guidelines to show "the full text of that document". I see this
as strong evidence that Quora's actions violate Google's TOS, because
otherwise what's the point of the FCF program?

[1]:
[http://support.google.com/webmasters/bin/answer.py?hl=en&...](http://support.google.com/webmasters/bin/answer.py?hl=en&answer=74536)

------
dinkumthinkum
I just can't understand why Quora continues ... in an existential sense (why
does it exist). I also find it odd when anyone in this sort of community has
anything but derision for it. They want to play this identity game and control
their users like little children. It's just too much. At least Experts
Exchange, in the old days at least, didn't basically ask me for my social
security number to figure out why my winmodem wasn't working or whatever.

~~~
Helianthus
Who would have thought we'd be nostalgic for Experts Exchange.

~~~
rdtsc
At least EE had the funny mis-pronunciation -- "expert sex change" going for
it.

------
andymcsherry
I'm hoping that Google will penalize them someday. They download all the
content in the page so that they'll get indexed for it, but they don't offer
it up without an account to the user.

~~~
niggler
How would google determine that the content being served to other users differ
from what the crawlers see?

~~~
andymcsherry
Probably if enough people report them for cloaking:
<https://www.google.com/webmasters/tools/spamreportform?hl=en>

~~~
niggler
Well, I did my part in reporting quora. I wish there were a way to track the
progress of this report. The process makes me feel as if the message was lost
in the ether

------
dylangs1030
Yep. In the past month or so, I've been conditioned not to click on Quora
links for disappointment-avoidance.

"Oh, look at that, someone had my exact problem on Quora!" ... "Fuck this
nonsense, I'm going back to Stack Exchange/Google."

...Which then prompts this response: <http://xkcd.com/979/> The answer might
as well be that far away.

This drives me up a wall. I hate it when websites try to restrict their
readership so brazenly.

On the one hand, I respect that the website has the authority and right to
control its own information. On the other hand, it was submitted by a
collective pool of users, and I just don't have the time to bother with side-
stepping the shitty blurring mechanism. I just learned not to click on Quora
links anymore.

~~~
codeka
Worse than <http://xkcd.com/979/> is when the only answer is the OP saying
"never mind, I figured it out."

------
jamiequint
To steal a quote from Chris Dixon (<http://cdixon.org/2010/01/22/techies-and-
normals/>):

"1. If you are loved first by techies and then by normals you get free
marketing and also scale. Google, Skype and YouTube all followed this
chronology. It is startup nirvana.

2\. The next best scenario is to be loved by normals but not by the techies.
The vast majority of successful consumer businesses fall into this
category..."

This is a case of #2. I know many "normals" who really don't care and just
sign up or download the app. It is probable that Quora alienates some
percentage of its content writers by doing this but probably not enough to
account for the absolutely massive increase in lift it is seeing as a result
(I would guess 3x minimum conversion improvement to account creation from just
this one change.) If they don't break out of the tech minority the company is
not going to be valuable anyway so it does not seem to make sense to optimize
for that audience.

All comparisons to Experts Exchange (where you had to pay to sign up) are
totally overblown, signing up for Quora takes less than one minute and its
free. It's just not that difficult to even be worth complaining about. You are
not entitled to the Internet your way as the user of a free product. As the
saying goes "if you are not the customer, you are the product".

~~~
arocks
That's an oversimplification of the situation. A Q&A based site like Quora can
be compared to it's predecessors like Experts Exchange or Stack Overflow
because the content is simply enhanced by greater participation of experts.
The early adopters could be techies or otherwise, but they _will_ notice the
increase in friction for sharing and using content.

Also the problem is not really "signing up". As the article points out,
downloading another app just to read content on the web feels like a overkill
to most people (even non techies). Especially when the most common means of
searching for answers remains Google which is usually found in the browser.

~~~
kamaal
Frankly speaking I don't see the problem at all. If you are a rare user/reader
at Quora not installing the App won't hurt you or Quora. If you are a regular
user you will install anyway!

Besides these days who worries about login's when there is unlimited supply of
free email accounts.

~~~
DenisM
Most frequent users start off as infrequent users. By discouraging infrequent
users, you prevent formation of frequent users. That's the business argument.

Personally, I just hate it when I click a google link and land on a blurred
page. It's deceptive to promise an answer and then make me jump through the
hoops before telling me what it is, all of which happens before I even know if
the answer was good.

~~~
jamiequint
That is secondary to my point which is that people like you, a founder &
developer who cares about cryptography (just guessing from your profile), are
not like most people ("normals").

------
spankalee
I hit this on Android the other day and quickly closed the page and put Quora
out of my mind. I'll never use it again.

~~~
bengillies
It's funny because (on Chrome at least) you can select the "request desktop
version" option from the menu and this goes away completely (although you do
still have to login).

------
nwh
It's one sucky business model. Force people to sign up in the hopes that
they'll stick around. It sounds fun, but the existence of services like
BugMeNot says otherwise.

~~~
MatthewPhillips
I don't think that's the plan at all. This is so user hostile that they _must_
be at the point where they don't feel they need to grow any more (I find it
very hard to believe they are still growing with these moves).

------
eshvk
I don't agree with the author's opinion on the New York times's block being
inherently evil. I am unsure of how else they could make money. The block is
not hard to circumvent if you know enough to clear cookies. It is designed to
give you just enough discomfort that you will probably cough up and pay for
the articles (which are incredibly well written) than the Quora style which
makes me want to rage and delete my account.

~~~
zem
the "evil" bit is not that they have a paywall, it's that they both want to
have a paywall and use the organic google search results for free advertising.

------
ozataman
I close the tab _immediately_ and without a second thought every time I get
their "you must be a registered..." page after following a link there.

This is like forcing a girl to say "I love you".

------
shurcooL
I completely agree with the article.

Apps are just fancy web bookmarks with some advanced abilities (interruptions,
native code, state). I prefer to have as little apps as I can get away, so
anything that can be viewed in a browser, I view in a browser.

I just want to know if you can get around this forced solution by picking
"Request Desktop Site" in Chrome for iOS?

~~~
aaaqw
you give them too many rights when you install their app

------
xefer
I've never understood how anyone thinks they can be successful by making the
web worse.

~~~
T-hawk
Because "successful" is defined as baiting users into yielding their personal
information in order to force-feed them ads and other marketing junk. Success
isn't defined as users finding what they want or otherwise having an
informative or pleasurable experience.

The ur-example: Zynga and their addiction-center manipulators that masquerade
as games. Zynga succeeds if they pay, not if they enjoy it.

------
dmor
I also noticed they force you to login on the desktop version in order to read
answers. Maybe this works, but the friction was seriously annoying and as a
really active social media they probably missed out on a Facebook post or
tweet I would have made about what I found.

I feel like it is a bait-and-switch, because as an early user I LOVED LOVED
LOVED Quora and contributed a ton. Now I'm just annoyed by them all the time.

~~~
intellegacy
If you could redesign Quora, what would you come up with?

------
gallerytungsten
How much money does Quora have left, and what is their burn rate? Are they
making any revenue? It seems not.

------
return0
I don't understand how it is comparable to the NYTimes at all. Times pays
people to write articles, not appropriating random people's free content.

------
lukejduncan
Even worse are mobile sites that ALWAYS display a full "download our app!"
page.

The New York Times handles this rather gracefully I think. Go to a mobile page
and they have a swipable banner that says "hey we have an app, but you can
easily ignore me."

I wish more sites would do this. I understand you want conversion to your app.
I get it. But stop undermining your mobile experience. Sometimes it's what I
need / want.

~~~
r00fus
The worst part of the "We have an app" div/interstitial is that sometimes I
have that app - and I'd love for the page to redirect me.

Instead, that's too hard, and they can't detect installed apps on my phone, so
I get the spam every time.

------
fabian2k
A second "feature" of Quora that is an absolute deal-breaker for me is that
they require real names for the accounts. And I imagine that I'm not the only
one who doesn't want to use their real name on just any site on the internet.

And am I the only one who finds the whole interface totally confusing?
Navigating the site is anything but intuitive, and I never even found a list
of topics/tags.

------
ardacinar
The desktop version basically begs you to login with facebook or google
account. Sign up with email is a much smaller link. Basically, the site
screams "We need your data so much! We're begging for your data! It's our only
monetization scheme" and if someone is that desperate for your personal data,
chances are they're not going to do good things with it.

------
jrochkind1
> [nytimes paywall measures] These techniques are wide and varied. They appear
> to look at your IP, use cookies, use HTTP_Referer, use URL querystrings.

"Appear" what now how? Nope, it's just cookies. Very easy to defeat for anyone
who cares on the desktop -- somewhat harder on apple walled garden mobile. But
apparently good enough for their revenue, so.

~~~
shanselman
Hm, I looked into this, and as of recently you could get around it just by
changing the QueryString: [http://twitchy.com/2013/02/12/paywalls-are-hard-
new-york-tim...](http://twitchy.com/2013/02/12/paywalls-are-hard-new-york-
times-attempts-to-plug-paywall-leak-fails-miserably/)

The cookies are for the number of times viewed, yes.

The HTTP Referer header is used to tell if you came from google or twitter:
[http://www.labspaces.net/blog/1258/Thwart_the_NYtimes_paywal...](http://www.labspaces.net/blog/1258/Thwart_the_NYtimes_paywall)

They definitely look at IP address for geographic reasons:
[http://blogs.hbr.org/samuel/2011/03/on-the-new-york-times-
pa...](http://blogs.hbr.org/samuel/2011/03/on-the-new-york-times-paywall.html)
but you are correct, they don't appear to use it for the paywall.

Thanks!

------
mark_l_watson
I will admit my bias: paying NYT subscriber, here.

The article has two main issues:

Nagging to install an app: yes, I hate this also. Quota, Techcrunch, etc. have
been pretty bad about this.

NYT trying to pay for 300+ staff: reasonable. I sometimes use their app and
sometime just use the email news summary they send me every morning. Works
well for me.

------
MatthewPhillips
This was posted an hour ago and still no one has released a bookmarklet to
circumvent? Come on HN!

~~~
walkon
That's not a bad idea. Here is some bookmarklet code that retrieves and
displays the actual answers when hovering over the blurred out answers. The
downside is, it cannot do anything about the answers that do not have a
permalink (clickable datestamp).

    
    
      javascript:(function($) {
        var $answerTextDivs = $("div.answer_text:has(.blurred_answer)");
        function heal() {
            $answerTextDiv = $(this);
            $answerLink = $answerTextDiv.find("a.answer_permalink");
            if ($answerLink.length === 0) {
                showError($answerTextDiv, "could not find answer - no permalink.");
                return;
            }
            $.get($answerLink.attr("href"), function(d) { 
                var $permaAnswerDiv = $(d).find(".answer_text");
                $answerTextDiv.empty();
                $answerTextDiv.append($permaAnswerDiv.first());
            }).fail(function(e) {
                showError($answerTextDiv, "ajax call failed - " + e);
            });
        }
        function showError($container, message) {
            var $errorDiv = $("<div>");
            $errorDiv.text(message);
            $errorDiv.css({
                'background-color': 'red',
                'color': 'white',
                'padding': '2px 6px',
                'position': 'absolute',
                'margin-top': '38px',
                'z-index': 2000
            });
            $container.prepend($errorDiv);
        }
        $answerTextDivs.one('mouseenter', heal);
        $.ajaxPrefilter(function(options, originalOptions, jqXHR) {
            /* this is to prevent annoying UIX usage tracking POSTs to Quora */
            if (options.type === 'POST') {
                jqXHR.abort();
            }
        });
      }(jQuery));

~~~
NamTaf
I have a bookmark on my iPhone that scrolls to the bottom of the page using
Java. Is it not possible to hack something together that takes the hidden data
(since the OP says it loads the actual info behind the white blocking screen)
and reveal it instead of the white?

It's another couple of button presses but if it fucks them over for this
scummy tactic I'm all for it.

~~~
walkon
The iOS version should be easy since they actually send all the answers to the
client and hide them. This works with my pretend iOS 5 iPhone (via Chrome):

    
    
      javascript:(function($) {
    	$(".app_promo, .app_install_dialog").hide();
    	$(".answer_text").css({'margin-left': '110px', 'width': '88%'});
      }(jQuery));

~~~
NamTaf
I tested it - it reveals the text just fine but the text sits off to the right
of the page and you can't scroll or zoom to reflow the text in to the screen
size.

Thanks for the first-pass at it though!

------
niggler
Quora does the same thing in chrome when you aren't logged in ...

PS: I can't think of ExpertsExchange without being reminded of the url fail.

------
Osmium
Quora is irritating in this respect; they're always so _pushy_. They keep
sending me weekly digest emails even after I asked them not to and repeatedly
tried to unsubscribe. As it happens, I then started reading them and found
them quite interesting, so I guess it worked -- but I still resent the tactics
used.

~~~
lmm
You've made those tactics succeed. It is _your_ fault that sites keep using
them.

~~~
Osmium
I thought there was a legal requirement to have unsubscribe links that work? I
was charitably assuming the unsubscribe function was broken by accident rather
than by design. Furthermore, this tactic only works if the site has content
interesting enough to overcome the extreme irritation that ignoring my
attempts to unsubscribe: this is not only rare, but the site is shooting
itself in the foot. There's no way I'd ever let a Quora app have access to my
phone after pulling that kind of stunt.

------
oscargrouch
This is not just about Quora, its more about Apple.. Apple is funny, cause its
innovation creates the technology of the 2010-20, but with the old-fashion
corporate mentality of the 80's.. it wins in the short-term because of its
innovation quality, but lost in the long-term because of its yuppie/greedy pig
style management: "Im a shark, i want all the market for myself and i will
crush the competition trying to bite my cake"

This is also why Google in the long-term are winning, and this is also
something to worry about, because its becoming more and more a monopoly
colossus of technology; and as Andreessen use to say; "software will eat the
world"

Quora are just replicating the bad/wrong side of Apple.. like a lot of old-
mentality companies are doing.. trying to surf in the Apple's vacuum

Just bad for them. Just another company to be forgoten because of bad(greedy)
decisions

------
kawsper
I am on Quora, but I can't for the life of me remember how I signed up. One
day I got an e-mail saying that somebody was following me.

There seem to be some interesting debates going on there, but I haven't used
it that much.

------
seanp2k2
Stack Exchange > Quora in every way possible.

Also, what quora is doing here REALLY seems like a black-hat SEO technique.
They're baiting you with the link and then switching on you to download their
app.

If I were Google, I would blacklist their whole domain for this crap and
explain again what cloaking is if I were pressed on for an answer:
[http://support.google.com/webmasters/bin/answer.py?hl=en&...](http://support.google.com/webmasters/bin/answer.py?hl=en&answer=66355)

------
sgdesign
Maybe I'm the exception but I really like the new "download this app" banners.
Much less intrusive than the standard splash screens and integrating them with
the OS makes sense.

------
spc476
Hmm ... it seems like it's a replay of the web circa the late 90s.
<http://boston.conman.org/2013/02/07.1>

------
brador
Who owns the content on Quora?

Could someone just scrape all the user contributed stuff and start a new site?
Even if it was just all flat text I'd use it. Would this be legal?

~~~
skymt
Quora's terms of service allow for republishing[0] of any amount of content
posted after April 22, 2010, so long as the user didn't mark it as not to be
republished. There are a few caveats around attribution and a requirement to
update content on request if Quora's copy changes, but it's actually fairly
liberal.

0: <https://www.quora.com/about/tos> (search for "Quora's Licenses to You")

------
ehc
Totally agree with the article also. I've run into this in the past when
getting there from search results, and it makes me really hate Quora.

------
shirov_39
<http://blog.intercom.io/if-its-important-dont-hack-it/>

------
jimzvz
I have no issue with quora wanting you to sign up to use their site but to
allow their pages to be indexed by search engines and then hide content on
those pages to humans unless they sign up (with their "real name') is
ridiculous. With $61 million, you would think that they could hire someone to
tell them that this is a bad idea.

I too have been trained to avoid quora search results.

------
vegashacker
Nitpick on the NY times stuff: In my experience at least, they do not paywall
you for links that come from an email, as the author claims. It's only links
that originate from clicking to articles when you are already on the site that
count against your monthly limit of 10. Links from Google, Twitter, email, etc
all take you straight to a paywall-free article.

~~~
shanselman
Ah, good nit, I'll double check. Maybe I've met my limit on all my browsers.

~~~
vegashacker
Nope, I'm wrong. I think actually nytimes has been changing stuff recently,
but I just reproduced a case where I was blocked even by emailing myself the
link. Pasting the link into Google still works tho.

------
jscheel
I've generally written off Quora because of their poor growth hacking
techniques. What struck me about this article is the the data usage. I didn't
realize they load the entire answer onto your phone, only to cover it up with
the "use our app" junk. I know it's not a lot of data, but this still appears
like a pretty big lack of respect for users.

------
abalone
It's even a little worse than loading the whole page. Quora has some sort of
poorly implemented background process constantly polling the server for
updates. Look at the page load indicator -- it never stops. This drains
battery like hell, even if you just have a quora tab open in the background.
For a page that can't even be updated.

------
seanp2k2
You know what happens when I'm clicking through a SERP link and you give me a
pop-up asking me if I want to download your crappy app? I hit the back button
in mobile safari and find an alternate source of information.

No one wants your crappy forum reader app. Stop bugging me about it _every
single time_ I visit your damn site.

------
baali
Something in same lines, recent xkcd strip, <http://xkcd.com/1174/>

------
ishansharma
I've landed many times on Quora but then left site because they allow me to
read only one answer without siging in.

This has been something that really irritates me. They are doing same thing on
phones now. I don't know about others but from me, they are not getting any
visits now.

Remocing Quora from my Google search results in 3..2..1..

------
volandovengo
I really don't understand why people are so up in arms.

First everyone was in love with Quora, now everyone hates them? What changed?

Yes - they want you to join their community because their ecosystem depends on
people signing up. I signed up for Quora once and since then it's never forced
me to sign in again.

~~~
venomsnake
Because people hate being coerced to do something. Stackoverflow didn't need
to force people to do so. A Q&A site only purpose is to give you the best
possible answer. FAST. Anything else degrades your experience.

If quora breaks me out of the flow to register to their site ... they have
cost me way more productivity than they could possibly bring back.

------
jamesmcn
The day this happened was the day I stopped contributing to Quora.

I did not delete all my contributions, but almost did.

------
damian2000
Another thing I dislike from Quora are their annoying "Kumar asked you to
answer this question" style emails that come in addressed to you. Its probably
their way to increase the answer rate. I think I did actually contribute an
answer on the first one of these I received.

------
cwharland
The mobile quora experience is pretty horrible. The site has some gems of
information but at the same time a vast amount of questions go unanswered and
there is a not insignificant troll ish community growing. Hopefully they can
find a way to turn it around.

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edem
I concur. The first time I saw that "you need to register" sign I laughed and
noted to myself "these guys will never reach the popularity of stack exchange
with that dumb restriction". I never opened Quora again.

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diziet
When viewing a site's content that shows up high on google's search requires
me to break out the inspector and hide divisions, or to spoof being a
different user agent, something is wrong... very wrong.

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eranki
I used to like Quora a lot but always hoped it would grow out of its Silicon
Valley cliqueyness... I think a lot of these recent changes ensure that it's
going to continue only serving that niche.

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raintrees
The amount of sites I have to use View Source to get to the content is slowly,
slowly creeping up...

But then I also get to paste it in vim or gedit and don't have to deal with
all the visual spam...

------
aaaqw
scrape quora's content and share

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joelthelion
There is still a need for a good general-purpose Q&A website, that doesn't do
this stuff or close half of the good questions like SE does.

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d0m
I hate when they say "Log in to read the answers".

------
alanho
I am fine with iOS smart app banner. Real problem to me is "view in app" never
deep link to the content I originally intended to read

------
xy0l0x
Does anyone else think there might be a correlation between the amount of
anti-user stuff at Quora and Charlie getting kicked out?

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orangethirty
So do you think I should black list them on Nuuton? I'd rather not waste my
time with a site that does this.

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jheriko
bth, i have no idea how Quora achieves anything. The service is kind of okay I
guess, but I was thoroughly turned off by my first visit. I got to read one
answer 'for free'... I cant remember what the price was I had to pay but 'far
too much' is how I remember it.

------
lttlrck
Download our app!! <http://xkcd.com/1174/>

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nasmorn
The real problem is Google not throwing them out of the index

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timc3
This reminds me to get around to removing my account

~~~
tiramisu
Good luck. They don't allow you to delete your account unless you write them
an email, which they don't seem to answer.

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jpd750
Amen to this post! This is SPOT ON!

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cncool
Quora is a horrible site.

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dreamdu5t
Try telling the manager that.

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Buzaga
Just opened Quora to see if my user was still there:

User name: Alsfkj Alskfjaslkfj

E-mail Quora probably sends weekly e-mails: alsfkj@x.com

(sorry if any of you owns x.com)

~~~
rurounijones
This is a good place to use alsfkj@example.com

With example.com (which cannot be registered) you know you are not potentially
smacking around the domain of a poor company

~~~
rdl
I usually use the site's own domain -- so a fake account on quora gets an
@quora.com domain.

~~~
pi18n
I do that too! I felt bad for the postmaster at fuckyou.com. It's weird but
this technique has not yet been rejected, whereas mailinator gets rejected all
the time.

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smegel
Seeing things like this makes me want to punch a hole in the wall.

------
chazandchaz
Important expression of opinion

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joshualastdon
Look, I love Quora and what they are doing. You like quality answers and want
to get access to the community of users providing it? Then, at the least make
the tiniest contribution back to that community by creating an account.
Simple!

~~~
pg
How does someone merely creating an account contribute to the community?

~~~
Robin_Message
If you create an account, they have another user which makes it easier for
them to raise money and/or figure out a way to monetise in the future, which
means they are less likely to die, which means you have contributed life to
the community.

Of course, actually having a business model might be a better plan for them,
but there have been plenty of QA sites that have not found a model that works,
so that sounds harder than just getting more users.

~~~
pg
What investors care about is how many people used the site last week, not how
many people have accounts.

