Sites that allow users to post questions for other users are growing in popularity and Guruza looks like an especially interactive one. It was created by Rich Collins, Adam Thorsen and friends under the name One Room Software in Palo Alto.
Here’s how it works. You ask a question and set a price you’ll pay for an answer that satisfies you. Users can scan the list of questions, leave their replies and the person who posed the question decides which if any answer they like best. That person receives the financial reward, transactions performed in PayPal. Guruza takes 20% when you cash out with the money you make answering questions.
How do you know people will pay? Each person who poses a question has the number of questions they’ve asked and the number of answers they’ve paid on displayed below their name. How simple is that? It’s an active little community already, with most but not all questions being about software development.
The best part is AIM, GTalk or Jabber IM notification when users you’re watching come online or when some one wants to discuss your question. You get a link to an inline chat sent via your IM client. All the answers and discussions are viewable by users even after the question is closed, so there’s a lot of potential for building a cool public knowledge base here.
The site developers say we should watch for a major design upgrade next week. I think it’s a pretty nice system already.
There are any number of different ways to get a question answered online, but I like this one. If free information is what you’re looking for, it’s hard to beat the sheer mass of brain power at Yahoo Answers. Ask.Metafilter costs five dollars to get in once and you’ll get lots of answers of varying quality. Google Answers has a fifty cent listing fee per question and is tough if you suffer from Google exhaustion. Oyogi is free but rarely used. Qunu requires a jabber compatible IM client.
I like the simplicity and interactive features in Guruza. I also like that it was put together by a couple of guys and their friends. I’ve already put it to use in asking one question and I may continue to do so if it works out well for me.
I use Guruza quite a lot and I must say I like it! You pay when you get a good answer (ie: you don’t pay for nothing). It is simple to use, unobstrusive and fast.
I signed up as an “expert” so I can make money when people have questions. I get notified of new questions directly in Google Talk, which is convenient (no client to install!). Their 20% on cash out scheme is fair. If you don’t cash out, the service is totally FREE. I personally use the money I make as an expert to pay for questions I have! I think it’s a good way to help the Guruza community grow.
Guruza has my 5! Can’t wait to see the redesign! Congrats to Rich and Adam.
I like qunu.com better. It is easier to use and understand and they said they are working on adding transports.
Sasha.
http://www.snimmer.com
Congrats Rich, site is looking good.
Great review. I took a look at both Qunu and Oyogi a while back:
http://mashable...-a-killer-idea/
http://mashable...ns-and-answers/
Both neat, but Yahoo Answers is way ahead of the pack.
Guruza can potentially deliver a more satisfactory experience than services like Qunu and Yahoo Answers for a couple of reasons. Most of these services tend to be just another iteration of expert exchange, there is no real connection to the expert. Yahoo Answers is largely for the trivial questions posed by trolling teenagers. Guruza provides realtime notification and allows you to get connected with an expert directly. Another huge difference is that Qunu and Yahoo answers are free and really don’t give much incentive for experts to provide answers for you, especially difficult ones. However, Guruza creates a competitive environment where experts compete to answer your questions for the all mighty greenback. I can see alot of developers benefitting from Guruza and as more experts come on board, System Administrator and end users alike will also gain the answers to many questions that they desperately need answering.
So you only pay when you are happy with the answer? Maybe I’m missing something here but couldn’t you just “say” you’re not happy with the answer when you are but get away without paying anything?
-Chris
http://www.SwitchDiscs.com
I looked at Guruza, and it seems pretty nice and useful and everything, but Qunu is better in my opinion. Why? Well Qunu has enough experts already, and it’s not hard to become one. Yeah, Guruza has more, but you only need 1 person who knows the answer to help you, and unless it’s a very hard or complicated question, it doesn’t seem hard to find an expert who knows the answer to your question. You said that one of the disadvantages of Qunu was tht you need a Jabber-Compatible IM Client to use it, but that is only partly true. The expert needs the client, but the question seeker can ask it all through the website in real time with the online client, and since it’s AJAX powered, the user only needs to have JavaScript enabled. So if you want to be an expert but don’t have a Jabber enabled client and don’t want to (or can’t for some reason) install anything, you’re out of luck with Qunu for now. But, as they said in their FAQ (http://tinyurl.com/f2qxu), there will be support for other protocols soon.
Of course the other benefit of Qunu is it’s totally free.
Qunu is actually quite a nice site. In fact, our original idea (and full implementation) for Guruza was almost EXACTLY like Qunu. You searched for experts, chose the experts that you wanted to talk to and then chatted with them using a Jabber client or the web client. We had this done and working. Kinda spooky actually.
Then we realized that this approach has some serious issues. The biggest of which is seeking out experts. The reason I would use a service like this in the first place is that I don’t want to waste any time. Searching and then going through experts one at time until you find one that is online, responds and knows the answer takes way too much time.
We felt the best user experience is to ask your question and then go back to whatever you were doing until you get an answer.
Qunu does have more experts than Guruza (at least until we get on Digg as well
) We are adding another nice feature just for experts in the next few weeks. Experts will be able to create custom question feeds / alerts based on keyword search. This will allow experts to craft a number of searches that will match the kind of questions that they are interested in (think PubSub). I think this will really liberate experts as well as they can create their feed and then wait for questions to roll in.
Ask Metafilter is awesome, IMHO. It’s not really comparable Yahoo or Google Answers, though. It’s more of a community (as part of the Metafilter site, with meetups and all the rest) than a simple question-and-answer site. People who just paid their $5, asked a few questions and contributed no answers to other users’ questions would be given short shrift I think/hope. I agree that the quality of answers is sometimes lacking, although the sheer breadth of knowledge in the userbase is pretty amazing.
SD_Chris,
Yes you can stiff the expert if you want. However, we keep stats on users that are presented to the experts, so it is not likely that they will keep answering your questions
Guys…the sit looks awesome. It definitely looks like a one stop shop, easy to use and to the point interface. Keep it up.
In answer to Miguel: “Another huge difference is that Qunu and Yahoo answers are free and really don’t give much incentive for experts to provide answers for you”
I would argue that this is our strength. Qunu experts are here because they want to help, not because they’re getting paid. The best motivator of all.
Murray,
The way you describe Qunu, it sounds like a website slapped on top of IRC. Sure, people are motivated by their desire to help – but I have found, personally (and disclaimer: I haven’t used Qunu, but I’ve used IRC far far too mcuh), that IRC people are not motivated enough to help you TO COMPLETION of your problem. Money might be just the motivator real time professionals need to reach that goal.
Good luck Guruza, your site looks great.
You can now ask questions for free if you like. You can also offer an incentive to experts if you think that will help
I’ve been trying it, so far it looks very vulnerable to spamming and griefing. Hopefully that will change once more people begin to use it for legitimate purposes.
One major problem is that you can change the question you asked after it was asked. For example, as an experiment “Pyro” asked what 1+1 was. I answered 2. He/she (she, if it’s who I think it is) then changed the question to “1+2=?”.
Editing a question in some way needs to be allowed, but it shouldn’t overwrite the original question, it should be appended to it.
J. Jeffryes:
Very good point. We should show previous versions of the question somehow.
Not that I will use this kind of service often, but this is the first knowledge trading site that I consider easy to use. Not bad at all.
If you like this kind of expert Q&A functionality and want it for your own web site or blog, check out http://www.help...re.com/partners. They can easily skin their features to be valuable. For an example, check out the popular blogger site, http://helpshar...lockergnome.com or if you are a blogger and want to add Q&A to your blog, check this out, http://www.help...s_affiliate.asp
I don’t like the business idea. I mean, it’s not that different from Yahoo Answer or Google Answer or Amazon what’s-it’s-named??
Oskar,
I think it is VERY different. I don’t use either of the services you named because of the way they work. When I have a problem that interrupts my work, I don’t want to wait hours or days for an answer. I want an answer NOW, and I’m willing to pay for it. Guruza does that job perfectly!
I like the simplicity of the site. I’m a little concerned about how it will scale over time.
They need:
- Good search/categorizing
- Better/More descriptive tagging
- More questions and answers
Kasamba (http://www.kasamba.com) is another expert advice site that exists for many years and is doing very well. The experts (~30k) provide their services via chat (using a proprietary software application for the experts and a flash client for the customers). I agree with Carl, above – speed is key, and people prefer to pay and get an immediate response rather than having to wait for an email.