ChaCha used to be a ridiculous human powered web based search engine that’s best use appeared to be for killing time when bored.
They raised a boatload of money from Jeff Bezos and others and eventually switched to an all-mobile interface. They also began offering their platform to third party marketers.
But now there are indications that the company is having cash flow issues, even after a recent pay cut to guides. As before, the information is coming from their poorly-paid and poorly-treated human guides.
Employees are simply not being paid, says one guide, asking to remain anonymous. And he sends several screen shots of ChaCha’s internal forum for guides, which show dozens of complaints about slow or non-existent payouts. A selection of comments:
I have been with ChaCha since the end of July and still haven’t gotten paid. I’m not even getting the runaround because I’m not getting a response from anyone…I have kids to feed and need to be paid. I’m not even tripping about the cut in pay…
I became a guide on August 6. I submitted my paperwork that day and then faxed my signature card on August 18. I heard nothing. I email FIB on August 28 and they wanted utility bills as I have a P.O. On the 28th of August I emailed them again as I had heard nothing. I still have no account!
ChaCha doesn’t seem to care about taking care of their Guides, which is really sad. It’s only due to our work, they are able to grow and make money. You think ChaCha would take better care of us. It’s pathetic to see them spend so much time on stupid hot minute contests and such things, while they don’t take a single second out to help us guides who are long past getting paid what we worked hard to earn.
For the love of God. It’s been 5 weeks and no pay me now button. No response, no anything. What’s going on here? I want my money. Can I get any help at all?
I have been waiting an extremely long time for them to get back to me over my earnings which I WANT NOW! And I am thinking about small claims because I contacted them MORE THAN enough times for them to respond, and gave them soo much time.
The comments go on. The guide who sent them to us also says the complaints are being deleted from the forum almost as fast as he can take screen shots.
I’ve emailed ChaCha for a comment.
Lol..
Lets see what the reply comes from them to your email.
That is ridiculous. Funding amount is too huge then why not paying them!
“The guide who sent them to us also says the complaints are being deleted from the forum almost as fast as he can take screen shots.”
That’s rich coming from you, Mikey, when you do the same on TechCrunch when you “edit” comments.
Yet you still come here and comment…. that’s rich.
Yes indeed, look how Mikey edited your post to make you look like a whiny thread-derailer.
Dear, Trace,
Voicing your opinion over something you do not like is important. It helps to bring about change. While this Web site is certainly not the ownership of any one unique visitor, it’s us as a collective that give the site its influence.
Also, if the Right Thing to do in any situation where you disapprove of 1 aspect of the whole were to leave, the population of the United States would be cut down 66%.
If you are an independent contractor isn’t that just part of it, getting paid just like anyone else who submits an invoice? It isn’t clear to me why everyone feels so entitled to employee like treatment when it is clear when you sign up what your status is with the company. Plenty of other guides, myself included, have no problems with getting paid. Being a guide is a great option for someone like me who has extra time. This isn’t my full time thing. Questions keep coming in and they keep getting answered.
Too many people have thrown up the term “independent contractor” to justify what ChaCha is doing. Those words do not impart a magical license to treat people any way you want to. For example, ChaCha states that none of their contractors are permitted to subcontract their work. That’s almost UNHEARD of in the contracting business and it will eventually get them sued for stepping over the employee/contractor boundaries.
Do you think this is the first company to call their workers “independent contractors” in the hopes of skirting labor laws and tax responsibilities? West (www.workathomeagent.com) got sued for this very thing and gloriously lost the case. Now, their workers are called employees, and rightly so.
The bottom line is control. When you apply IC status to your workers, you don’t get to exert the same control that a “boss” would. Your rights extend to assigning a task and a deadline, and paying the agreed-upon amount of money for said assignment, provided that it meet the agreed-upon standards of quality. You don’t get to dictate schedules, decide HOW a contractor goes about completing said task, or any of the other privileges a boss has toward his employees. Pay for Performance also straddles the line between contractor and employee.
In closing, just because people are independent contractors does not give a company the right to string them along, change the contract at will, ignore their issues, and more or less do whatever suits them with the attitude “love it or leave it, you expendable sucker!” As far as contracts go, I could talk you into signing a notarized contract stating that for a one-time payment of $100, I get to punch you in the nose every time you piss me off. You may sign it, figuring “gee, I have no plans of pissing this person off, and I need the money, so what’s the harm?” Legally speaking, we now have a binding written contract. However, as soon as I actually strike you, my ass goes to jail for assault. Now why would they do that? We had an AGREEMENT!
“You don’t get to dictate schedules, decide HOW a contractor goes about completing said task, or any of the other privileges a boss has toward his employees. Pay for Performance also straddles the line between contractor and employee.”
ChaCha does not dictate your schedule. ChaCha does have the right to tell you how to do the task because you are using their system and agreed to it when you joined. Just quit and move on with your life.
I agree with Alan.
Yes. ChaCha sucks. They still claim that we make .20 a question. I have not received a SINGLE qc email in three months yet STILL i don’t make top guide. I will work until this company burns, but it will burn. I will have a “real” job in the mean time, but I cant wait to see this BS company fall.
We have “Human powered” answers? for real? just ask for a joke or the weather or what our name is to see the real truth. it is an auto answer. NON human powered.
Please learn english befi=ore commenting and sunding like a retard.
Funny, you sound like a retard even though you are likely fluent in English.
I’m still trying to figure out how you typo an equals sign when aiming for the ‘o’ key.
You simply drink too much and come here before going to sleep.
Please learn english befi=ore commenting and sunding like a retard.
That was hateful and MISSPELLED. YOU learn English before you sound like a retard!
ChaCha’s inability to pay their employees is another indication that human powered search can’t work. Wikia and all it’s hype was the first example: http://www.techcrunch.com/2008.....e-letdown/
Search engines become profitable as they scale out: the cost of indexing the web is basically the same if you have ten people using your search engine or if you have 10Million. With human powered search, or guide powered search, you need to increase the number of guides you have as you become more popular.
I think Mahalo.com will have the same fate at ChaCha.
It’s even more than profitability, search engines can only be competitive when they can scale out because the web is constantly growing. Wikipedia wouldn’t have gotten as big if contributors had to be paid…
Human powered internet services have always been a failure. Why do investors still keep falling for the plan? The first question I ask when these companies are promoted is for someone, anyone, to name a successful mediated service. Always crickets in silence.
Mechanical Turk? Not sure it is a success.
Jott hasn’t had an exit yet, but it’s generally regarded as successful so far.
You speak about ChaCha “inability to pay guides” as if even 1% of the guides complain about it… uhmm… how about the 99.9% of guides that do get paid… maybe this human search engine is actually a great idea afterall eh?
I agree with somegirlnamedvee. I have been a ChaCha guide for a few months now. When I first signed up, I was planning a vacation and was going to use ChaCha earnings to pay for it. Within 4 weeks I had earned over $500, and already had my debit card for the bank account. I earned this in addition to my “regular” job. All I had to do was hit the “Pay me Now” button, and literally got in my car and went to the nearest ATM and cashed out. It was that simple. As for all this B.S. talk about ChaCha going under and burning to the ground, you people need to realize that even though you may be too stiff for the fun that is ChaCha, there will always be people who enjoy the personal touch to a simple answer. My question for all you guides that claim you hate ChaCha is, WHY are you working for them? You understood the pay scale when you signed up, and if you read the recent news and check your email, they do an EXCELLENT job of keeping you up to date with what is going on. Not to mention, there are almost always opportunities to earn weekend bonus’. So if you don’t like it, shut up and find another source of income.
you are somewhat correct- but a few things
1 - Mahalo is now defining itself as a content company; it may find success as weblogs 3.0
2 - human powered can and will be successful, but you need to be able to scale your creators at the same rate as your searchers.
Please learn to type before flaming someone, you total moron Cheech.
am i teh olny one who rlazeeis taht cheech did taht illaonnntiteiy?
From the start, it was clear that the model was flawed. It simply wasn’t scalable, and probably belonged as part of the Web 1.0 dotcom boom. Unfortunately, its business model lured in unwary employees instead of greedy investors, which is in many ways worse.
So glad they banned me months ago after I first brought the ChaCha corruption story to TechCrunch.
Michael you’re dumb
Liars? What are talking about? How did they raise such capital? This isn’t rocket science, just treat your partners well.
To be honest, a lot of these comments aren’t ChaCha’s problems. The ones complaining about Pay Me Now buttons and FIB wanting more info should learn to read and follow directions. With 10 or so complaining, thousands are getting paid fine because they aren’t complete idiots.
The only thing I wish ChaCha would change is the way they hire Guides. I honestly don’t know how some of these people make it through the initial test. If they would just learn to read, a lot of their problems would be solved.
In fairness, Alan, people deserve a response to their inquiries. They may be overlooking something obvious, or simply not getting the process, but they were at least smart enough to ask for help, and a lot of those complaints indicate they aren’t getting it.
I was a Guide for a while, and even managed to get paid once. However ChaCha started changing the rules and the pay structure about a month after I started. That didn’t inspire a whole lot of confidence, so I’ve found other things to do with my free time. These complaints seem to indicate an issue with ChaCha, or their banking partner, FIB. Regardless of who is at fault, ChaCha needs to address the issue, and get people paid for their work.
But the thing is a lot of these people are pointed in the right direction by their fellow Guides, but don’t want to follow their advice. Some after being told multiple times where to find the Pay Me Now button will finally post stating they found it.
I just don’t think it is right for people to bash a company with information that is being received from someone who obviously picked what he wanted to share. I could go and send tons of post about people getting paid and being happy with the way things are going, but that would be against the TOS that I agreed to when joining ChaCha.
Like I said I just wish people would take a bit of time to read before they start acting like everything is a conspiracy.
Site owners have the responsibility to make tfeir site usable. If even a small amount of people have trouble navigating info on a page the design needs to change. It’s like hiding the ‘pay me now’ button in the fine print. It’s not Best Practice and it’s shady.
hey Michelle, if the site wasn’t usable, wouldn’t there be ALOT more complaints? I mean come on… over fifteen thousand guides and a few complaints and you automatically call their practice shady? I don’t think your name calling is “Best Practice” and a little bit shady
Michelle are you a guide? And if so do you have a complaint? Just wondering, because you seem to act as though you know.
As a former guide myself, there’s two threads in the Earnings and Payments area each with 2000+ posts and 20,000+ views. That sounds like a lot of guides having a serious problem getting paid Alan. Maybe you should try to cut down on the bullshit and look at the facts. People aren’t getting paid.
People are getting paid Gregory. If you take time to read the thread, issues are people resolved and people are getting their money. 2000+ post with A LOT of those being from the same people over and over. So how about you get your facts straight?
NO system is without bugs 100% of the time. They have managed to get everything worked out. Some of these people need to realize that it takes longer then 1 hour to fix a problem. Asking someone to wait one week isn’t the end of the world.
A week is the difference between paying rent and your landlord telling you to take a hike. Paying the water bill and having no water. Groceries and going hungry. Where I grew up, if a job told someone that they can’t access their earnings due to a bug in the system and to sit tight for 1 to 5 weeks while they fix it then the people responsible would probably of had a baseball bat taken to their legs. You don’t fuck with people’s money period. It took me 2 months to get my money and I had to get it through small claims court Alan so go fuck yourself.
As you said it’s the same people over and over because ChaCha is and always has been known for deleting posts regarding things like the article explained. Maybe they can, I don’t know, pay their guides? Get your facts straight and don’t talk again.
My facts are very straight. I work for the company to as an Independent Contractor. You should not rely on your rent being paid when you are working under a contract that can be changed at anytime. From the tone of your reply, it probably took you 2 months to get your money because you didn’t know how to read and follow procedures to get paid.
These people who complain so much, because they don’t know how to do things, should just quit and move on with their lives. Like stated, go get a real job where you can’t sit at home in your pajamas and work, if you want to be protected by an employee/employer contract.
I know a few guides and haven’t heard of any issue yet - is it possible that there is some kind of issue with accounts for certain users?
Their model sounds a lot like Mahalo.com.
First — I’m local to Indianapolis, where ChaCha started. They raised a significant chunk of money because the state of Indiana also kicked in. They got this through the political connections of Scott A. Jones, who is a bit of a local celebrity for “inventing voicemail” — kind of a joke, but it works great with politicians.
Second — I loosely keep in touch with a developer on their team, and he says the stuff with the guides does not necessarily reflect whats going on at the company. In other words, they are still hiring new people to actually work. I’m not sure its sane to judge the cashflow of a company by its independent contractors.
Third — They are continuing their local marketing spend, as they have a bunch of wrapped bus advertisements rolling around the city, and then there are the billboards and local event sponsorships (they were big at the Indy 500 this year, if I recall).
Not even close.
I think this company should take all their remaining money and invest it in “Pet Rock II”. I think they’d have a better chance of making money off of that.
Its always a little sad when you learn that people aren’t receiving their compensation. What I find interesting is that it seems fairly obvious that the business model has some flaws. Then I wonder how it even got funded in the first place?
Jippidy.com - Video Yellow Pages
I recommend that the disgruntled guides send a short text message asking when they will get paid to “242242″
Sebastien… you should become a comedian
This is par for the course for the founders and executive team of ChaCha. Too many egos, decisions get approved and resources committed and capital spent and then someone wasn’t in the loop and strategy is abandoned. Local media is too soft on reporting in-depth on the company (desperate for tech) and national media doesn’t really know who they are. Executive team has very little experience in Web 2.0 and it shows. Typical dot com mentality… spent 6-8 weeks making sure the office was perfect and in the “right spot” and no expense spared. Image before substance. There is a reason most successful web startup’s come out of Alley/Valley, not Carmel, Indiana. People in the know wouldn’t touch this investment with a 10 foot pole. Not to mention Mahalo stole their thunder.
Question to 242242 (ChaCha text): Is it true some ChaCha guides are no longer being paid?
Answer from 242242: No, that was just a rumor. ChaCha guides are being paid as usual. Is there anything else ChaCha can answer for you?
ChaCha, anyone want’s to do the ChaCha? Sounds like a 1940s dance from the old movie classics.
ChaCha what are your goals? It does not appear that you were in it for the long haul. A few mil, then poof. Interesting. Anyways, we could work something out. I could use such skill sets.
lol Anti Anti Anti… the 1940s dance comment is classic… did you come up with that yourself? WOW you are too funny…
anywho… a few mil, then poof? Whatever do you mean? They are still here and answered OVER 24 MILLION mobile questions since launch… which is VERY IMPRESSIVE considering they just recently launched…
I think I heard in the news last week that SayType is preparing to launch a fully automated internet powered solution using their new voice recognition process which if you haven’t tried it yet, you should. Seriously, they provide accurate text and e-mail messages in less than 90 seconds from any phone. Plus, you can now spell any word you can say and receive a text with the word all spelled out in less than 60 seconds.
If their talk to translation product is any indication of the accuracy and speed at which imput/output is capable of being produced using their new voice recognition process. I can’t wait to call a phone number, ask any question, and know that the answer I receive 60/120 seconds later with be coming from either Google, Wiki, or Answers.com
Seriously, they provide accurate text and e-mail messages in less than 90 seconds from any phone.
How accurate? Speech recognition as a service cannot be trained for single users (like with personal SR) and last I checked, getting over 90% accuracy for arbitrary speech required human intervention. Less than 95% accurate is considered unreadable.
Sigh. Just call or e-mail your local reference desk, at the public library. “Your tax dollars at work,” as we say at my place.
Thank you!
I’m glad to see them failing!
I myself commute to my work in Carmel, Indiana where ChaCha is located and its location has just about the highest taxes in the state. I cant imagine the pain of pay cuts for ChaCha workers living in Carmel.
Hamilton County, where Carmel belongs to, has one of the lowest taxes in the state. Please, do your research before you show your ignorance!
I got hooked up as a ChaCha guide when they first started the human-powered search thing. Didn’t need the money, just thought it’d be nice to make some side income in the evenings while multitasking. I would say at least 90% of the searches I did were bogus searches.
But I can attest to the total lack of organization on the internal side. Their payment process is ridiculous, and I cashed out and got out while I could. About every two to three months the whole internal structure would change. One month you just did searches. Next month they decided to have everyone go through some quiz. And then “training”. And then you had to train so much per month to maintain a high volume of searches. And then nothing for awhile. And now this stupid mobile thing, which they’re attempting (I imagine) to convert their existing guides to.
Not to mention you get paid by the hour, the hour of searching. And you have to compete with others to search. IE, it sends about twenty people an “Accept this search” dialog. Whoever clicks it first gets to run that search. And you get paid hourly by the time you click that button to the time the customer decides they’re finished. Often times they’d click End immediately, wasting a few minutes of my time in the process.
Why did you just comment when nothing you said pertains to things now? If the last time you worked was the desktop searches, than you really have nothing to add to this. Pay is not per hour instead it is per search. There are no quizzes or constant training (which sometimes wouldn’t be a bad thing).
Next time maybe learn something before you make a comment.
CHRIS you’re too S-M-R-T for your own good… lol… get with today’s program buddy
Next time maybe learn something before you make a comment.
I was simply pointing out the lack of planning or internal organization the company has. Which is maybe why I said “But I can attest to the total lack of organization on the internal side.”. Go ahead, go back and look it up. It’s there.
No business succeeds without good leadership, organization, and a clear plan. Which has been shown in so many examples in the past (even on this blog!), and probably in the near future with ChaCha.
Now learn to read, and stop being a douche.
I just tried to sign up as a guide on ChaCha. Looks like they need website guides pronto:
An error has occured
An error has occured - 500
It appears our servers have received an error. Please try your request again.
Please try the page you requested again. Use our feedback form if you have any questions or concerns.
We apologize for the inconvenience.
The most interesting sentence in this story is the last sentence. Michael wrote: “I’ve e-mailed ChaCha for a comment.” So, did they respond before you wrote the story? Or did you go ahead and publish without hearing their side. If ChaCha didn’t respond, say so and publish. You have one anonymous source, no confirmation from a second source, and no comment from the company you are writing about. That sounds like an “F” in business journalism 101. Perhaps you are too busy prepping for TechCrunch 50 where you vett the next group of companies you are going to invest in and then cover “objectively”.
I would be very astonishing if Michael even really emailed ChaCha… I will need to wait and see if he really did…
It’s so funny that out of over 15 thousand guides… a few complaints and Michael Arrington goes on a “ChaCha Suck spree”… lol I guess he will find anything to complain about ChaCha…
To Brushfire that lives in Indianapolis and others who comment about tax dollars at work… UHMMM… it is… have you not considered that the 15 thousand plus guides that are smart enough to understand how to get paid HAVE a job? Not to mention the fact that ChaCha already employs over a hundred Indiana people… and also bringing technology to the midwest… BTW there’s no billboards yet…
It’s also VERY FUNNY that Michael Arrington actually says he emailed Cha Cha for a comment… because I am very sure he did not… ChaCha founder Scott Jones have tried to contact him on several occasions to correct a story some “guides” wrote… but he refuse to converse with Scott Jones…
Hey Michael… why don’t you email Scott the founder of ChaCha directly? I 100% gaurantee you that he will answer any questions you have… or are too scared the truth might come out? lol
Over 15 thousand guides and 3 or 4 jump the ship to complain about ChaCha and Michael swears he has a BIG BAD CHACHA story…. and the people who really don’t know anything about it, actually takes his word as gold… wow you guys get your own opinion by facts, not by fiction…
Hey, 3 or a thousand. Whatever way you look at it, it’s a raw deal and something is going wrong.
Are you some kind of dumbass Vee? Earnings and Payments forums both have stickied posts with posts going over 2000+ and views of said threads going over 20,000+. That’s a serious problem. Keep thinking it’s just 2-4 people having problems getting paid though ok?
It’s NOT just 3 or 4 guides complaining, kiddo. It’s HUNDREDS!
Sorry Vee guess you are right.
ChaCha sux ass, theres a reason why ex guides come here flaming it - pay attn to them, chacha bans guide for flaming on their threads and steals their money - as some people here have attested to already. Ima get my money before the place burns.
It’s plain and clear that these guys have a terrible business and that they clearly have no ethics. But, the big picture here is that it is a slap in the face to everyone who has contributed to the user generated information revolution and who has taken time to devote their own time (both for money and not) to enhance the way we get info on the web. These guys should have their passes stripped from the 50 until they pay those writers.
Comparing ChaCha to Mahalo is a painful stretch at best.
http://www.mahalo.com/ChaCha
http://www.mahalo.com/Mahalo
See? Mahalo is a much longer page.
The end.
Ehhhh, one would hope that Mahalo would have more information on it OWN company that its COMPETITOR’S.
You need to see a picture of the ChaCha buses here in Indianapolis. The city transit system rents out the buses as advertising space and ChaCha has about 10 of them. I guess they are after the lucrative Indianapolis text messaging base!
And I wonder why they can’t pay their guides!
-Indy.
Who needs “human powered” search anyway? What’s so difficult about typing “10 dumbest ideas” into your search engine if choice?
Me!
I’ve made a buck or two from bets, gotten free drinks at the bar a few times, looked like the smartest guy in the room, found out how to make mixed drinks and became the life of the party, and have gotten a last minute recipe with Human Power Searching.
I don’t know much about business models, or DotCom bubbles- But I can tell how neat of an idea this is. On a practical side, it makes me like Trinity from Matrix, standing atop the roof learning how to fly a helicopter in seconds. Whatever I need to know, where ever I am, it’s amazingly easy.
I think the world is in the beginings of an “intellectual revolution” and anything that exchanges human ideas is a step in the right direction.
It sucks if ChaCha turns out to be a bust- but I like the idea of Wiki’s and other “people fed” searches.
This is good, but there is a new start up in the web and mobile advertising ecosystem that is coming to make things easier and more efficient to both Advertisers and Publishers . It is called Webmob-ad. . It is a pioneer in the automation of mobile and web advertsing by creating the only self serve and fully automated marketplace for CPC and CPM advertising . It supports all types text ads, banners and video ads.For publishers , it offers the highest split of earnings and much more. It caters to web and mobile Publishers and Advertisers . Registering is FREE. Please check it out : http://www.webmob-ad.com
my thoughts: chacha bought the bus ads in indianapolis so that its investors and the State of Indiana can see them and say “look, great investment!”
on not paying the guides, hey, scott is a busy guy, he has a lot of bus ad offers being sent to him from cities all over the u.s.
$16m buys a lot of bus ads
—
human-powered search is not completely baseless. but about.com did it first and sold to nytimes for a busload of booty
—
chacha will probably be sold to a wireless carrier, although the human guide angle means that the margins are ultra thin
—
about mahalo, it’s trying to copy about.com…it’s been done mahalo, who was dumb enough to invest in your slideware?
—
about arrington: he is like the ‘writers’ from The Enquirer who try and appear serious about being a ‘journalist’ but he’s more interested in being recognized by a handful of geeks and techies
I’ll believe you if you said that he’s more interested in making millions of dollars.
They pay new “guides” with $0.02 per task. It’s scandalous. I am so surprised by the fact that there are so many people from the United States who are happy about this payment!!! I believe that if they won’t raise the payment rates they’ll end up hiring “guides” from poor countries…
Wow, another negative article about ChaCha by the in depth and well rounded Tech Crunch team. I would have expected nothing less.
The day I EVER hear something positive come out of the mouth of Michael and his team on this company, I will do cartwheels naked down the street.
I just don’t “get” it Techcrunch. Out of the 2 years of posting articles about ChaCha, have you “ever” actually got in contact with Scott Jones or Brad Bostic to talk about the business model, the plans, growth, etc…? I am serious about this.
Truth of the matter is…there are plenty of west coast VC’s interested in ChaCha, so if your grand plan has been to derail that from happening over all this time…you have failed.
But the other truth is, 99% of their customer base has honestly probably never even heard of TechCrunch…so the geeks jerking off in their moms basement to each and every article you write are not the customers they want nor need.
First of all: Gregory, thank you, I was having a bad monday and you still made me laugh. “a baseball bat to the legs”? seriously. Being an independent contractor for ChaCha is for people who need extra money for gas or books, not for people who can’t make rent. Get a real job. Also, if they were deleting comments, yours would definitely not make the cut to stay up.
This is ridiculous, everyone needs to take a chill pill and get their facts straight before jumping on the bandwagon. Even you Mr. Arrington with your highly credible source of “one anonymous guide”. Just do a little research and you’ll find that ChaCha has over 30,000 guides and they get paid 10 cents per question. Everyone is quick to cry and pout about the pay rates but they are independent contractors! Get it through your heads, get a real job if you want to get paid a salary. The idea is that the job is cush, you get to sit at home in your pajama’s and answer people’s mundane questions about nothing, it’s no different than IMing your friends except that you get paid for it.
First off retard, ChaCha even stated themselves in their own forums that ChaCha was a viable job that you could make a living out of. They even advertised that their job model was excellent for stay at home mothers and college students. When you make claims like that then expect to get put through a grinder when you can’t back them up.
Arrington’s source isn’t just “one anonymous guide”. As someone that’s seen ChaCha’s forums, it was a shitload of guides with payment problems. I’m sure the fanboys here will say it’s the same 20 people posting 10,000 times in the same thread or something else idiotic but let’s face it, when you got your face buried that far into ChaCha’s balls then no amount of logic makes sense to you anymore.
It’s a brand new company with a new business model (yes much different than anything else out there), they are going to have some glitches, give them a break. What’s so wrong with trying something completely different? Or would it be better for google to just monopolize the entire search market? I’m not saying it wouldn’t be bad if guides weren’t getting paid but I still haven’t seen actual proof of that other than a few people’s illegitimate complaints on go-nowhere forums like this one.
And bus wraps come out of a marketing budget dead last, no way they would invest in those if they didn’t have the means.
Are you a guide? Do you have access to the ChaCha forums, where complaints (logically) tend to gravitate? Further, what are you doing wasting your time and considerable talents on this “go-nowhere” forum? Doesn’t that make you a “go-nowhere” writer?
I am a loser
Everyone, meet my retarded twin there! Isn’t he cute?
You’ll have to check the time stamps to tell one A. Nonymous from the other. BTW, does that kind of name sniping happen here often? Seems kind of childish if you ask me, and it leaves me to wonder what I did to get singled out. Care to enlighten me there, oh retarded twin?
One of the big problems has been a lack of criteria for the “Pay for Performance” plan. The pay cut is only supposed to be for guides that don’t give quality answers. No one can argue with that, right?
They finally gave us a lengthy and confusing description for the quality criteria today. They even included a photo of the “ChaCha QC Mission Control” department. Many guides were very impressed with the sophistication and professional looking control room photo. Heck, it was so complicated looking it looked like you could launch the Space Shuttle from ChaCha Quality Control headquarters! It took about an hour before a ChaCha guide was able to find the picture on the web. Guess what, it was the Mission Control Center at Johnson Space Center in Houston, Texas! ChaCha is a real joke!
Now, that is funny! I don’t suppose they would want to show a real picture of their QC office because 75% of guides would probably quit on the spot. I’m not saying they work out of a tool shed, but who knows? Last I heard, they have their HQ at some strip mall, paying more than they had to because “a happy employee is a productive employee.” A miserable contractor, though, is an absolute gold mine. The same article mentioned that Brad or Scott is ordering street performers to liven up the joint. Sounds to me like someone has gotten to spend-happy for the company’s good.
Robert, I know that they’ve come out and plainly ADMITTED (after an earlier promise to the contrary) that their system failures would be counted against guides. What better way to control the number of Top Guides? There’s no way to complain about it either, except by coming to forums like this one and venting in public. I don’t like doing it, but as long as their internal forum is so heavily censored, it’s inevitable.
Sorry replied in the wrong post, I’ll move it here.
They are offering tours to any guides in the area. I guess seeing will be believing!