Quora Co-Founder Charlie Cheever Steps Back From Day-To-Day Role At The Company | Hacker News Reader

Quora Co-Founder Charlie Cheever Steps Back From Day-To-Day Role At The Company

techcrunch.com

77 pointsrelation41 comments

Quora is great for geeks, but I've always found it off-putting that you have to sign in with facebook to see all the content. I understand why they do it, but I just don't much like it. One more point of friction maybe? I'm not sure.

Also, a lot of the best discussion on Quora is too "inside baseball" in the tech world. It has amazing discussions on frameworks, scaling, interesting company history on Facebook, Google, etc. but I just can't see people outside of tech using Quora. Why would my non-techie wife use Quora? Why would people who already latched on to Stack Exchange sites, Yahoo Answers, and so on use Quora?

Interestingly enough, Quora's beginning userbase may doom it to forever niche status. The people, while intelligent, seem a little edgy and too sure of their opinions. From what I've observed, this attitude is very off-putting to non-techie, normal people who just want to have a conversation and learn something.

I have a new vision for a website, targeting those dissatisfied with Quora. You can see it here. http://pozium.com/vision.html

There already was a non-edgy, mainstream Q&A site for normal people before Quora got on the scene: Yahoo Answers. This video is a good summary: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w_RaPOOVX1Y

This may be non-PC, but I think the IQs and maturity of the Quora users and their responses is head and shoulders above those of Yahoo! Answers.

This may be a function of niche vs wide adoption, or real name usage on Quora, but regardless, it's a very apparent effect.

Their mean IQs surely are. Know what else sometimes comes with smart people?

Snark, arrogance, responses that come flying at you. Mainstream people don't want to post on Quora. They're intimidated. One of the insecurities of dumb people is to have their dumb-ness pointed out. In their philosophy to ensure quality answers, they've driven away a lot of potential users.

There are some really intelligent, insightful answers on Quora. There's also a lot of attitude.

The sad thing is, Quora is a wonderful niche site. But since they've taken VC money and there are so many expectations in the startup world, they've put themselves in a tough situation in regards to growth. Though they should probably stick to the 'intelligent professional' niche, they probably need to pickup more mainstream users to justify valuations; but it's hard to go mainstream now with the userbase they've built up.

Yeah, I see this a lot in the atheism v. religion debates on Quora (big surprise I'm sure).

I think a part of the reason is that those people want those posts to be associated with their meatspace identity.

Firstly, you don't need Facebook to login. I signed up with an email account and I've always been using that to login.

I was also attracted to Quora due to the more "techy" questions and answers that they have[1] but I've noticed for the past year or so, there are quite a lot of interesting non-techy questions and answers that people like your non-techy wife will enjoy.

In example:

1. What are some news stories that the American mainstream media completely misconstrued and/or presented out of context that ended up helping change American laws or culture? http://www.quora.com/digest/track_click?source=1&tid&...

2. Why is there this belief that the USA is a conservative country? http://www.quora.com/digest/track_click?source=1&tid&...

3. What are some things that airline pilots won't tell you? http://www.quora.com/digest/track_click?source=3&tid&...

4. What is the most beautiful number, and why? http://www.quora.com/digest/track_click?source=3&tid&...

I can give you more but they do have a lot of interesting questions (and answers) about politics, life, science, etc.

[1]disclaimer: I've been a Quora user for nearly 3 years.

>Firstly, you don't need Facebook to login.

As I recall, Quora did require a Facebook account for a while [1]. I imagine that someone initially put off by that requirement isn't going to be particularly inclined to continually check back to see if/when it changes.

Also, since removing the Facebook requirement the means to sign-up with an email address has gone through several iterations of varying unobviousness.

1: http://www.quora.com/Why-did-Quora-decide-to-stop-requiring-...

I've used Quora for all kinds of things outside of tech, including diving deep into shows like Breaking Bad to understand the symbolism and other aspects of it. I've used it to ask questions when I lived in a new area for a few months. It can be very useful beyond just talking startups and technology.

Usually a founder steps back when there's either disagreements about the roadmap/path or if they realize that the product/company will not become as successful as they though it would be.

or if they realize that the product/company will not become as successful as they though it would be.

I'd put my money on this one ^^, if I had to choose. If growth is 50% month to month founders can learn to "agree to disagree" over a lot of things. Quora was way too overhyped to begin with and maybe they bought their own hype

Charlie is a really smart and humble guy; I respect him a lot. He's definitely someone I look up to as a person and as a leader. He is the one that inspired me to move to San Francisco and join a startup, and I'm grateful for that.

Best of luck, Charlie, with whatever direction you decide to go.

+1. Super smart + humble.

When I met him, it took me a few minutes to realize that he was the founder. He spoke about Quora and the associated technology therein in an amazingly casual way.

He sold it to me without even really selling it.

Ughh, these moments suck. Every startup goes through them but it is just painful to watch founders getting forced out of the companies they started.

Adam D'Angelo answered a question on Quora regarding this: http://www.quora.com/Charlie-Cheever-1/What-is-Charlie-Cheev...

It's kind of a vague, press-release style answer that is short on details though.

As negative as people are on Quora (oh lookz bubblez!) - I honestly think that they are onto something (as is Google+).

They are both interest based social networks - rather than geographically constrained ones (i.e. Facebook and people you know IRL). Think of all those disparate niche forums we all frequent around the web lumped into one easily usable, easily searchable, real-time and real-name network - that's what Quora/Google+ are becoming.

Quora/Google+ are essentially specialist forums reimagined - topical discussions based along interest lines with real-time feedback by people you can actually see (instead of geographical/friendship ones and pseudonyms on forums).

I go to Facebook (rarely) to catch up with people I know IRL - but with whom I don't really share that much in common (apart form going to school/living nearby). Indeed, outside of Facebook's instant messaging utility - I really have very little use for it (yes I understand that "normal" people differ).

I go to Quora/Google+/specialist forums/HN to discuss things I'm interested in with people who are like me. They do have something here - and the fact that they have such a strong hold on so many smart people (see how prolific some are) illustrates this fact. I think reports of Quora's death are greatly exaggerated (especially with their war chest).

For more, see here on (you guessed it!) Quora:

http://www.quora.com/Hypothetical-Questions/Imagine-its-Janu...

As a Quora user this seems to be a big setback for the company. Charlie has always been more engaged in actually using the product and interfacing with the community. Adam has picked it up a bit lately, but their stats below show who was more engaged with the product.

Charlie: Users They Follow - 3474, Topics - 578, Questions - 1240, Answers - 1524, Edits - 36951

Adam: Users They Follow - 587, Topics - 338, Questions - 890, Answers - 848, Edits - 24374

This could certainly just be a result of their focus at the company, but it is interesting.

I am actually really interested in knowing if his departure is in any way fueled by the recent changes in privacy policies that had some backlash from users.

I, for example, deleted my account when I decided I was not trusting of their handling of my data. I refused to continue to participate and quit.

I would be really interested if these canges fed this leaving in any way.

Since it said he was leading the Android app development (which was released a few weeks ago), I doubt he was involved in the privacy policy changes.

You don't need to be involved to be against something.

He's one of two founders in a company with under 50 employees; he wouldn't be nose-down on a single project unless there'd already been some devolution of roles.

It's certainly signals that. The Android app is more or less a port of the iOS app and isn't a project you'd expect a founder to be heavily involved with.

If that was his only project, yes. But I've not seen evidence of that; I was suggesting that even if he'd stewarded that Android app project he'd also still, as a founder, be weighing in on things like the "who viewed this" feature and policy.

Good for him. Looks like he's going to enjoy the fruits of his labor. There's no reason to assume he's being forced out.

isn't there? From what I understand Quora has been pretty stagnant. It failed to go mainstream. Sure the valley people know of it's existence...but most people? not so much

You have to wonder then why Paul Ryan submitted a question to Quora. Was it coordinated, or was Ryan already a Quora user?

I'm sure it was coordinated but IIRC, Ryan was on Quora before he was nominated.

The Republicans had to show they were also hip to social technology after Obama did an AMA on Reddit.

"There's no reason to assume he's being forced out."

When another officer of the company says "We decided it was best for him to leave the company.", I'm not as sure there's no reason...

I was actually surprised they used those words.

techcrunch has been down all day for me (on mobile). anyone else experiencing this?

Same here.

Yup, all day.

Time for the business people to take over.

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