Meanwhile Stack Exchange has been around only a year longer, a fraction of the funding, and pretty well owns the entire question-answer niche.
Stack has seven sites getting at least 100,000 visits per day. One is a break out homerun (Stack Overflow obviously), and it drastically dwarfs the other sites. All but a few of their top 20+ sites are strictly technology focused, and the others are geek friendly (math and video games), so they cross over conveniently.
Most of their network is flailing. Photography is 3 years old and gets a whopping seven questions per day - that's what most of their network looks like.
Stack doesn't even remotely own the Q&A category. They own one piece of it, and will never own anything more than that, because they can't translate success in technical Q&A to other categories well. You can beat StackExchange at any given of their smaller niche sites, because they can't do them as well as someone that is dedicated to just that niche - the same reason Quora et al can't compete with Stack Overflow.
What is the Quora engine the best in the world at?
I'd look at growth, too. Even the less popular SE sites grow at very respectable rates. How much is Quora growing?
Edit for clarity in case I was misunderstood
Or it's just my usage, largely influenced by the weekly email.
I even have a Quora account, but rarely log into it. Most of the time when I come across an interesting question on Quora and it asks me to log in to read more than the first answer, I say, "Well, I guess it's not that interesting anyway."
When you post questions or answer, you can also click the "anonymous" checkbox to remove your name.
if you don't, they'll flag you and until you update your name, your account will be frozen (you can read and follow but can't answer) and all your previous answers hidden
[1] https://web.archive.org/web/http://www.quora.com/
[2] http://blog.stackoverflow.com/2009/06/stack-overflow-creativ...
It is useful to get an opinion on which library / language / framework is better for a particular task, or what the pros and cons are. Stack Overflow has a real attitude problem, closing these questions as "not constructive" despite the fact the question has hundreds of upvotes.
Quora is not tech focused, and still feels a bit more like facebook (questions feel more like they are based on how recently they were asked as opposed to outright relevance - though that may the way I view the site, and the way it markets itself to me). But there is a huge opportunity to pick up where Stack Overflow is failing its users.
quora = tell me a story
quora = help me procrastinate
quora = find question, ask to log in to fb, close window.
Quora's non-fragmentation is it's ultimate downfall.
I'm all bull on SE and bear on Quora.
But I have never used Quora, so I know nothing about it beyond getting the blurred webpage when you are not a member there. Ill check out that video now.
Also you go to S.O. to find a specific answer than move on, on Q you stick around and read other stuff, go back for discovery.
I am not saying which one is more valuable, perhaps S.O. is more monetizable.
This is why they formed a parent company with a broader focus (Stack Exchange). Joel Spolsky wrote more about their thinking here:
And how many of them are going there? Every indication is "not many".
"Also you go to S.O. to find a specific answer than move on, on Q you stick around and read other stuff, go back for discovery."
By "you" you mean?
I've visited quora maybe a dozen times, usually by following a link from an aggregator like HN. I didn't feel compelled to poke around once I got there, and the comments and replies (though they came from the people with higher reputation) generally ran the same gamut as everywhere else.