One of Our Best Websites Died While No One Was Looking
slate.com
The once-thriving site used to answer our most specific questions. But users are fleeing.

“Why Do So Many Music Venues Use Ticketmaster?” “What’s It Like to Train to Be a Sushi Chef?” “How Do Martial Artists Break Concrete Blocks?” If you were looking for answers to such questions 10 years ago, your best resource for finding a thorough, expert-informed response likely would have been one of the most interesting and longest-lasting corners of the internet: Quora.

  • db0@lemmy.dbzer0.comEnglish
    54·
    10 months ago

    Another social media site which followed the enshittification paradigm. This playbook has played out so many times until now. Start it with “good intentions” as a for-profit startup. People join and volunteer their time because the founders say all the right things and the site culture is so new and exciting. Once the site gets popular though, all the fancy talk from the founders goes out the window.

    When will people learn this lesson? Don’t ever volunteer your time on a for-profit proprietary social network. You will get rugpulled! We are all the value in all these sites. Why do we let them control our interactions, ffs?!

    PS: Would be interesting to get a fediverse version of Quora. Or Maybe we can make something using Lemmy communities instead.

    • abhibeckert@lemmy.worldEnglish
      3·
      9 months ago

      Would be interesting to get a fediverse version of Quora

      A Fediverse version of Stack Exchange would be easier - since the content is creative commons you could start with a full catalog of already answered questions…

      But honestly, competing with the real Stack Exchange on one end and Large Language Models on the other end… never going to work.

    • corsicanguppy@lemmy.caEnglish
      3·
      9 months ago

      Volunteer your time, but do it with your eyes open.

      If you’re okay with how it’s going to end up, it’s all good.

    • Captain Aggravated@sh.itjust.worksEnglish
      2·
      9 months ago

      You mean like c/asklemmy?

      I think Reddit almost had it for awhile. There was a point when stuff like r/askhistorians and the like actually worked, and you’d get fairly good answers. That’s one place where the Fediverse isn’t up to speed yet, for that sort of thing you need a critical mass of “everybody uses it” to really achieve.

      So far Lemmy is at its best in the hobby subs because three people with the same hobby will still have fun talking, but if I say “nutritional anthropologists of Lemmy: when and where did humans begin eating cheese?” it’s gonna be crickets because there’s probably not a nutritional anthropologist to be found among us.