Quora

[Dungassin]

Not quite sure how it happened, but I seem to have done something that means I get emails from Quora. I probably did it when I was websearching for something or other.

Well… it helps to pass a little bit of time during the lockdown, and has to some extent replaced my old habit of looking at Yahoo news purely to read the inane comments which are now no longer available.

Mostly it’s entertaining nonsense, but one thing that annoys me is the number of people posting idiot level questions. By this I mean questions which could be easily answered just by RTFM for the software they are asking about (e.g. photo-editing), or a very simple websearch. A couple of times I answered questions, but am now getting irritated by the emails asking whether I can answer question x, y or z etc.

They actually censured me when I responded to a couple of questions by posting a URL of a website with the answer, and the comment 'why didn’t you just look for yourself? Are you stupid or just lazy?

Last night I reported one VERY frequent questioner, who I suspect is either just plain idle, stupid, or a troll. Dare say I’ll get told off about that too.

Perhaps I should just unsubscribe altogether, but as I have said, it does help to pass the time.

[Innocent_Bystander]

I get irritated from the other angle, i.e. when I Google something and Quora pops up, with blatantly the wrong answer, or trivialised answer etc.

That aside, it seems you are in need of a hobby. Have you tried this thing called hifi? I gather some people have developed side-hobbies from it, e.g. there’s a branch where you can while away your life comparing every permutation and combination of Ethernet cable, network switch, power supplies on the switches, mains cables on the power supplies, fuses in the plugs…

[Dungassin]

SWMBO just says that I’m turning into Victor Meldrew …

Just off to start a thread about electric cars …

[steviebee]

Almost asked Quora what RTFM was.

But Google told me…phew, dodged that one.

[Yeti]

I think some people get paid for posting questions and by the number of questions.

Be careful which ones you spend time on as the algorithm starts selecting the topics you see based on those you looked at. It can get a bit tedious. I read quite a few comparing UK to US and now see far too many just when I’m getting bored with the topic.