Grab some popcorn and ease back on that chair: We just posted the video below on YouTube to share with the masses. It’s “an entertaining overview of WikiAnswers, where people answer questions about things they know and ask about things they don’t.”
Love it? Rate it!
Elisabeth at Web 2.0 newbie diary lends her opinion on librarians participating on Q&A sites like WikiAnswers:
“I think it is very important that libraries get involved in answering questions, so that people remember that this is what we do. The difference in quality between the librarian’s answers and other answers was interesting.”
The WikiAnswers folks couldn’t agree more, as commented by Ksmail, one of WikiAnswers’ top Supervisors. WikiAnswers has become a top destination for the librarians participating in the Slam the Boards project. We hope librarians continue to contribute their knowledge and expertise to the fastest growing wiki Q&A site!
Part of this What’s New on WikiAnswers page is the list of the latest category additions. I love skimming this list every so often because it reveals the wonderful, wacky and wild topics that WikiAnswers community members are interested in.
Currently, the homepage boasts “2,841 community-grown Q&A collections.” That number is constantly climbing, though, as evidenced by the latest additions list mentioned above.
For instance: Rats of NIMH. First of all, I loved the movie as a kid. Brilliant story. Second of all, it’s actually a category on WikiAnswers! Whether the people asking are kids, students, bookworms or nostalgic old timers like me, there is a population out there demanding answers, and here is a Q&A community giving just that.
Other new categories include Fashion Design, Yahoo Mail, Paganism, and Microsoft Word. That might be a random list, but hey, who is going to argue with curious people looking for answers?
Thanks to a truly talented designer, there is a fun new page on WikiAnswers for keeping up with what’s new. The page is called, er, What’s New and it highlights the What’s new section from this very blog along with new categories added to WikiAnswers and press releases.
So now you can go there to get the quick rundown or come here for the full story.
WikiAnswers has teamed up with Itamar Medical — a world-leading developer of cardiac diagnostic equipment — to spread cardiovascular awareness by pumping the Cardiovascular Health category with new questions, answers and edits. The experts at Itamar Medical are officially Supervising the category, contributing their professional knowledge to growing cardiovascular Q&A.
Here are some of Itamar Medical’s contributions so far:
This is an excellent way to get experts on a topic to contribute to WikiAnswers Q&A: You scratch my back, I’ll scratch yours. When you use your Bio Page to promote yourself, and then answer questions in your field, you gain credibility and a fresh audience. Not to mention that all the curious people waiting for information are getting quality, thought-out answers directly from the experts.
Are you a professional who might be interested in covering a WikiAnswers topic in your field? If you’d like this kind of opportunity, leave a comment.
When we say WikiAnswers rules, we’re not kidding. Sure, Yahoo Answers is still in the lead when it comes to most-visited Q&A sites, but with a name like ‘Yahoo’ backing it, that’s not shocking. What’s shocking - or maybe not, if you’ve ever used it - is that Yahoo Answers numbers have been falling as WikiAnswers numbers rise and rise.
Hitwise came out today with its report on the subject, picked up so far by notable blogs like Mashable, Search Engine Watch, The WOMMA Word, Stephen’s Lighthouse, BizReport, IT Business Edge, Search Newz, Marketing Vox, What Little I Know, Moraaz.org, and Web Analytics World.
The report includes that WikiAnswers’ site visits within the U.S. have increased by 125% compared to the week of June 9th 2007.
Let’s hear it for WikiAnswers, social knowledge and the wonderful Q&A community that makes it all happen!
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