Due to a recent thread, where someone who seems not to ride bikes, has signed up to STW to ask a non bike related question. Are we the best "think tank" forum in the world (or even the UK) for answering obscure questions or is there somewhere even better than us?
Quora.com , although it doesn't really count as its intention is to answer questions.
As mentioned on the other thread, I've used STW as an example of getting answers from a random bunch of people in a work seminar. There was an "identify this stone in my garden" thread, and another on corporate tax rates.
I was thinking about registering on, say, a car audio forum to ask a question about haberdashery. The 'other' thread inspired me...
Back in its heyday, I'd have said [url= http://www.mono.org ]Mono[/url] without a shadow of a doubt. Like STW it attracted people of wide and varied disciplines and areas of expertise. It's a bit quiet these days though.
[url= http://www.google.co.uk/search?q=what%27s+the+best+forum+in+the+world+for+getting+obscure+questions+answered%3F&ie=utf-8&oe=utf-8&aq=t&rls=org.mozilla:en-GB:official&client=firefox-a ]Google says it's us.[/url]
Now there's a surprise result wwaswas!
🙂
although I'm now worried that the recursive links will break google.
I don't think it matters, just pick one which is well populated.
I know of one very large multinational organisation that uses internal and external forums to find answers for stuff rather than google/libraries as the respondents are usually more intelligent than a search algorithm and hence they get more accurate answers more quickly. edit I think it's called crowdsourcing?
STW normally has the answer, you just have to pick through all the vitriol and criticism to get to the facts.
Google says it's us.
It's finding the question title. Clever clever.
although I'm now worried that the recursive links will break google.
Have you ever googled "recursion"? If not, you should.
STW normally has the answer, you just have to pick through all the vitriol and criticism to get to the facts.
NO YOU DON'T!!!1!
Cougar - that wasn't vitriolic or critical enough, merely contrary.
I like [url= http://ask.metafilter.com/ ]http://ask.metafilter.com/[/url] for answers to questions you never thought of asking.
Sample questions currently on there:
[list]
[*]I am looking for a pink castle-shaped pen holder. It should be suitable to hold the kind of stationary your average office worker needs. Glitter and fur a bonus. Must be from some where that delivers to the UK.[/*]
[*]Does a bomb calorimeter give a value of heat energy per gram of material or electricity? [/*]
[*]How do I convert an existing GPS track to an estimate of calories burned?[/*]
[*]Please help a total novice scuba-dive in Thailand and have a great experience.[/*]
[*]Help me pick out a $50 birthday present for a 60 year old friend... [/*]
[/list]
Cougar - that wasn't vitriolic or critical enough, merely contrary.
No it isn't!
I htink the problem with "ask" sites is that you run the risk of getting swamped by ill-informed idiotic americanised junk. At least in here most posters (with some notable exceptions) restrict their replies to technical questions within their own specialist sphere for fear of being contradicted by a genuine expert. You still get the wiki-linkers trying to sound like they know all the answers though 😉
This forum is pretty awesome for answering most things!
Yeah. I've spent a bit of time around Yahoo! Answers, and whilst you do get some excellent advice there the signal-to-noise ratio is depressingly low.
Metafilter doesn't seem to attract too many of the idiots, I think because there is a $5 joining fee to discourage you. It's not as fun as STW though (probably as there aren't enough idiots making it interesting).
To the OP - this is some kind of google spamming experiment to get more random questions on here isn't it?
I tried a guitar forum once for guitar related advice. I would have been much better asking on here.
What strings for Fender acoustic anyone?
I htink the problem with "ask" sites is that you run the risk of getting swamped by ill-informed idiotic americanised junk. At least in here most posters (with some notable exceptions) restrict their replies to technical questions within their own specialist sphere for fear of being contradicted by a genuine expert. You still get the wiki-linkers trying to sound like they know all the answers though
bingo
STW is just one little forum along with all the other little forums (fori?) that collectively make up the whole massive forum that is the Interwebs...
Nicely self referential question there. Good one. Is there not a name for this artistic device?
STW has never let me down yet.
Pistonheads
forums (fori?)
The Latin plural would be "fora," but for the purposes of 'more than one Internet forum,' "forums" is considered correct.
</STW>
The Latin plural would be "fora," but for the purposes of 'more than one Internet forum,' "forums" is considered correct.</STW>
You could use "fourum", if there were four fourum (four fourumenemums?).
We need more female members, though, as most of the questions I need answering are of a woman's nature.
We need more female members, though, as [s]most of the questions I need answering are of a woman's nature[/s] [b]we're on the Internet[/b].
FTFY.
It just sure as hell isn't yahoo answers.
Be surprised if you can beat the general questions forum on the straightdope.com
It's got excellent signal to noise. Big, busy forum with tight moderation. This level of moderation is not my cup of tea on the other sub fora there, but on simple questions it's just what you need. All the dickheads / time-wasters / attention hoors are given short shrift; you get a very broad church of people giving good answers to every sort of question under the sun.
This forum's not as good as it was. I asked a perfectly good question about Myelodysplastic Syndrome and got almost no authorititive answers.
it's what i like about this forum, quite similar to a fitba forum i go on too..I'm sure it's hardly unique mind you, put enough people together and allow them the freedom to talk about anything and they'll have an incredible knowledge base, well as long as there's somebody keeping the loonballs in check and allowing it to come through...