Askville.com: Amazon`s Answer to Social Networking - Other Signs of Community

The discussion boards that crop up around each question are often pretty active; the “circus freak show” question, for instance, inspired 23 replies. Those who are used to discussion forums that have fixed topics and areas may find these a bit disorienting, though; they’re dynamic. By that I mean that you can search on a topic and get a list of questions that have been answered OR that need answers. Let me show you what I mean. I did a search for “crafts” and this is what I turned up:

Granted, the craft community may not be as active as other parts of the site, but two things are worth noting here. First, it’s easy to find the questions that pertain to your interests. Second, if you look on the right hand side, you’ll see the “Topic Leaders.” Those green boxes next to the icons tell what “level” they are. Yes, you can gain “levels” for your expertise from the amount of points you gain from answering questions. At last, all that time playing Dungeons and Dragons pays off!

If you’re answering a question, you want to put in a real effort. Those who vote on the answers can give five different ratings, ranging from “Great” to “Awful,” and if you get a “Weak” or an “Awful” rating you can actually LOSE experience points. I think Amazon put that in to discourage users from giving flip answers, which makes sense since each question is “full” after five answers.

The Askville FAQ is quite comprehensive. Here I learned that users can embed widgets into their answers, as well as content from other sites. I also learned about “superpowers” here. Superpowers “are special powers and privileges” that users can earn after answering enough questions to be at least level 1 in a topic. They let users do things that one would associate with a moderator (like vote on questions in which they didn’t directly participate, for example). I like this; I think it’s a clever way to automate the process of getting a site moderated without forcing the administrators to get involved in choosing moderators.

It’s been observed that as a web 2.0 site, Askville has the same problems as most web 2.0 sites – namely, that there’s no telling whether the answers are any good. But that’s not really Amazon’s concern. Amazon is going to make its money from selling products that users recommend to each other, and through the ads that crop up on certain pages (though none showed in my screen shots, there were there, sitting discreetly on the right hand side). With the rewards and recognition it offers to users, Amazon is doing its best to make sure they keep coming back; they’ve also set up the site to be as low maintenance for them as possible. I’m still waiting for my verification issue to be settled…but I’m still interested in participating (that will change if I don’t hear anything back by the time this article goes live, however). I have no doubt that we’ll be hearing more about Askville – and Questville – by the end of this year.