FEEDBACK: Minimum tip amount to ask a question on Mahalo?

I am great a worst case scenarios so her goes... with a bit of positivity. :) ~If anonymous questions remain at the free default tip of $0.25 and user asked questions cost $0.10 to ask then the amount of anonymous questions will skyrocket and the amount of them being answered will plummet as there are limitations (7) on the amount of anonymous questions visible on the front page. ~~ also the cash motivation to answer user asked questions at $0.10 will fall as the recent poll is that many Mahalo users are answering questions for the cash reward and feel the money adds overall quality http://www.mahalo.com/answers/mahalo-answers-community/would-you-be-a-part-of-mahalo-completing-tasks-anwering-questions-etc-if-there-were-no-money-involved Recent @trmbngrl poll The combination of increased asked but unanswered anonymous questions with the falling number of user asked questions with the cash motivation to answer them could spell trouble for users by creating a back log of unanswered questions.

A dwindling motivation to ask attributed questions just for the sake of getting answers due to cost could lead to an overabundance of questions specifically designed for revshare and not questions for the sake of learning or knowledge enrichment. Just brainstorming here..now some positivity :) ~If each user asked question was to cost a dime AND we were to keep the sharing rewards for Tweeting questions this negates the cost of asking questions for the users as they when asking a question would be able to recoup the dime for just being the first to Tweet via Mahalo the question they just asked. ~~This is a double win as it guarantees every user asked question will be shared via Twitter as it is being asked..but does take away the added bonus of getting the dime as as reward just for asking then Tweeting the question and there are users who do not use Twitter that would be left out on this break even mechanism.

I think overall the type of questions asked here on Mahalo Answers might fundamentally change from people asking questions with their name attached so they could get real and accurate answers to users asking questions ONLY designed to earn revshare and not out of the real need for answers. I also think the user attributed questions asked for the sake of actually getting knowledgeable answers might drop off and the users would ask these questions anonymously for the default tip and the likelihood of better answers due to the $0.25 over the $0.10 and with the front page limits on anonymous questions many of these knowledge seeking questions would be difficult to see and get good answers to. Just a few bits of feedback .. trying to be foresighted and honest.

No, I don't think this would be a good idea. Many users would not be prepared to pay for all of their questions - personally, I find that most of my questions I ask on a whim, and I don't want to offer a tip. I think this would dramatically reduce the amount of questions asked, or if anonymous questions are still free, most users would simply opt for asking anonymously.

The beauty of this site (and indeed, the whole internet) is to be able to obtain knowledge from your peers free of charge. Plenty of us are on here willingly to answer questions, but without questions to answer, the site would become moot. Also, I agree with @girlieq3000's point.

I only have accumulated M$1.05 in AdSense revenue. This would not be enough to make up for the 47 questions (and counting! ) that I've asked.

Before I answer I will also say that the revenue share so far for me is not big, but I can see it improving over time. I gather that Mahalo has done the revenue reports and might see this as a way of cutting down payments. That bothers me.

Since the rev share has been implimented we have had great questions and great answers and far more users competing for best answer, and that's a great move! It's boosted Mahalo Answers big time and we've even had less active answerers come back to participate. I don't believe this change should go ahead now.

I believe the Answers community needs to see the revenue share reports and have a few months of examining them to see how best to make money for Mahalo and themselves. I must admit I will be looking through them with a fine tooth comb to see trends and then act upon them, within my expertise anyway....so firstly, give us time to see how we are moving with the new changes. If you let Anonymous questions 'free' but make members pay I can see more anon questions being asked and they are already of a lower standard ( in general ) to member questions.

They are already backed up in the system ( to date Anonymous has asked 28, 866 questions ). I don't believe more anonymous questions will improve Mahalo overall. What will improve Mahalo is more members asking questions, not anonymous.

I don't believe Mahalo should hamper their top users from making money by answering questions. If you decrease the tip to 10cents you will stop people answering some of the questions that they do now - not all answers are gong to make revenue share and some users will already be waiting years to make a decent amount of money for their time.....it will not encourage them to answer the questions that are non-commercial and those questions will sit in the sytem without result. If Mahalo wishes to decrease the amount of default tip there will be many changes as a result.

Most will not benefit members, it might benefit Mahalo but it would be shooting yourselves in the foot - this is not a typical answers community, we know how good it is compared to the others. Don't degrade the quality for a short term monetary gain, especially now. Give us time to see the new sharing, give us some of the upgrades you have mentioned first ( more filtering, more reports ) and then ask again....

I don't think most people would ever make their money back with revenue. I mean, all of my questions and BAs (of which I have about 450 combined) I've only made 67 cents. I definitely wouldn't put the same amount of effort into a 10 cent question as I would into a 25 cent question.

Though I don't mind paying for my questions (since I usually do anyways) I think it would just mean a lot more anonymous questions and lower quality answers when no one wants to work for only 10 cents. I think it would also discourage new users from asking questions - no one wants to spend the first dollar they make.

Jason, it is obvious that users making money is not working for Mahalo. Just change the M$ into points! By giving and then taking away the financial opportunities from users you are alienating the only commodity that you have.

The people that spend their quality time to ask and answer questions here. Do not tell me about managed pages. Do a google search for, "this page has no page manager site:mahalo.Com", and you will see over 1/4 million pages!

Kick me out. Ban my account. What ever?

But you will at least read this first. In trying to turn a profit, you are alienating the users that make this site a viable option to make you and users money. Every time you offer financial incentive you revoke it by finding a way to minimize the actual rewards.

Mahalo is nothing without it's users. Continue to treat them as ignorant and you and your investors will pay the price. You claim transparency.

Then be transparent! If something is costing Mahalo, say it. You have dedicated users, they will understand.

We (Mahaloians) want this to work for all of us. However, if you think you are pulling the wool over our eyes. Shame on you.

Be real, be transparent, make this work for all, or your company will not make it. Turn back revenue share to 10% or 5%, what ever it takes, however, do not pull these moves to cover up your projected or expected outcomes.Be real, that is what you project. If I am alone in my opinion then you have heard from one.

If I am not, then you have heard from many! I like your concept, however, I am very disappointed in your application. Sincerely, Larry Benner larry.

[email protected].

It doesn't sound to pleasing on the surface because.. A) You asking users to pay to ask B) Answerers see a major decrease in the amount they earn for answering. Yes, we can justify it by M$1 bonus given to users when they sign up, but the language will have to be changed in the introduction to let them know that the dollar is for asking questions, they will need to be taught how to tip. ~~MY VERSION~~ I have an idea however that will ensure Mahalo still saves money, while promoting users to tip and at the same times answerers will see an increase on minimum tips to questions...ready... Instead of Mahalo offering a M$0.25 automated tip on questions, they lower that to M$0.15 - Mahalo instantly saves a dime on each question.At the same time, we introduce Jason's idea of having mandatory tips no questions, so we ask users to Match Mahalo's tip and require them to include a minimum of M$0.15 in order to ask their question.

This turns the questions minimum bounty to M$0.30 - Meaning active answerers are likely to see an increase in revenue and most likely happiness will ensue. What do you think of that idea?

Not a good idea for the aforementioned reasons. We've gone through so many basic fee changes here, up and down, and settle don a good 25 cents. Rev sharing is still new and few people here are benefiting from it.

Why not instead of making us pay more, we fix the bugs that is causing so many backlogged unanswered questions (anon and from members) and the backlog of undecided questions that need voting.

As stated, I don't like this idea for the reasons mentioned by others. For the sake of completeness, the objections I agree with are: 1. Likely increase in anonymous questions to avoid paying any tip.

While this may seem like a positive to Mahalo because then only 25% of rev share goes out - to the best answer, there is a certain feeling of community that comes out of answering questions for someone with a face (or at least a Mahalo handle) that goes flat when answering anonymous questions. This reduces the likelihood of people answering anon questions with low tips. 2.

Likely decrease overall in the number of quality questions. 3. Likely increase in gamed questions designed to get rev share.

This may not be a negative for Mahalo if it works, but where it is not done correctly it will simply degrade the value of questions asked on the site. Here are some thoughts of how Mahalo might achieve a similar result. As is the case with @omicron's thoughtful suggestions (some of which I adapted below), the following are intended to work together, so cherry-picking one or several without implementing all of them together, is likely to not work well.1.

Charge at least M$0.05 for anonymous questions, and preferably M$0.10. Then, make the tip equal to what the asker offers (i.e. Mahalo pays nothing for an anonymous question).2.

Offer the asker's portion of revenue share on anonymous questions to the best answer (i.e. M$0.67 per US$1 of ad revenue, which is a 50% ad revenue share given the M$1 = US0.75 conversion).3. Charge Mahalo members the same amount to ask a question as anonymous askers, but allow a registered asker of a non-anon question to offer his/her share of ad revenue to the best answer provider in return for posting the question with no tip.4.

Instead of tipping M$1 for members achieving new belt levels, offer 10 free questions at M$0.10 a piece. Likely results: - Item (1) will reduce Mahalo's cost on anon questions to $0, and will drastically reduce the flood of non-questions, rants, spam, etc. That makes up the bulk of anonymous questions. - Item (2) will increase the likelihood of good anon questions being answered, even at M0.05.

- Item (3) will reduce Mahalo's cost for registered member non-anon questions to $0. Given the added revenue share incentive, even untipped questions will likely get answers, at least if they're any URL1 making the cost equal for posing anon and non-anon questions you avoid pushing many members to post anon questions simply to lower their cost. - Item (4) will cost Mahalo nothing, and will recirculate those few M$'s that new users get, which given the M$150 minimum payout threshold will likely not affect anyone significantly.

I like the idea, but I'm confused. So... the person asking the question pays ten cents. Mahalo puts up ten cents (instead of the current twenty five).

Does the question show up on board as ten or twenty cents? If the answer is twenty cents, I think that's great! If the question still shows up at ten, I have the feeling that people might ignore them because of the small incentive.

Overall, I think this idea is great. It's really hard to tell how this will really play without doing a Mr. Calacanis "let's try this on for size" test drive. I would love to see more quality questions blow through here, but if the questions show at ten cents... I think that would hurt the site in the long run.

What I love about Mahalo is the eclectic group behind the scenes that can tweak and fine tune changes like this until it works!

I think the service is better when there are lots of questions being asked and answered. I think charging anything (even $.01) would dramatically slow down the rate of new questions. There is a good exploration of why free is likely to be a better business model for Mahalo on Wired.

Free! Why $0.00 Is the Future of Business Read More wired.com/techbiz/it/magazine/16-03/ff_free.

There is currently too many questions, and too few answers, and anything that can help re-balance this would be great. Requiring a fee for asking a question would be a great start. There is one thing I don't like about the idea, which is the fact that Anonymous is getting away with asking any question without payment.

I don't like Mr Anonymous, and I probably never will. I hate his questions, which border on stupidity most of the time, and are nearly always unanswerable. They've never been implemented as a way to 'ask questions you feel uncomfortable to put your name on', but as a way to let non-members enter a question into the system on a whim, significantly lowering the quality of Mahalo Q&A.

I've tried to neglect Anonymous questions as much as I can, and I'm pretty sure I'm not the only one. That said, I think the minimum tip amount should be applied to ALL questions, including those by Mr Anonymous. If someone is not a member, tell them to become a member before their question gets truly inserted to Mahalo Q&A.

Tell them their question will cost them 0.10, and that Mahalo gives them M$1 to finance their first questions. As for Rev Sharing: the earnings from that as so very minimal, that I simply will keep that out of the balance. Most users don't make more than M$1 per month on their Q&A Rev Share.

Oh, and I really like Jeff's (was it Jeff? ) idea, where Mahalo will match any user tip, up to a certain amount. Concluding: - Mandatory tipping is a great idea - Mr Anonymous has to chip in too - Mahalo should match the provided tip up to a certain amount (M$0.25?).

I don't like the idea of charging registered users for questions if anonymous questions can be asked for free. I think this would just encourage more anonymous questions when it would be better to encourage people to log in to ask their questions. It would be ok if all questions including anonymous would cost $.10.

Would their value start out at $.10 or would they start out at $.10+$.25? I think people would appreciate if they started at $.35 by combining the base tip and the user added tip. Adding the $.10 cost might lower the amount of questions asked, but I think the quality of questions would be better.

Simple answer ... make unregistered and anonymous pay the .10, and registered members post for free. Then we will either get rid of the stupid questions, or be able to see who is posting them. If we have a certain member who is posting a lot of bad questions, we can ban them.

Also, if someone is consistently asking undecided questions we can deal with that. OR we can just require everyone register and be confirmed to post questions at all.

Okay, I'll make my answer short... Since I can ask anonymously without paying even a Mahalo cent then I think I'd better choose it in favor of the answerer so s/he can get the M$0.25. This is far better than personally giving a M$0.10.

It doesn't seem like it's really easy to make money from people clicking on ads. Everyone is aware of not to click on them because the companies would be charged for each click. Besides, everyone is good at researching that they will go right to the website that will have what they need.

Jason The bottom line here is Mahalo Answer's need higher quality questions asked to then garner higher quality answers. There are a lot of seemingly low quality trivial questions that in turn receive a low quality, short answer. Example: Why won't my iPod turn on?

I'm sure in your study you've found that great questions with a decent tip receive the best most thought out, researched answers. Example: How do you trouble shoot an iPod that will not turn on? Both are really the same question, but partner the 2nd with a M$1 or more and you'll get good answers, which will lead to the BEST answer for that question.

I say up the ante. The real players will stay at the table.

They seem to have the highest percentage of crap. The .10 to ask a question is a good idea, if everyone gets $1 and it's fairly easy for people to earn more free Mahalo dollars.It's still too early for most people to spend real money on a site like this. Getting rid of Anonymous questions and making it easier for people to earn free Mahalo dollars would encourage more engaged users.

I also think giving people free Mahalo dollars that they have to use to tip would increase the quality of answers. You should also do more to encourage tipping of good answers not just the best answer. I'd also like to see everyone who provided a "helpful" answer be part of the revenue share.

The problem is, I only get good answers when I put forth a big tip ($4+). I don't even bother asking a .25 cent question. Align incentives and good things will happen.

There are so many pros and cons to this, so it's difficult to really say. I can definitely see the benefit in having to fund your own questions. However, I can also see how that will increase the amount of anonymous questions which everybody hates.

Maybe there should be a limit to the number of anonymous questions a person can ask? But I do think it's fair for Mahalo to ask users to fund their own questions. The reason is because Mahalo is different from all other Q&A sites.

There aren't any other Q&A sites (that I know of) that offer you several different ways to earn money. And now with the revenue share on questions, why not ask users to fund their own questions? I can only imagine how much money it costs Mahalo everyday to put up the .25 cents for every unfunded question.

But, on the other hand, I can see how it might turn off new users who don't know what the earning potential is on Mahalo. Having weighed the pros and cons, my vote is to charge .10 cents for questions.

In my opinion, I think this would be a good move, in order for members to improve quality of questions and not based on quantity. Furthermore, the Google adsense revenue is already in place, so that already compensates for the reduced minimum tip. On the other hand, this change might increase the number of anonymous questions from members who just wanted to ask question and does not care about the revenue sharing in Mahalo Answers.

I would be willing to pay for every question. I appreciate the opportunity to earn tips when I put time and thought into giving a good answer. I don't plan on asking any free questions anyway and figure I'll take a portion of what I earn here to fund the questions I want to ask.

Though I'm not in this for the money, I wouldn't look forward to seeing a sea of $.10 questions - a 60% decrease.

Oh I thought the users already pay .25 for a question Personally, I have no problem in paying .25 for questions-I think that's fair. I asked few question but every time (with one exception, by error) I tipped more than the usual .25 On second thought, I see some users may stop asking questions which may not be pleasant. Also, on the lines of @buddawiggi .10 would be...depressing.... I don't want to see .10.

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