Should people who originate questions earn a share of the revenue from the clicks on the ads that are present in their questions?

In my opinion this could work, but only if Mahalo sets things up in a way that avoids spam questions from resulting. The following is one set of rules that might make it work. - Ad revenue share goes only to questions that are not anonymous.

- No ad revenue share if nobody votes the question interesting. - No ad revenue share if there are no answers. - Ad revenue share only if the asker provides a tip of at least $X (X to be determined by Mahalo).

I believe that if something like the above is implemented it will provide incentive for people to ask interesting questions, put their own money at risk, and require proof that the questions are interesting through other members voting so with their money.

I'm not so sure. Although I can't say for sure, of course, my guess is that we would see lots and lots of questions like these: "does anyone know where I can find coupons for ...." "does anyone have cheats for my latest game? " "I need to know how to change the oil in my Buick".

When I say lots, I mean thousands, as in one question for each coupon page, and one for each how-to page, and one for each game page, all entered by the page managers or vertical managers as a possible way to earn revenue on their pages. If you didn;t like twitter questions or cunundrim questions, how do you think you might like to log on one day to find the first 25 pages filled with "Where do I find Coupons" questions? I'm not smart enough or experienced enough to know for sure that this will happen, it is simply my personal concern.

If we start keywording questions and attempting to draw specific type of ads to our questions, shouldn't we think about how that will affect Mahalo and the overall experieince of users? Someone who comes to the site may find hundreds of questions from the same person, all asking about a different product coupon. Page after page of "where can I find ______ coupons?".

Ugh.

I don't think so. Mahalo has a lot of expenses and they need to make money somehow. The ads on questions is one of those ways.

Mahalo funds a majority of the questions posted here, so I don't think it would be fair to ask them to fund the questions and then also share the ad revenue. I agree with those here that mentioned how the reward for posting a good question is the answers you get. The point of asking questions is to get answers, not earn money.

If I write an interesting question the tips goes to the one who gets best answer. So if I get enough people to say I wrote an interesting question I should either get some of that tip or percentage of revenue or whatever to encourage good questions. That percentage would not be on what I tipped to create the question but on the amount that others tip as they indicate it is an interesting question.

Sounds like a wonderful idea, to make it a realistic business model for mahalo maybe the click thru income should be limited to inly a month or so after a question is answered. You will see a huge increase in interesting questions though you will see a huge increase in questions that generate specific ads that are known to do well like health and nutrition supplements etc.

Thats how you fix the anon problem. Let someone take ownership of the question by tipping Mahalo more than the standard 25 cents. It would work, right?

If no one takes the question after an hour or two, delete it. It would also fix people jacking the system by answering thier own questions. Two birds with one stone!

Questions /Answers both are rewarded .. I will say that ,Mahalo Managerial community might look into it. It's not bad to post any opinion in order to make Mahlo more entertaining. Regarding incentives , I do believe is quite interesting,if you can be competitive..and can manage pages or complete tasks.

This is a better way to involve and create good content. To get paid is not always ..main option but to have a good point/the best answer. Always check to see ,how to contribute in a better way.

I'm personally very impressed of how many of the top manager have to give. The option remains at last to be more creative and supportive. It's not only about us but everyone.

The role of Mahalo members is to make sure that they do respect the TOS and Add Great content. To conclude I agree that some of this changes might help...but still the managerial line should look close to it . May be a good thing anyway.(only if can the system control the -real value of clicks or the quality of questions /Answers).

I've thought about that, too, coltech, and I agree with you. (It might have some side benefits, too, such as reducing the flood of anonymous questions. ).

I'm going to say no... The reward for asking an interesting question is getting an interesting answer. Tips, points, interesting votes are incentives for people to answer the question. Presumably people are asking questions because they want answers.

If that isn't your motivation for asking them then why are you doing it? Seriously I'd like to know. There are admittedly other reasons why people ask questions... to promote their page, to have an interesting discussion about the topic, to make a point about something... but all these have their aims met by someone giving a best answer to the question.

Getting paid to ask questions will only increase the number of 'bad' questions coming into mahalo and won't increase the quality at all.

You know, that's not a bad idea! Might encourage more interesting questions.

I cant really gove you an answer,but what I can give you is a way to a solution, that is you have to find the anglde that you relate to or peaks your interest. A good paper is one that people get drawn into because it reaches them ln some way.As for me WW11 to me, I think of the holocaust and the effect it had on the survivors, their families and those who stood by and did nothing until it was too late.