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Stack Exchange is more a reference tool... something you use when you NEED a specific answer to an actual question that actually has an answer. We're the reference section of the library, they're an awesome salon where smart people are shootin' the shit.

Quora is mostly Questions & Opinions

Over 80 percent of questions get a good answer, Mr. Spolsky wrote, and many of the new Stack Exchange sites have 100 percent answer rates. One of the issues with Quora, a well-funded Bay Area startup founded by former Facebook employees, is the high number of unanswered questions.

One way to solve this problem, Mr. Spolsky realized, was to separate Q&A sites by topic—that way each site attracts a more engaged group.

I spent yesterday on the front page of Hacker News for my git primer, which resulted in over 12K page views and some fascinating insight into what technologies are being used by HN’s readers. Here are some of the main data points:

1. Chrome is stomping Firefox among HN-browsing developers (50% vs. 27%).
   
2. Almost 10% of readers came from mobile devices (8.62%). That’s pretty stunning to me. We all know mobile dominance is coming, but this seems high for being this early.
   
3. Apple is still crushing among developers (most hits were for the post about git), with almost double the hits of all the competitors in the next nine positions.

My takeaways are that mobile browsing is accelerating faster than I thought, and that Chrome and iOS are dominating among those most capable of using alternatives. ::

But Digg is in a deadly, unrecoverable tail spin. The fact is, people -- real people -- are beginning to tire. Submit this, upload that, vote on this, "like" that, be my "friend", check in here, suggest this, retweet that ... there's already so much to do. The only thing left to "Digg" is a grave.

It is, precisely, the simplicity and minimalism of Hacker News' feature set that keeps it usable for everyday, busy, -- real people --. Obviously, the culture on Hacker News keeps submissions and comments in check, but that culture would not exist if HN were trying to become a social network for entrepreneurs.

Your continued interaction and consistent fine-tuning makes this a place that I like to come back to. There is a certain social satisfaction with knowing that one is a part of a community in which the creator is still a participant.

I know you are cognizant of what makes this community tick; I also realize it wouldn't be what it is today if your intentions hadn't been clear (and they obviously are) - so I didn't need to say this, but I did want to say this: thank you.

I did recently (about 3 weeks ago) tweak the algorithm for ranking comments, and that has had a noticeable effect. Previously it was the same as the one for ranking frontpage stories. Now it also considers among other things the average comment score of the submitter. With any luck this will keep HN poised in its usual position mid-way over the shark for another 6 months.