Jeff Atwood has said that stackoverflow.com is partially a response to the massive suck factor of sites like Experts Exchange. One of the most annoying things about researching programming topics is trying to find something on google and accidentally clicking an Experts Exchange link. I really wish that site would just go away.
What's the problem with Experts Exchange, exactly? I'm speaking from mainly a .Net point of view, but I've found solutions to many, many problems there.
One, they're deceptive. Top of every page says you to pay to join to see the answer, shows scrambled answers, etc. Bottom of the same page shows the actual answer.
Two, the ratio of crap to goodness on their page is astoundingly high. If I counted pixels, it's like 20:1. Painful to use.
Stackoverflow is also trying to tackle issues like out of date answers, the anonymous user experience, etc.
Whoa, I never noticed that the real answers were at the bottom of the page!
But anyway, I assumed a site that looks "commercial" and secretive like that would probably have crappy answers. I'm wary of the "What's in my hand?" tactic.
For example, it adds "This answer is only available to paid users" where real answers are meant to be - but if you check right at the bottom of the page, the answers are there....for search engines to see, obviously.
I am really looking forward to this site, but hopefully a little newbie questions aren't laughed at.
"I’m sure it’ll still suck at the end. But with your help, less. Much, much less! With any luck, we might even flirt with.. wait for it.. not sucking! A man’s gotta dream."
Cuil probably should have had text resembling this in all their press releases. Nothing like setting expectations where you have a chance to exceed them.
From what I've heard from the podcasts, two points. First, it's not a link submission site, it's question/answer with digg-like voting for questions and answers. Second, the mockup has all .NET content, but it is not specifically .NET-focused.
