Ever wonder about the best way to remove wax from clothing, or variations on how to play with a dreidel, or how to make flavorful barley recipes?
If you have the answer, a user of the Mahalo.com search engine might be willing to pay for it through Mahalo’s new Answers feature, which allows users to ask questions, offer answers, and provide monetary “tips” for the best answer.
Mahalo’s founder is Jason Calacanis, the cofounder of Weblogs and former general manager of Netscape. Calacanis launched Mahalo in May 2007 with seed capital from Sequoia Capital, Elon Musk, and News Corp. When Calacanis launched the company, he did not share much about the long-term vision of Mahalo — until now.
On his personal blog, Calacanis said Mahalo first launched its human-powered search engine, which includes the top 100,000 search terms. Next was content in the form of notes by “Mahalo Guides,” as well as vertical content, including how-to articles and video-game walk-throughs.
Mahalo’s latest feature, Answers, is what Calacanis describes as the piece that will thread the needle of search, content and knowledge exchange.
How It Works
A user can ask a question for free, but is encouraged to set a tip amount they are willing to pay for a helpful answer. (Calacanis suggests $3 to start.) Mahalo collects a deposit via PayPal or from the user’s account balance of “Mahalo dollars.” Once the best answer is chosen, the user pays the tip originally offered. If no one offers the right answer, a user’s deposit is fully refunded. But rescinding too many tips also sends up some red flags and leaves a mark on a user’s profile.
If a user doesn’t decide on the best answer within three days of posting the question, he or she loses the deposit.
Each Mahalo dollar is worth…