Yahoo Answers launched yesterday morning (December 7, 2005) and I gave it a test drive. The first thing that came to mind was the search engine formerly known as Ask Jeeves (now goes by Ask) where you would ask the search questions and it would return answers. Of course Yahoo and Google did away with that early form of search functionality with the rise to prominence of the keyword search. Yahoo Answers is not about search though, it is a social network that allows you to submit questions and then hope that someone has an answer to your question. To see just how it worked I submitted the questions and within a few hours I received an answer via email notification. The question was posted onto the Yahoo Answers website and a category was associated with it to make it easier to find questions that were both answered and unanswered. So here is the email I received with an answer to my question:
Hello Somewhat Frank, Good news! Someone has answered your question on Yahoo! Answers: Here's the answer that TwAs_98 gave: So that pretty much sums it up, Yahoo has set up site to help answer your questions. For more blogosphere buzz about Yahoo Answers check out these posts on Websosphere, Jason Golod Blogs, Moustache and TechBulletin.
Santa lived his life on the Southwest coast of Turkey, of all places. And yes, he had a beard and allegedly gave presents to children, but that is where the similarities end. St. Nick was born in Patara, Turkey around 4 BC. Patara is now a sleepy coastal town but was once the Roman seat of government in Lycia, an ancient Turkish civilization. Patara’s ancient port has silted in, causing an abundance of impressive ruins and mosquitoes. Patara is perhaps most famous for its undeveloped 18 kilometer beach, perhaps the finest on the Mediterranean.
