The California based question and answer Unicorn Quora is looking to extend its realms beyond textual Q and A, and it seems like no video giant or startup can scare it in its quest.
Quora is now going to host video answers to the questions on its own platform, because it thinks that a lot of things could be explained better by showing them, rather than writing about them. This feature is currently being tested, and the users in the beta group can now record videos through their Android or iOS device and then post it as an answer to a question on Quora, which can then be viewed by the users of the platform.
In the past, Quora users could only use the forum for answering in texts, natively hosted photos, links, and embedded videos from platforms like YouTube. However, now the service is actively hosting videos and requesting its audience for the same.
Quora already hosts a How-To video content on You Tube. Meanwhile, the video answers on Quora will be sorted on the basis of their importance to the community, and not their popularity.
Also, Quora’s entry into this space could hamper the growth prospects of other Q and A apps like Justin Kan’s Whale, and the Ask Me Anything app Yam. These platforms allow you to record your answers as videos, for any question posted on the service. However, they have filters to make you appear good while narrating those answers.
While speaking with TechCrunch, Quora’s head of mobile Tommy MacWilliam, said:
Our mission is to share and grow the world’s knowledge, and knowledge comes in many forms—not just written answers. Just like with text answers, people can upvote or downvote video answers to indicate how helpful the video is at answering the question.
This video answering service could be the start of Quora finally delving into monetizing. The company has never been very open on this subject, but MacWilliam says:
Through the beta, we’re learning how video fits into Quora for both authors and viewers, and we’re solely concentrating on building a great product.
Quora was a little slow in making money through its service, although its first Sponsored Questions ad format was praiseworthy and fresh. However, this new video based answering format could be something very interesting for ad companies, providing them an unprecedentedly different way of reaching out to their users, without making them compromise with the quality of answers.
Whatever being said, video is certainly the future of all mobile based applications, and its about time when all the old websites and apps recognize this fact as such.
