You’ve got a Question? Ask Yahoo! Answers!

Google Groups is known among many people. This discussion group was for a long period of time known as the Usenet-archive, which was accessible via the website Deja.com. In 2001 Google acquired Deja.com, and Google Groups was born.

Yahoo! started in the beginning of 2006 a similar service, namely Yahoo! Answers. This service provides access to several categories, in which people can post questions. Afterwards visitors have the possibility to answer these questions. The silliest questions are posted. For example: "When brushing your teeth, where do you begin?" But fortunately there are also questions that are more serious of nature: "Do not copy! How do I protect the content of a web site?" Also you can search at keyword and you can view answered questions.

Yahoo! Answers has started in January 2006. By then more then 10 million questions are answered. (Yahoo! Search Blog, May 14, 2006) From the subcategory “Internet” 20 questions from the second 100 questions are not answered (20%). So, approximately 80% of the questions are answered. Although this is a rough appraisal, it seems like this service is going well. Some questions look like a discussion (for example: Do you think Mexico will win the Fifa world cup 2006?), which I think is a pity. Nevertheless, I think this service could come in very useful some time.