Start-up pays people to answer questions online

A new social search site that pays people to answer questions from visitors will become publicly available on Monday.

ChaCha.com will pay "guides" up to $10 per hour spent searching for Web sites that contain answers to user questions. Guides invite other guides to the site and can then earn 10 percent of what the invited guides earn, said Brad Bostic, ChaCha.com president and co-founder.

There are four levels of guides: apprentice, pro, master and elite. They will be able to earn reputations based on user ratings and how the system rates their performance, Bostic said.

The Web site also indexes the responses to questions and makes them available if they are pertinent to future queries.

When a user asks a question, a guide will respond in a live chat window, providing a link that will contain the answer to the user's question, as well as a snippet from the Web page referenced.

The free site has about 2,500 guides, Bostic said. Targeted ads appear next to results.

Social search sites have been cropping up as an alternative to algorithmic-based search engines that provide results of links based on keywords. Experts say that while traditional Web search is best for providing answers to factual questions, people can often get better answers to subjective questions.

Rather than a user asking a question and getting answers from any random person in the community, which happens at Yahoo Answers, only one person answers a question on ChaCha.com. Another service, Google Answers, pays "researchers" 75 percent of the amount a user agrees to pay to get a question answered.

Paying the answerers ensures better-quality results than other question-and-answer sites, Bostic said.

[cpoarch]

Experience

I'd like to share opinions & anecdotes on:
Design, Patenting process, Investment, Relationships, Art.

[amybeth24]

Cha Cha Guides

Cha Cha is new, ground breaking and extraordinary!!
If anyone would like more information on how to become a Cha Cha "guide" please email me at
[e-mail]
Experience in search engines is great, but not required!

[APerls3206]

Cha Cha!!

I don't know if you guys have given cha cha a try but I definitely would. It's nice to not have to search through thousands of results on google and instead sit back on your couch and have a guide do it for you. I have experienced some technical difficulties with the site but I would expect that because of how new it is. Give the site some time and you'll be cha cha ing in no time.

[briannguyen0102]

ChaChaGuides.com

When I first saw Chacha, I did very impressive about the idea. It seems ChaCha gonna beat Google soon.

Im trying to create a small ChaCha Guides Community here:
http://www.ChaChaGuides.com
Please join and we have more big discussion

[debbieoc]

Any

Can ask me anything,i can help out in alot of areas

[moseyeslee]

Guide sign up

I have 7 invitations left to become a ChaCha guide. Mail me at [e-mail] to see if you qualify!!

[jazzaboo99]

what is the price?

i would like to know about this account you have for sale ?

[Xbxg32000]

8 Invites Open

I currently have 8 invites for anyone wishing to become a ChaCha guide. You must have the following prerequisites:

1) You must live in the U.S. and be at least 18 years of age.

2) You must have a proof of ID.

3) You must have knowledge about the internet and have the ability to retrieve information quickly from the internet.

If anyone is interested, please send me an E-Mail to [e-mail]