"Quora has a lot of really reputable, valuable, and domain-specific contributors, and it's easy to identify answers from people who have credibility on a subject"
I haven't been back to Quora for a couple of years, but there seemed to be a lot of astro-turfing by people who self-appointed themselves as "credible people". I also found that it was difficult to discover interesting content by genuine experts who exist outside of the "valley" VC/entrepreneurial bubble.
Yes, I really find this to be the issue with Quora. It's great branding about the wisdom of the crowds, thought leaders and what not. But really when all you have are a bunch of subjective questions/answers that people vote up, what else do you expect to happen except the one with most broad and popular appeal goes to the top. That's not the truth, that's a popularity contest. It's the same thing you have with the news -- reading it feels informative, until you see them horribly screw up something you know very well, and everybody laps it up mindlessly. Once you see that happen, you can't trust anything you read there.
For every legitimately influential person who posts on Quora, there are 10-20 "CEOs" with expired or dead links to their "startup".
The whole community on Quora also seems uncomfortably obsessed with wealth and being/getting rich. I can't browse through it for too long before I tire of that atmosphere.
I haven't been back to Quora for a couple of years, but there seemed to be a lot of astro-turfing by people who self-appointed themselves as "credible people". I also found that it was difficult to discover interesting content by genuine experts who exist outside of the "valley" VC/entrepreneurial bubble.