So how do I…?
First, we wanted to remind fans of Twitter that you can follow us on this messaging service for news, competitions, and updates about Answers. The link to the U.S. Answers blog is: https://twitter.com/YhooAnswersBlog.
It’s always nice to be reminded of things you may have forgotten from time to time. Every day the Yahoo! Answers team and Customer Care take time to review your feedback and try to help you if you have any uncertainty about how Answers is used. Today we want to recap the most common questions we receive, and the answers we give.
I want to have an Avatar. How do I get one?
1. Go to Yahoo! Avatars.
2. Create your Avatar.
3. Go to Yahoo! Answers.
4. Click My Profile in the upper-right corner.
5. Select your Avatar.
6. Click Preview.
7. Click Save.
How can I contact other users?
- Go to their profiles and see if they allow communications via email or Messenger.
- If you want to be reachable, set that on your profile (we will not display your email address).
How can I add a friend or block someone?
To add someone you know outside of Answers, click http://answers.yahoo.com/my/contacts/invite/ and enter your friend’s name, email address, and a brief message (optional). We’ll do the rest. Your friend will receive an email from us, with a link to connect to you as a Contact on Answers.
- To add an existing Answers user, starting from a question page, roll over the picture (or Avatar) of the person you’ve chosen to add as your Contact. Click Add to My Contacts.
- To block someone, starting from a question page, roll over the picture (or Avatar) of the person you want to block. Click Block User.
- To add or block someone, starting from their Profile Page, click their Avatar or user ID to get to their Profile Page. Click Add to My Contacts or Block User.
I have seen content I find offensive. What do I do?
- Yahoo! Answers provides a Report Abuse link after every question and every answer. You should complete this form anytime you are exposed to content that you feel violates the Community Guidelines or Yahoo!’s Terms of Service. Please be sure you understand the Guidelines before you report anyone. Disagreeing with a community member’s point of view is not justification for reporting abuse unless the expression of their point of view violates the Guidelines.
- You can learn more about the community moderation system here.
How can I keep up-to-date with the latest questions from my network and news from the blog?
- Subscribe to the different Yahoo! Answers categories via RSS on your My Yahoo! page. Find out more here.
- Subscribe to our blog by clicking Subscribe in the upper-right corner of the blog’s front page.
- Follow us on Twitter: https://twitter.com/YhooAnswersBlog
- Join our MyBlogLog community. Read all about it here.
Do you have any other questions? Leave a comment and let us know!
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My Friends,
It seems that you are unclear yourselves as to what constitutes an offensive question.
I can offer many examples, but I think just one will serve to show your ambiguity.
Over a period of a week, I ask the same question three times in the same section.
There is no problem with one of them. I receive violation notices for two of them. I appeal both violation notices. For one, I get the response that I have, indeed, violated guidelines. And for the other, I get the message that my question has been restored and the reporter may lose credibility.
I’m less interested in the reporter’s credibility than in yours, friends.
How can the same question be viewed in such completely different ways?
There seems to be no real understanding on your part. How, then, can the users ever hope to guess what does or does not follow your nebulous guidelines.
Joy, love and peace to you. And also wisdom and clarity of mind.
►⇒⇒⇒⇒⇒⇒⇒⇒⇒⇒⇒⇒⇒→↗ ↗ ↗ ↗ ►▲
why is the voluptuous Chicblogclub always here advertising in blog, which links to porn site,
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the avatar is easy to apply, Y! 360 is complicated and glitched off and on, and not animated yet,
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i don’t mind being blocked, whats annoying is answering question, then to find it has been removed, and reposted again,
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reporting spam in forum allows spammers to know where to spam, and they still repeat spam usually on weekends,
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twitter appears to be safe idea, ☺
have a nice day
Please give us the option, like in 360, to preview before someone becomes a FAN, not contact. Sometimes I periodically check the fan folder and BooYah there’s someone I dont’ know who they are.
Well apparently disagreeing works on this application. Persons reporting just because…. and it’s unjustified yet the innocent has to suffer a canceled or terminated account.
That seems clear enough. I really love Yahoo Answers. Everyone is very nice. Sometimes when a person has friends, sometimes the friend gets short with the person or drops them. That is just a fact of life. But on Yahoo Answers that never happens. Everyone is nice or gets deleted. Thank-you Yahoo Answers. Susan D. Snavely
… or check my tutorial and find out all of this and more… LOL!
Seriously, nice blog entry. I’ve just finished sending you lots of feedback from your FAQ/Help pages, I hope it helps to improve them.
By the way, I have a question. Why is it that the Feedback box only appears if the User states that the FAQ was not good? Sometimes I don’t want to give a negative opinion, I just want to add something to enhance the text, but I can’t do it unless I give a negative rating first.
Isn’t it a bit limited?
is there anyway i can be one of those top yahoo best answering people??
Some true facts. It is also nice.
-To have consistency in enforcing rules. Without consistency, rules become a joke like the Community Guidelines are now. How can you mark something as a violation in one question and let it stand for about a year in another.
-To educate and not just punish. Education goes a long way towards prevention. How can anyone learn anything from a form e-mail that basically says you received a violation for “violations of TOS/Community guidelines. I mean, no kidding, I figured out that much but what specifically??? I bounced my answers against these documents and found nothing.
-To treat your customers like they matter. Customer (We Don’t) Care is absolutely horrible at what they do. Automated responses that say “You’re wrong, We’re right” 99.9% of the time indicate that the customers are nothing but an inconvenience to you.
-To have a monitoring system that is objective. Community based reporting is not. It enables any user with a vendetta and multiple accounts to go out and target other users resulting in BS violations and account suspensions. Everyone in the Community, like it or not, is in the competition for points. This brings out a “win at all costs” mentality in some users resulting in the misuse of the reporting system. The current system is a lot like what would happen if the NBA or the NFL allowed the athletes on the field to referee their own games. Community based reporting was devised so that the Y Answers Staff could do nothing and still get a check. It isn’t working. Objective (meaning people not involved in the competition for points) people are needed to enforce law and order.
This site and its rules are a joke. You are treating adults like kindergartners.
Every day the Yahoo! Answers team and Customer Care take time to review your feedback and try to help you if you have any uncertainty about how Answers is used
Really??? The automated responses seem to indicate that a computer does all that. The only thing different on the responses are the names but it is the same basic texts. I’m sorry but the statement I pasted above is the biggest lie since “I did not have sex with that woman”.
You removed my post. You just proved one of my points. You don’t care anything about the customers.
Offensive is in the eye of the offended , it is impossible to predict what offends.
how about informing the masses of the “be courteous”rule? Kurt succinct answers abound on this site with very few people reporting them for a violation.
Peace be with you and have a great day !
I don’t waiting time to make my avatar
Ha, not everyone is very nice…come to the dog section and you will find that out quickly!
But then again you can’t blame them…with all the Drama in the dog section and the trolls, and the dumbass questions…you really can’t blame them.
Plastered throughout is the message “If you report incorrectly you will lose credibility” and is not quantified, identified nor defined. CG are not clearly identified as to what should be reported. There are horrible responses with profanity and generally disgusting to other members, but do not get reported due to the mere CHANCE at losing credibility. What the heck does that mean, anyway? And how does one lose credibility? simply stating ‘reporting incorrectly’ identifies nothing really…..How many times? Does reporting the use of explosives constitute reporting incorrectly if it is not deleted? this is more a threat and so many people are just not reporting because the consequence is looming but lacks clarity. When in doubt, just DON’T.
Yahoo Answers has become the site that ate the first amendment. Freedom of speech is a thing of the past. You have to check your rights at the door and risk your account to be on Answers. I’m a Level 7 user who simply stays away. It isn’t fun anymore, and lets face it, its never been informative.
yes it is me again, i still dont understand how u can pull a comment, because of ur guidelines and allow the users to use such vulgar names and post them where kids can see them,it is wrong to use such language in a answer yet u allow it to be posted under ther avatar, why is that
Y/A is a great site. Community members who follow the guidelines as well as reporting people who are using it for spam and classified ad ‘questions’ help make it so. I’ve learned a lot by using this site. By answering questions, I’ve found that I don’t need to look them up in my textbook anymore, and some of the top contributors have also made me think seriously about some questions in the areas in which I contribute. Thanks Y/A
The comment from Colonel Puddles on Feb 9 must be addressed by the Yahoo staff. Also you must address the issues of arbitrary and “computer generated” responses from Yahoo (see Barney, Simon and Firespider on Feb 10) showing no human review. By not addressing such issues, the Yahoo staff is losing all credibility. Answers will fall apart and become just another chat room!
This blog is ok, but totally useless. 99% of the users on YA don’t ever come to the blog. The things you put in this blog should go in a YA FAQ that is DIRECTLY findable from the YA pages. Don’t count this entry as customer service. You are not reaching your customers that need it. You are just padding your touchy-feely quotient for the week.
It appears to me that predjuced against Whites runs rampant in Yahoo Answers. I have become afraid to answer any questions concerning Black racial issues. The slighest innuendo or mention of a Black person having done something wrong is banned because you consider it predjuiced. Likewise, a White person dare not even ask a question regarding Black behavior. Banned. Obviously Yahoo is afraid of suck questions, and so when in doubt, they cower.
Yes. Freedom of speech and the first amendment are truly gone in Yahoo Answers. No questions or answers should be banned. If you don’t like the content, move on. Where Yahoo gets off telling me what rights I have concerning my fellings and issues, I don’t know. but I do know this. Yahoo answers has become offensive, not because of the questions asked, or the answers given, but because Yahoo stunts freedom of speech, whic is a fundemental of all free societies. Study the constitution Yahoo. You might learn something.
Good Morning,
I love Yahoo, Y/A & Yahoo, Suggestion Board. I have JUST become familiar w/ the computer and find both these area’s very helpful as a learning tool. So.. for that I would like to say THANK YOU! (not yelling as I have learned caps indicate, I just like to use caps, sorry)
I have posted a Suggestion that I feel will greatly improve upon Y/A, which in itself IS a wonderful sight as it is currently, but as we all know there is always room for improvement! I have had tons of positive feedback from others that frequent Suggestion Board, those of which have been active members for years.
I realize my suugestion is not the 1st time it has been brought to the attention of the Yahoo team, but I think it may be the 1st time for this solution to the problem. I think it would be quite easy to implement and/or design, & to use by the community.
So I ask that a team member from Yahoo take a look at my suggestion, I honestly think you will love it!
Oh, I also think it will cut back on a lot of “chat” cu’z I think this ‘lil’problem Yahoo has may be what generates some “chat”.
You can find my idea under, “More Information, Please” my name is Marcella.
Oh, again…I also have a solution for all the “Actual Chat”. But I haven’t posted it yet!
I sincerely thank you for all that Yahoo offers & for any time given to my suggestions. Even if yu don’t run with it,
JMB*
I think if we are going to be truthful – we must first admit there is virtually no rhyme or reason whatsoever as to how Yahoo! Answers is moderated.
I agree with many of the others here, that there is extreme prejudice as to what is “offensive” and who is being “filtered” – In the last few days I had to delete about 15 LEGITIMATE questions – four times alone I asked in “horses” – “Should hay be shaken out” – several of my questions are not appearing in the category thread and thus I delete them and continually lose 5 points for asking legitimate question while the threads fill with mocking and ridicule.
Account suspensions are also a joke – someone gets suspended – comes back with a new account or perhaps it is their 6th or 7th account after multiple suspensions and just return in the same offensive manner.
Many good intellengent people with thorough and informative answers have left Yahoo! answers because of all the juvenile mocking and behaviour.
The market cap of yahoo is multi billions and it is supposed to be a “technology” company – and that being the case with such resources and technology it has, it is indeed amazing that there is no rhyme no reason to anything, and I echo the sentiment of others, as to how a good idea can often be made so discouraging to legitimate users.
JC
Why do people think other people can remove posted questions. They cannot, correct? Yahoo! should post a statement maybe in the Community Guidelines about it.
You missed a step in your “get an avatar” instructions:
4. Click My Profile in the upper-right corner.
[4.5 Click on Edit My Info.]
5. Select your Avatar.