Google Prizes - Solve Problems, Win Contests, Make Money

As the hype surrounding Google+ keeps building, Google has launched another site that is a blend of the question and answer site quora and Amazon’s mechanical Turk service. The site called “Prizes” (#-Link-Snipped-#) allows users to answer some questions posted by others or finish some task and win cash if your answer gets picked. The range of questions and tasks varies from suggesting a start-up or a place to buy a bike to planning trips. And the cash prize varies with each task, usually 10$ - 50$.

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This is not Google’s first attempt at the question and answers section. “Google answers” which was run by Google from 2002 to 2006 was also based on a similar idea. Lack of popularity for the site made them shut it down for good. They have now given their second shot at it through Prizes relying heavily on the publicity they hope to garner due to the social networks.

But what seems so strange is that there is little Google flavor to it. No mention of Google anywhere in the site, the only exception being the privacy link, that leads to a standard Google Privacy Agreement. It is not only Google that has got meager recognition, Google+ has also received the same treatment. The site allows login using Face book or twitter (but not Google+ and not Gmail too!) and setting up an account directly is also not an option. The site was set up by Slide, a social app developer which has also been releasing products without google brand like the group texting app, Disco.

But the question that remains, Will people be ready to pay for the answers to some questions for which 5 minutes in google is sufficient? Will prizes meet the same fate as “Google Answers” did?

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