Yahoo Answers rival ready to fight

Amazon's Askville service, which we previously tested on test launch, is officially open today. The new service, as suggested by its creators, must compete with Yahoo Answers : Askville users will also be able to absolutely free ask any questions to the community, and other users to answer them.

However, unlike other similar services, the answers to the questions will not be open to the public until the time allotted for answers (7 days) is over. It is assumed that this feature will eliminate duplicate responses. Each question can receive no more than 5 answers: the limit is set in order not to “overload” the person who asked; if the answers he received are not satisfied, he can repeat the question.

In addition, members of the Askville community will earn points depending on the quality of their answers on certain topics. By correctly answering a question marked with a particular tag, the user improves his rating in this area. For each incorrect answer the rating will decrease.
')
Points for the correct answers are converted into a special "currency" - Quest coins. It is assumed that it will be used on Questville - another service Amazon, which will be launched in 2007.