Regarding the Quora 'Want Answer' change, what kind/type of users does the inability of sorting out between one's own questions and the questions that one follows benefit?

I, till now, haven't found any plus point about this change. I asked a question anonymously some time back which would have been helpful for me. I wanted to revisit it and check one or two answers because I knew they were helpful. Since I can't distinguish my question anymore, which is very important to me at the moment, I had to resort to Quora's search box. Which didn't yield the results even though I entered some of the correct keywords. I had to look for another question instead. I had to then look at related questions to find my own question from that other question. I know how to tackle Quora at the moment. I can do it well enough. That's why I help around redirecting questions. But I don't wish to take a longer route to solve a basic problem. This "merger", though focusing on removing the distinction between the OP and normal users, has just two issues - It doesn't let me find my own questions easily. It helps no one at the moment. I don't think anyone wants to go through questions I am following. In fact if someone were to check it out, let's say a potential employer, and they notice me following a question asking an easy concept related to my field, Robotics, my credentials would be doubtful. So it doesn't seem to solve any particular purpose other than remove the barrier between who asked the question and who wants answers.  Which ironically I can still find out looking at the log, but oh well... Thanks for the A2A!

The idea of not being able to separate the two does not benefit me, that's for sure. And I cannot imagine anyone it benefits, myself. and have already given good ideas in that direction. The only good side is that now I no longer seem obliged to follow questions I answer ... but that's not really that much of an upside. We can always unfollow a question with the click of a mouse, after all. I think just adding a tab of "Followed Questions" would be a good idea. If only I had the authority to do something about it. But let me take off my lei and give thanks to for this A2A.

My Answer : Question ratio is huge, so it's not going to make any difference in my Content listing.  I know what questions I asked, pretty much. Frankly, I come here because I enjoy writing.  If writing stops being fun, or if I find someplace else to write that's more fun, I'll disappear.  Some of the time, Quora seems to deliberately make writing less fun for me.  There are huge parts of the Q. system I don't know how to use.  People post statistics that I have no idea of how to generate.  I don't see a user manual.  I do experience "old age discrimination" in the additional clicks required, challenging interface, different responses to "open in new window," etc.   I want to be able to get my content.  Q. repeatedly tells me that it thinks other functionality is more important.  OK.  I really should stop giving them content.  One of these days, I will.

After considerable thought, I think it may benefit less popular users who ask questions that power users then see and decide they want an answer to. People then see that the popular user wants an answer, and are more inclined to pay attention to the question. I don't think anyone benefits by not being able to separate questions they personally have asked from those they didn't ask but are interested in. However, the Quora employees who designed the UI may benefit because they didn't have to design a separate flow for looking at your own questions versus looking at questions on other people's profiles.

Thanks for the A2A, Claire. I understand all these reasons, although did not have a chance to check it myself, since the feature was implemented only a couple of days ago. Realistically, I don't think Quora will revert this feature back to "Following the question". I would think, with so much negative feedback on this new feature, there is a chance that Quora will develop some additional function to fix the problem. It does not sound too challenging, as far as technology is concerned. On the side note, I still can't get the concept of "power users" though. Just thought that Quora is a place to share knowledge and learn something useful. Don't know how does this "power user" thing works and not sure if Quora needs it. But this is just my impression, certainly not a decision-maker here.

There is a short window of time in which to fix something. This is clearly an unpopular and uncompelling decision by Quora. While, as a business, they certainly have the right to make this decision, any business or economic criterion upon which it can be justified escapes me.  Rather, it appears to be one of those cases of taking something that is good and making it worse., thereby alienating users and, worse, damaging the brand by reducing the participation of those who contribute most meaningfully. It is a bad business decision. It should be reversed and Quora should revert to the system everyone was happy with. As far as what I'd recommend, I'd suggest that we start a viral movement. Every post everyone makes should have as its signature what I have below.  And everyone should add it to his or her profile.  Believe me, if it spreads, that sort of thing gets noticed quickly.  Why this approach?  It's ethical, it doesn't harm the business model, it doesn't interfere with valid answers, it doesn't encroach on the rights of those who disagree, and it's highly visible. KEEP QUORA GREAT - STOP "WANT ANSWERS" NOW!

This is a surprisingly dumb move on the part of the Quora team.  Just look at the reviews for it... I think drowning puppies would rate higher, considering you can't rate zero stars. They need to separate questions you are following (want answers to) from the questions written by one person. Just add in another tab, and all this ill will disappears. I can't think of any use model of any type of Quora user that would be harmed by separating them... And not separating them is absolutely harmful.  We can no longer see what kind of questions a person asks.  That's a useful piece of information that adds to the social context of Quora.

People who write spam and trolling questions will benefit, because they can use "want answers" to hide their tracks.

Honestly I think this is just a hiccup. What I foresee in the near future is a usability update that retains the "Want Answers" additional features while also identifying the initial question asker. It's the only way I can see this going forward. That, combined with a better, categorized search functionality will add a lot of utility to the way things work. I honestly think this is a stepping stone on the path to a better layout, and all the Quora team needs to do is try and implement an organized way to maintain question ownership while also keeping the more-useful aspects of the new setup. Time will tell.