Why are some people, especially PhDs, not taking Quora seriously and are quick to belittle and discount Quora? Will they eventually come around?

I do not have a Ph.D. but I would guess that many don't take Quora particularly seriously because a considerable portion of the questions (like this one) are loaded and based off assumptions and assertions that have no apparent factual basis.

There seems to be an implied assumption here that the PhD folks should take Quora seriously. And if they do not, it's either their fault or Quora community's. Why can't it be nobody's fault? There might be many good reasons why they do not take Quora seriously eg. Cos they don't want to, they have better things to do. Some of the bad reasons could be: 1. Good students are not necessarily great teachers: I might be writing a white paper on string theory, but am unable to explain a basic physics concept to a 10 year old. Sorry - wont work on Quora. But hey - I would be famous in the scientific journals community. Everybody cannot be famous everywhere. Conciseness, brevity, simplification, knowing where to compromise accuracy for simplicity helps. Work on that and then come back. 2. Seeing upvotes as an evaluation of proficiency: Would you want to congratulate yourself on the upvote you got from the guy who votes based on pretty pictures? People who look for 'good' answers will seek them out and upvote. People who don't need good answers do not matter. If you are sure you wrote a perfect/true answer, then low upvotes just means a) people did not read it b) read but were not sharp enough to understand it c) were not looking for a good answer, just an entertaining one. No need to take it personally 3. Undermining the importance of giving back consistently: There might be some users who made it a moment of fame through a pretty picture viral answer. But they are not always the 'power users'. The power users are usually people who have given pretty good content for long, and been around longer. My merit lies not in my qualifications, but in the content they produce. If I am going to be discouraged by the few upvotes that my first technically perfect answer got, I will give up for the same reason that an average answerer does. Both do not understand the value of consistency. 4. Inability to understand simple marketing tactics: Starting my answer with "As a person who has been studying child psychology for the last 15 years and has published 5 whitepapers on the subject, here's what I think..."   might get me more eye-balls from the serious folks(which might be few), and repel the non-serious folks. This is the same stuff that goes into creating a great resume. All PhD resumes are not as great as their work might be. 5. Inability to understand/accept how human psychology works: If the same start above is  accompanied by the profile pic of an extremely attractive looking PhD lady, whose answer do you think most people(including the PhD guys) will click on? And unfortunately, a) Her answer might be great enough for an upvote, if not perfect. b) People cannot upvote answers they never read. For a PhD, this should not be too hard to understand!! 6. Inability to understand/accept what Quora is: Quora community is more like a school, than a research facility. Fueled by curiosity more than rigor. So yes, a little eye candy, emotional connect might be needed to grab their attention. To succeed on Quora, they might have to be a little less serious than they usually are on that subject!! :)

I don't have a PhD, but I applied to start a PhD program in my field. ( I know this doesn't count) My mom has a PhD ( I know this doesn't count, either) 1) I know people in my field who have PhDs who teach, and have come to me for input or to understand something or to get my opinion.  I'm a soldier in the field ( with a M.A.) and while they are professors, they don't get a PhD in everything.  Now, if I wanted input on the methodology of a journal article, then they are clearly the one to go to. 2) People who have worked hard through a PhD , defended a dissertation, etcetera  probably want to get a return on their investment, for their resume or CV or whatever. So, I could see where Quora could get frustrating. 3) some, but not all, people with PhDs who are in academia can get a little esoteric, and aren't able to answer a question in a way that is accessible to a layperson. They're used to talking to other PhDs. Which brings me to a delicate topic, but my mom agrees with me.. Sometimes being in academia too long you're used to a lot of preening and a captive audience ( it's okay, I really looked up to my profs in grad school) and maybe you can come off a tad hoity-toity. I must say I had competing feelings about academia, and when I explored getting my PhD, doing research and teaching sounded really appealing, but the culture can get a little food chainish. So anyway, those are some additional thoughts. Please PhDs, don't be mad at me!! :)

I have never seen this belittling, but assuming that the claim is true, I can offer my 0.02$ worth. Quora claims to be a knowledge repository. That is something that academics would be interested in. However, in fact, 99% of Quora is a forum for opinions and advice (this question being a perfect example.)

I haven't had the experience with PhDs of which the OP is talking about, but if I were a PhD candidate there are 3 reasons I wouldn't use Quora for research: 1) You need to use citations in your research and Quora does not meet University standards as a source for research information. Therefore it wouldn't be a credible citation. 2) The whole purpose of a PhD is to understand the paths taken to reach conclusions, in addition to all the opposite and competitive theories which are counter to what you are proposing. Quora does not provide this type of intellectual breadth and depth, as most of the material of interest to a PhD is found in articles and books. 3) There are too many answers in Quora which are not well established or argued. It would be a very inefficient use of time to go through all of them while you search for the well thought-out and well-structured answer.

Err, for PhD Candidate in rather "social" field of science (I am Master in Software Engineering and PhD Candidate Human Nutrition my self), listening and answering in Quora provide an insight, "How people think". If you want to talk about nutrigenomics or coding tips, better forum exist. :) If you research something very deep, but can't translate it in down to earth description, don't blame anybody why your answer is not popular. :)

Well what are the incentives for Ph.Ds (or any other experts) to come here and share their knowledge?  Will it lead to jobs, pay, networking?  People try it for a while but eventually leave because the benefits just aren't there. I do like the anecdotal stories on here, though.  That's something that you can't get from journals.

Quora depends on intelligent people getting involved and immature people NOT getting involved.  The PhDs' attitudes are fairly self-fulfilling, aren't they? Every online community as it grows becomes more and more infested with immature people. Quora is destined to become completely overrun by these people considering the Quora development team seems hell-bent on only using the upvoting/downvoting mechanism for quality control.  We don't even have a flag feature anymore. Quora is right now approaching the tipping point at which it jumps the shark and becomes more like Yahoo! Answers.  Just look at how many childish "my boyfriend won't change his Facebook relationship status" questions there are and how few intelligent questions and answers there are. They aren't wrong.  Perhaps their intelligence is giving them some clairvoyance.

Some people who have PhDs, especially recent ones, are a little carried away with themselves.  Some of us even insist on being called "Doctor". A PhD is a sign of opportunity and sheer persistence, much more than intelligence.  I mean, you can't be a dodo, but you need be NO genius. It's a hi-tech apprenticeship.  If we're using formal education as a yardstick here (and it's not necessarily the best one AT ALL), someone who got 3 Master's Degrees in widely different disciplines has a MUCH better case for intelligence than does any PhD.