Yahoo! UK & Ireland Answers blog

UPDATE: Double Points is now over, thank you so much for your amazing answering!

For a strictly limited period, you can earn an extra 2 points for every question you answer.

‘Tis the time of year for saying “thank you”, giving gifts and rewarding hard work. Our way of saying “thank you” to you, the Yahoo! Answers community – for your hard work this year – comes in the form of this special bonus. Yes, it’s DOUBLE POINTS for every question you answer– four instead of two.

Why are we doing this?

We know you enjoy earning points on Yahoo! Answers, especially to move up through the levels. But we also know it can feel like slow progress at times, like a marathon… So, for a short while, we’re giving you the chance to sprint! With double points up for grabs, it’s a golden opportunity for you to make some big gains and go for the next level.

Has it started already? When does it end?

It’s live now from December 6^th and will last for a limited period of time.

Want to know when it will end?  Well, we’re going to keep that a secret for now…

However, if you follow us on Twitter we’ll give regular updates of how long is left…

We’ll also notify you here, on the blog, as soon as it closes. In the meantime, make the most of it!

How do I get started?

It couldn’t be easier to get involved. Just sign-in (or sign-up if you’ve not visited before) and start answering questions. The browse categories page is a great place to start.

Tell us what you think about our Double Point bonus

We think offering double points is something you will appreciate… we hope it’s not like one of those terrible Christmas presents you just want to put back under the tree. But do let us know what you really think – we won’t be offended, promise.

Also, do let us know what you think by leaving a comment.

We’ve made a few minor changes and bug fixes this week to both the desktop and mobile versions of Answers which we wanted to let you know about.

Here’s a rundown of the changes:

Mobile

Our new mobile experience has proven extremely popular with you all so far and many of you have given us feedback on what you’d like to see. Taking this into account we’ve made a few tweaks:
• You can now star questions from the question page on mobile

• We’ve now enabled `Show me another` on iPhone and Android. You can see further questions now by scrolling horizontally on each question page.

For those of you who use Android we want to let you know we’ve just created an Answers Android App! This is free to download and works on Android phones version 2.0 or above. Try it out by searching for “Yahoo! Answers” at the Android marketplace and let us know what you think of it!

Changes to the Desktop version of Answers

We’ve made a few cosmetic changes that you may see depending if you’re signed-in or signed-out of Answers. Let’s explain how these affect each page on the Answers site:

Choose Best Answer, Edit Answer & Additional details pages

We’ve updated these pages to our new look and feel that you see when asking or answering.  By improving the code behind these pages too this should resolve some of the issues that occasionally occurred with special characters and text wrapping.

Question Page changes

• Last month we made a change which moved edited answers to the bottom of the list. Due to your overwhelming response against this change we have reversed it. Now, when you edit an answer, we will display an edit time stamp but won’t move it to the bottom of the answer list. We feel this shows that the answer has been edited from the original submission without discouraging those who want to make genuine edits.

• Thumbs: We’ve had extensive feedback around thumbs and this month we made the first of several changes to the rating system. Further changes will come in the following months.

• Thumbs up and Thumbs down will now only show when you are signed in to Answers. When signed-out you will not see the Thumbs down icon but will see any positive ratings that have occurred. This is how the signed out experience will look:

• We’ve moved the Report Abuse away from the thumbs on all answers whether you are signed in or out. We hope this will stop you accidentally hitting the thumbs buttons when you mean to report abuse

• Also when signed out and visiting a voting page, we now display a sign in to vote button at the top of the page to make it clearer on how to vote for your preferred answer.

My Activity Page

We’ve made a small cosmetic change to the My Activity page and made some technical improvements to improve performance on this page.

• Your identity information has now been modified slightly. We’ve moved your stats information to the right and now your contact information, nickname and start date to the central column.

• We now collapse “About Me” on your private view of My Activity. This means your content is higher on the page than before.

• There should now be no delay with your avatar appearing on the My Activity page after you’ve updated it. Previously there was a delay of up to 10 minutes of avatars updating on the My Activity page, this will now be instant.

• We’ve heard from those of you with lots of answers, activity or contacts that retrieving this information in the new My Activity page can be problematic. We’ve made some tweaks here so should you should notice this is all displayed much smoother now.

• On rare occasions your nickname or avatar on the question page wasn’t taking you to My Activity page but to the public view. This is now fixed and you’ll no longer be taken to the public view of My Activity.

As always we’d love to hear your feedback on these changes and what you’d like to see on Answers.

– Yahoo! UK & Ireland Answers team

You may notice there is no longer the option to choose whether you `Show link to my Profile Page`.  This previously controlled whether you linked directly to your Pulse profile on Yahoo!

There is a link on the public view of the My Activity page to View Pulse which is active for everyone.

However the level of visibility you share about yourself on Pulse is controlled by you.  This controls how you are viewed across all Yahoo! properties from `Settings`–> `Privacy` and the `Manage Privacy Settings` page within Pulse.

If you set this as `Hide my profile`  then when someone view your Pulse profile they will only be shown the following:

Images and Avatars

Pulse manages all your images and avatars for your specific Yahoo! properties that you use.

Your avatar will be hidden if you have checked “hide my profile” on your Pulse privacy settings and an exclamation mark will be shown instead.

If you want your avatar visible to others you have to have your nickname/avatar visible and the hide option unchecked for your image to be visible on Yahoo! Answers.

We hope this clarifies how this setting works.  Here in the Answers team we’re focusing on enhancing the QnA experience for you, this means we need to leave the profile aspect to the Pulse team.  If you need further advice on the settings within Pulse, check out their help pages.

– Yahoo! UK & Ireland Answers team

Thanks to everyone for creating these amazing Yamster costumes and for taking the time to vote. We received a total of 23,902 votes for our fantastic nominees! Since we liked the nominees’ and winners’ entries so much, we will also be rewarding each nominee 50 points.

It is now our honor to announce the Yamster Halloween Costume Contest winners!

Overall Winner (500 points)

WINNER: YA’MI THE YAMATAR

Is the Yamster ill? Has the Yamster been drinking paint? Could it be both? Nope, it’s “Avatar” Yamster, or should we say, “Yamatar.” This remarkable transformation from rodent to alien somehow seems so realistic, like Yamster had always been blue and from another planet! Congratulations to this well-deserved winner.

Scariest Yamster (200 points)

WINNER: ZOMBIE YAMSTER

The Scariest category was a hard-fought one, and Zombie Yamster is no exception, with a gnawed shoulder, nibbled ear, and stitched-up head. He really looks like he’s been in battle, though not quite so much as Headless Yamster, whose head has come clean off. And if we’re looking for culprits, we’d look to his left, as Machete Yamster looks well equipped enough to have committed the crime. But we’re not; we’re after a champ, and Zombie is our drop-dead winner. Be afraid, be furry afraid … sorry.

Most Creative Yamster (200 points)

WINNER: HARRY POTTER

Many of the Halloween Yamsters we see today could have been nominated in this category, but these three were well-deserved finalists: Gnome, Harry Potter, and Crystal Ball. We have to admit we thought Crystal Ball was a particularly strong contender, especially given how far it had come from being just a hamster, but Harry Potter Yamster must have cast a spell over you all as he powered through to win. Magic!

Best Classic Costume (200 points)

WINNER: MUMMY YAMSTER

One is as white as a sheet, one’s been mummified, and the other is just hanging out — Best Classic Costume is one hell of a category, and we’re not just talking about bats here. When our furry hamster friend became winged, fanged, and nocturnal, we thought he’d be in with a shout, but no, you guys had this one all wrapped up Egyptian-style: Congrats to Mr. Mummy.

Funniest Yamster (200 points)

WINNER: YAMSTER HILTON

Many of the Halloween Yamsters were funny, intentionally or not, but these three really tickled us and, it would seem, you guys, too. Grampster Yamster has sprouted quite the beard … and facial mole … and even ear hair. Elephant Yamster is a remarkable transformation — you’d barely know there was a hamster wedged in there. But the overall winner simply had to be a celebrity Yamster Hilton because — dare we say it? — it’s so bad, it’s funny.

Celebrity Yamster (200 points)

WINNER: KISS

Up until the last minute, we weren’t sure whether Lady Gaga, Kiss, or Justin Bieber was going to win. Gaga’s dazzling sunglasses and attire and Bieber’s cool shades and noteworthy hair were worthy foes to the ultimate winner: Kiss. In the end, the pop singers couldn’t outdo rock ‘n’ roll. Kiss Yamster blazes on in glory with his signature makeup and stuck-out tongue. Hard rock fans, unite!

Best Cartoon Costume (200 points)

WINNER: MARIO BROTHER

A legendary bear, a computer icon, and an international mouse — boy, the Yamster is getting the all-star treatment here. We quite like the Yamster going yellow and growing a black tail, but you guys loved the cheeky moustache, so Super Mario got the nod. Congratulations to all Nintendo fans everywhere!

Special Award for Innovation (200 points)

This could easily have been called the “Prize for Thinking Outside the Box.” This video was so good, we had to invent a category to honor it. Its mix of scary soundtrack and ghostly Yamsters floating about had us mesmerized. Congratulations!

We’re pleased to announce a new re-design of the My Activity page to freshen up the page as well as some changes to how you control who sees your content.

• Click here (when signed in) to see your new My Activity page

As we’ve made quite a few changes we’ve broken this down for you by section, so let’s get started.

1 – Member Info

Avatar:

Your avatar is now larger and now displays your Best Answer percentage right below it.

Activity Summary:

• We’ve removed the Activity Summary chart and simplified it so it’s now included at the top of this box.
• Your name is now displayed on the right side of your avatar with your registration date, level, and total points, points needed for the next level and how many points you earned this week.

We’ve kept the `How others see me` link so you can check how you are viewed publicly.

2 – My Statistics

• We’ve moved the My Statistics chart up the page and this will now show details around both your questions and answers.
• For you to keep track of how popular your questions are with the Answers community we now track how many of your questions have received stars.

3 – Your Q&A

• Your content now appears right below the user card. We haven’t changed what the functions of the tabs do, they still do the following:

1. My Answers: The default tab that displays the five most recent questions you have answered. Want to see them all? Click on `More Answers`. You can sort these by all answers or best answers.
2. My Questions: The Question tab displays the five most recent questions you have asked.
3. My Starred Questions: The My Starred Questions tab displays the most recent questions you have starred. These can be sorted in order of the newest, oldest or questions with the most stars.
4. Watchlist: The Watchlist tab displays the most recent questions that you are tracking.

4 – Activity Details

On the old My Activity page, the Activity Summary tab and Activity Details tab were combined into the same module. We have now created a separate Activity Details module and it is placed right under your Q&A. From here, you’ll be able to peruse all of your recent activity on the site.

5 – My Network’s Q&A

With the new page we’ve brought all of your Network and your Network’s Q&A together towards the bottom of the page. In addition we’ve made another change to how you share your questions and your Answers Network:

Many of you gave us feedback that you wanted more control over who you Share your Q&A and Answers Network with.

Now under Edit My Preferences, on the Privacy and Communications tab you have the option to share your Q&A and Network with:

• Everyone
• My Contacts and Fans
• My Contacts

As a reminder, contacts are people you add and fans are people who add you.

Tell us what you think

Once you’ve given the new My Activity page a test drive, tell us what you think! There will be more changes in the future so please give us your feedback. As always you’re welcome to leave your comments here, or on our Suggestion Board.

Thanks, and we hope you like it!

– Yahoo! UK & Ireland Answers team