This is the answer I provided on Quora. Quora recently released their blogging service and I found it pretty unique compare to all other blogging service, so I did some comparisons and here’s what I got: 1. Audience The biggest advantage and differentiator for Quora among other social media is its great audience. The quality of information you’ll get from Quora’s brilliant user base is higher than Twitter or Tumblr. I’m not saying Tumblr doesn’t have quality information. It has, but it also has a lot of noise. While in Quora, the signal-to-noise ratio is way higher. People here are less likely to troll, digress from a topic or post random irrelevant stuff. Come back to blogging, you’ll be able to find more focused audience here, and likely smarter. If you’re good in your area and you write well, I think your talent will be easier spotted. For Tumblr, because of all the apps, web plug-ins, browser extensions, it’s very easy to post something. Since more people are doing it, it’s harder to get recognized.
2. Relevance Any content on Quora is highly relevant. It either answers a question, or provide information on a specific topic. Blogging on Quora often stems from a brilliantly answered question. You see, great mind gets better when challenged by equally great minds, thus generating great discussions. Blogging on Quora is unique in the sense that you’re not blogging alone, you’re blogging while discussing with and challenged by one hundred experts in your field, which will lead to better quality blogs. Tumblr blogging is looser on this front.
3. Media In terms of media, Quora focus heavily on text, pictures are supported for sure, but also to prove a point or illustrate an idea. In Quora, knowledge is on the center stage. Tumblr is really a multimedia micro-blogging site. When you’re blogging on Tumblr, you’ll have great freedom on what media you want to leverage. (Quora should do a better job on this front IMHO.)
Image: Sharing options from Tumblr.
So to answer your question on where Quora adds value in terms of blogging, I think the biggest value is its highly focused, well-informed and passionate community, that will challenge you, endorse you and support you, as long as you really want to generate great content.
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