no.stupid.answers

Remember when WikiAnswers was one of the Top Ten Web 2.0 sites chosen at TWS 2008 in Tel Aviv, Israel?

Here’s the presentation that was given by two awesome WikiAnswers-crazies:

The winning charities and participants of the latest AnswerThon have been announced and congratulated; see who won by clicking below!

Or I could just tell you here.

First place: The Leukemia and Lymphoma Society $5000

Second place: ArtWorks $1500

Third place:CaringBridge $500

The other two charities, Global AIDS Alliance and World of Good, will receive runners-up donations of $100 each.

The top 20 answerers (will get WikiAnswers t-shirts):

Darksyde
Kodiakcathy
Stupid little genius
JRWADDY
Mntnapoet
WikiRicki
BigSisterKnows
ThatwouldBme
Aggie80
Singingangel93
Tazmcg
Chicagoborn
Robbb
Natural Val
Krazywhitegirl
Porkdisco
Cdonorab
Mattmastersword
Apepper
Xanthotrichious

Stay tuned for more contests coming up soon…

I’ve been thinking a lot about animals lately. I took a trip to the zoo last week and I can’t stop thinking about something weird I saw. I was standing outside the monkeys area, watching all these eerily people-like orangutans jumping, playing, fighting, etc.

My eyes wondered nearby and I noticed on the ground next to me was this incredible swarm/army of black ants. The beefy kind. There must have been thousands of them, all in this one little spot, scrambling in and out of a hole in the ground.

It got me thinking:

Why don’t ants eat monkeys?

I mean, there must be trillions - if not quadrillions - of them on planet Earth. They are everywhere, numbering in thousands at a time. They could totally rise together and eat monkeys. If they took down one monkey, the whole clan would be fed for a good decade, assuming they could keep the meat fresh.

I have pondered a few reasons why this would actually not benefit the ant population. Here’s a sample:

Monkey meat is probably quite tough (all that swinging). I’m not sure if ants have teeth, but if they do; ouch.

Ants are incredible smart creatures. They probably look down at the monkeys (as they watch them up there swinging in the trees) and think, Blech. Something so easy to catch would probably make us stupider.

The hairballs. *shudder*

I’m pretty satisfied with my hypotheses, but you may not be. Any more ideas?

Just recieved an email with this new press release from the Answers folks. It goes on and on about “revenues,” puts the letter Q in front of numbers, and uses words like “sequential,” so I’m taking from it the bit that I think the rest of us really care about.

WikiAnswers’ revenue is up 27% in the last three months: If revenue is up, it must mean that questions, answers, members and community participation are probably up, as well. And that makes for a wonderfully involved Q&A social knowledge site, which is what WikiAnswers is.

Nice to get some good news! Keep it up, community!

Reported side effects of participating in the AnswerThon, as recorded by several Supervisors:

Numb-bum.

The need to change their focal distance.

Mush for brain with mild blindness kicking in.

Not being able to remember the last time you ate something that required a fork (and a bit of basic attention).

Having a rather large pup lick the keyboard a time or two trying to get your attention.

A lot of Coke-drinking.

The feeling your eyes are crossing.

Falling asleep with head on keyboard resulting in FGHJVBN being repeated for several minutes as an answer.

Not noticing the chickens being released from the yard and herded around and around the house by a well meaning but otherwise bored puppy. (no loss of livestock).

Failure to multitask and leave supper burning on the BBQ while submitting “just one more answer.”

Hey, we said it would be an intense challenge. You still have a few hours left to contribute: Get going!

Folks, this is last call for signing up to participate in the second WikiAnswers AnswerThon, which starts tonight at 12:00 am EDT.

It’s the charity-edition AnswerThon, where your answers are actually sponsoring the charity you choose from the available list. The charity with the most answers at the end of 48 hours will receive a $5,000 donation from WikiAnswers.

Of course, the top answerers will receive a small token of their own, so make sure you have your favorite category set up and dig in!