Get Expert Advice About.com Anything

People-powered About.com adds the advice of more than 5000 ExpertCentral consultants.

Liane Gouthro, PC World

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What's missing?

How about people? Many sites offer lots of information, but do you know where it comes from? You do at About.com, a site offering more than 250,000 articles written by a group of more than 700 guides--many of whom even show their face right next to the articles they've written. And if that's not personal enough for you, About.com on Thursday acquired ExpertCentral.com, giving its users access to 5000 "expert" advisors for tips and advice on just about anything imaginable.

"About.com guides are responsive to their readers, but they're not as able to provide personal responses to all of their e-mail," says Scott Kurnit, About.com chair and chief executive officer. By adding access to ExpertCentral's advisors, About.com now offers its users easier and quicker answers to their questions, Kurnit explains.

Launched last fall, ExpertCentral lets you choose a category in which to look for help, and then pick a consultant from a list of available experts. Consultants are rated by past visitors to the site, and all experts can charge for their services. Kurnit says that most advice is free, but he expects that experts who continually achieve high ratings will eventually charge fees.

About.com and ExpertCentral will continue to exist as two separate Web sites, but you can expect to see a lot of links between the two, Kurnit says. You'll see references to ExpertCentral's advisors in several places on About.com, and About.com will be a prominent link on ExpertCentral. Say you read an article about hiking on nature trails, and you want to know what to pack. You can write to the About.com guide, who may simply direct you to an ExpertCentral expert.

What Makes Them so Smart?

So, who are these experts and why would you want their help?

About.com recruits its guides, and each guide must spend 16 weeks in a training program. Guides are supervised by About.com's in-house editorial staff.

ExpertCentral's experts are not as tightly controlled. Anyone can apply to become an expert advisor, supplying credentials that the staff verifies before adding the new expert to the list.

While these experts may not have the qualifications of a college professor or a doctor, they can offer basic advice. The user ratings can play a vital role in helping people choose their advisor wisely.

Will people-powered Web sites be the next big trend? Many users seem to appreciate the human touch that About.com already offers. In December 1999, About.com sites were rated ninth on the MediaMetrix list of the top Digital Media/Web Properties, with more than 12 million individual visitors.

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