W hen David Sarokin heard the news last December that Google’s four-year-old Google Answers service was shutting down, it was quite a blow, considering he was one of their original researchers.
Google Answers employed 500 contractors to answer questions submitted by Google users, who would offer to pay between $2 and $200 for a response.
The small, fee-charging service was a departure for the company, though Google never officially said why they shut down the division.
“My suspicion is that for a company that deals with everything in terms of billions, this just wasn’t a big enough thing for them,” Sarokin said.
But it had been a perfect fit for Sarokin, who had always been seduced by the powers of the Internet.
He believed enough in the business model to found his own Q&A service this year, XooxleAnswers.
“It became a deep immersion lesson for me into how to start up an Internet-based business; I’d never had to think about things like monetizing or sending out press releases before,” Sarokin said.
This month, Sarokin joined forces with 40 other former Google Answers employees to form uclue, now in its beta version.
The site has researchers based from Denmark to Argentina, operating in English, French and German.
Sarokin’s new businesses offer the same investigative challenges of Google Answers.
Whether he’s using Lexis Nexus or going to the Library of Congress, Sarokin loves answering quirky questions, such as which Broadway starlet gave an impromptu singing performance years ago for a group of World War II soldiers on the Staten Island ferry. (The answer: Wynn Murray.)
The venture will not be without challenges. XooxleAnswers and uclue have to compete with free question-and-answer services that sites like Yahoo provide, where the community answers the queries.
But even if the sites don’t deliver big profits right away (Sarokin maintains a day job as a biologist for the Environmental Protection Agency), at least his clients always keep him on his toes.
“Once, a fellow wanted to know what female vampires looked like, and how he could protect himself from female vampires,” Sarokin recalled. “He needed to know because he was going to a party at a house where he expected vampires be present; what should he do?”
For once, Sarokin didn’t have the answer.
BUSINESS
Current jobs: Entrepreneur, bureaucrat, dad
Number of e-mails a day: Not as many as you’d suppose … spam filters are getting better
Number of voice mails a day: 10 to 15
Essential Web site: Google, of course
Best perk: My home office
Gadgets: I still haven’t figured out the remote control.
Education/credentials: Biologist, Fulbright Scholar, Senate Fellow
Last conference: Dear God, no more conferences, please.
First job: Working the mimeograph machine at Stanley Kaplan’s SAT Prep.
Original aspiration: To make the world a better place before I leave it.
Compensation: More than I ever thought, but not quite enough to keep afloat.
Career objective: Grow XooxleAnswers and uclue into world-class services.
PERSONAL
Date of Birth: 1952
Hometown: Brooklyn, N.Y.
Sports/hobbies: Hiking
Transportation: Metro, of course
Favorite restaurant: Angelico’s, in Tenleytown
Computer: None of them are good enough, yet
Favorite clothier: (snickers)
Vacation spot: Margarita Island
Role model: Mom and Dad (really!)
Quote: Pretty much anything from Martin Luther King Jr.’s “I Have A Dream”
Reading: My favorite magazine, D.C.’s own Science News
Worst fear: No worries, mate.
