What is the purpose of the point system?

Question

It seems that few people are actually serious about answering questions so why a point system? I guess it does make it more exciting...

Answer 1

The points make to you more answers,questions,voting and rating questions and answers, depends on level you have, go to this link from Yahoo Answers to know all about limits and systems in this site:
http://answers.yahoo.com/info/scoring_system
Level 1 from 1 - 249 points
You need 250 - 999 points to get to level 2
You need 1,000 - 2,499 points to get to level 3
You need 2,500 - 4,999 points to get to level 4
You need 5,000 - 9,999 points to get to level 5
You need 10,000 - 24,999 points to get to level 6
You need 25000+ points to get to level 7

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At level 1 You can ask 5 questions and answer 20 question and vote, rate 20.
At level 2 You can ask 10 questions and answer 40 question and vote, rate 40.
At level 3 You can ask 15 questions and answer 60 question and vote, rate 60.
At level 4 You can ask 20 questions and answer 80 question and vote, rate 80.
At level 5,6,7 You can ask and answer unlimited of questions and vote, rate 100.
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Points Table:
- Answer a question give you 2 points
- Ask a question reduce from you 5 points
- If you answer picked as best answer get 10 points
- Choose an best answer from your question get 3 points.
- Rate answer 1 point
- Vote answer 1 point
- If your answer in violation reduce from you 2 points
- Deleting an answer Reduce 2 points
- Receive a "thumbs-up" rating on a best answer that you wrote 1 point.
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You're Welcom.

Answer 2

To encourage participation and reward great answers, Yahoo! Answers has a system of points and levels. The number of points you get depends on the specific action you take. While you can't use points to buy or redeem anything, they do allow everyone to recognize how active and helpful you've been. (And they give you another excuse to brag to your friends.)
it is like a competition (a game) the one who scores highest and probably gets the most amount of highest scores wins the race.

Answer 3

the point system gets people to answer.. and if they answer well they can be voted as a best answer and get even more points so there is even incentive to give good answers.. Although I am hoping that the points will be worth something someday.. who knows?

Answer 4

SO YOU CAN ASK QUESTIONS. Questions cost 5 points.

Answer 5

Its the same as hierachy system...
☆

Answer 6

It just gives you a goal.

Answer 7

IT MAKES IT INTERESTING AND TO SEE THE LEADER BOARD TO SEE HOW FAR EVERYONE ELSE IS...

Answer 8

you answered your on question.......tks