The first half of January has seen a massive increase in user participation on Mahalo Answers. The top 80 users have all earned at least a Green Belt, meaning that they have accrued 500 points or more. Our top contributor at the time of this writing is darcy logan, who has just eclipsed 6,000 points. Congratulations, Darcy, in your attempt to become the first Mahalo Answers member to don the coveted Brown Belt!

Earning the Brown Belt isn’t as easy, however, as simply acquiring 8,000 points. The profile of every member to reach this plateau will be reviewed by several members of the Mahalo staff. The staff will analyze the user’s behavior and judge whether the quality of their questions and answers are high enough to warrant the Brown Belt. This method will eliminate the possibility of someone gaming the system to appear to be a respected member of the Mahalo community. If you want to be a Brown or Black Belt, you must be helpful. That is, after all, the Mahalo mission.

Our Top 10 users are now all purple belts, earning at least 2,000 points within Mahalo Answers. Congratulations to you all!

Left or Right?
Whatever your political beliefs, Mahalo Answers remains a place where you can pose questions on the modern social landscape and receive thoughtful, non-biased answers. Ann Coulter’s appearance on The View this week encouraged some healthy debate on the controversial author’s opinions. Despite Coulter’s infamous reputation for inspiring ad hominem attacks among both her fans and foes, the Mahalo Answers discussion remained respectful and fact-based.

This question also exemplifies the benefit of being able to embed media within Mahalo questions. Even a user unfamiliar with the segment can click ‘play’ and be a part of the discussion within minutes.

Expanding Categories
As our community grows, the questions are becoming more specific and targeted. To further foster individual communities within Mahalo Answers, we’re continually expanding our categories to include more focused subjects. To see the sub-sections in every category, simply click on the blue arrows next to your selected category, and the more specific sections will appear below.

The categories will be continually refined in the coming weeks. E-mail feedback@mahalo.com with comments, or make a suggestion in the “Suggestions” category on Answers. As always, keep your questions and answers coming!

After only two weeks of operation, Mahalo Answers has already built up an enthusiastic community of informed users, posting diverse, nuanced queries and providing thoroughly researched responses and solutions. More than just a repository of requests for romantic advice or movie torrents, Mahalo Answers has become a venue to find instant information about baseball statistics, video game tips, food safety warnings, or even gardening advice.

And of course, like all passionate communities, the Answers users spend a lot of time thinking about themselves:

How long do you think it will take to get to purple belt?
What will be done to improve the answers on Mahalo?
Would you join or participate in a Mahalo Answers bulletin board?
Are you going to be on Mahalo Answers on Christmas day?

Purple Belts
The most hardcore Answers fanatics have already made it to the coveted “Purple Belt” level. (Hey, it only requires 2000 points!) This elite squad, which includes Mahalo CEO Jason Calacanis, have already earned between $40 and $150 Mahalo Dollars, and can be seen applying their expertise on a great variety of subjects, all over the site.

The reigning “Queen” of Answers, Darcy Logan, tends to participate in at least 20 questions each day. She’s our only user so far to have been awarded more than 100 “Best Answers,” an enormous number that surpasses the runner-up, Calacanis, by 20! Close at Darcy’s heels is Carriep, one of Mahalo’s remote guides, who has answered a staggering 278 questions thus far, receiving Best Answer for 70 of them. Since becoming a Purple Belt, she’s opined on the chances of finding true love on a reality show, the relative cruelty of putting booties on a cat, and podcasts that feature readings of short stories.

With 2135 points and $52 Mahalo Dollars received thus far, Bugsy is another Mahalo power user. He encourages other users to ask him personal questions for only $1, a steal for the attention of someone who has demonstrated expertise in film/entertainment, technology and mathematics, all in the past few days.

ConnectedGeek, a major Mahalo fan since the company’s early days, holds both a purple belt and the record for most questions asked on Mahalo Answers (182!). He’s curious about all sorts of things, from entrepreneurship, to astronomy, to, well, Mahalo Answers.

Undoubtedly, we’ll be seeing a lot more Purple Belts in the next few days. Several more power users are hovering at the 1800-2000 point mark already. It’s only a matter of time.

Controversial Discussions
As the Mahalo Answers community grows, we’ll have the opportunity to approach questions of considerable moral weight. In just the first two weeks of our existence, we’ve managed questions regarding with violence, controversial politics, drug use and abuse, and racism. Our goal is to treat all of our users with respect, but to manage any inappropriate discussion promptly.

Several questions concerning marijuana cropped up since mid-December, with users asking how to grow it or if it is safe to use marijuana while breastfeeding. Some users felt these questions should be immediately removed from the site as they refer to potentially illegal acts, while others saw no harm in encouraging the debate. As a community, we decided to keep questions intact that ask about how to grow marijuana as well as other topics discussing its possible health benefits. These questions do not refer to illegality and can be discussed in a clinical, respectful way. If a question was posted asking to buy or offering to distribute marijuana, however, this would constitute a violation of our Terms of Service, and would be removed. The most important thing to remember, however, is that posing a question on Mahalo Answers is not a substitute for seeking out professional medical advice through a licensed physician.

Our current Answers “Queen” Darcy Logan stirred up some controversy of her own when she asked what Mahalo should do in the event that someone suggests suicide through a Mahalo question. The community was immediately torn on this subject, with some users arguing that Mahalo is not the forum for such a discussion and that the question should immediately be removed. Others argued that removing the question could be potentially detrimental to the mental state of someone seeking help. Though we have been fortunate to avoid such dramatic circumstances, we are keenly aware that situations such as this may arise during the lifetime of our community. Our current strategy would be to remove the question and immediately contact the user with information referring him or her to a hotline or other service where they can get the help they need. Though we value the input of our knowledgeable community, we are simply not qualified to approach any physical or mental health issues.

Thanks to all of you who have been active users in the early weeks of Mahalo Answers. Our community will only be as strong as the dedicated members involved, so give yourselves a big pat on the back for making our launch and progress so successful. Keep those questions coming!