An iPhone App For Asking Questions And Getting Nearby Answers

The search engine Ask is about to submit an iPhone app to Apple designed for asking questions on the go. About a year ago, Ask returned to its roots as a place to ask and answer questions. Roughly 35 to 40 percent of all search queries typed into Ask are in the form of a question, versus maybe 6 to 9 percent for other search engines, according to Ask president Doug Leeds. Ask's main search page centers around questions, and last July it launched a social Q&A feature that is still in private beta. When the iPhone app launches in the next couple of weeks, anyone who downloads it will automatically be enrolled in Ask's social Q&A beta. The app lets you ask questions either by typing them in or speaking them. It translates the voice to text and then tries to offer up the most likely answer right away, based on its index of more than 500 million question and answer pairs from sources across the Web, including other Q&A sites, FAQ pages, and more. Right below that best guess is an option to "Ask the Community." Your question will then be routed to people in the beta who self-selected as being knowledgeable in related categories.