Yahoo! Singapore Answers blog

Friday 05 November is Diwali/Deepavali, and it’s going to be a happy day for many of us. Wear new clothes, go out, spread the light and let it shine!

The Answers Team in Singapore would like to share a beautiful post by our Community Manager of Answers India – Bhumika Anand. How is Diwali celebrated in India? How do you decorate your house? Let’s read on…

Share your happiness and spread the light.

Participate in the Diwali Dhamaka on Answers. Answer the three questions below and if your answer is selected as the best answer win 500 points for each best answer!

How do you celebrate Diwali in your state?

Photo Courtesy: Cprogrammer on Flickr

Each state in India has a different way of sharing happiness and spreading the light that Diwali brings. In Karnataka, Diwali traditionally begins a day prior to the festival with the ‘Neer thumbo habba’ literally ‘water-filling day’. The idea is to scrub and wash your bathrooms and fill tanks with water. In olden days when there were water tanks in the bathrooms, this was a way of ensuring hygiene and cleanliness and symbolised filling one’s home with wealth. Once this was done, the lady of the house lit a lamp in the bathroom and prayed to the house-hold Gods as the others clapped their hands or beat drums. She would then distribute sweets to the family. The next morning, the day of Diwali begins before sunrise with an oil massage and bath. The family then pray to the Gods, wear their new clothes and go out to burst the first cracker of the day that heralds the beginning of Diwali.

As a child, my favourite custom was the bursting of that first cracker. And my father always ensured I was the one to light the cracker that then boomed loudly and woke the neighbourhood. It somehow made me feel important and brave. I’m sure you have a similar favourite custom. How do you celebrate Diwali in your state? What are the customs you like the most and why? What is the best part of Diwali for you?

Do you have any tips for decorating one’s house for Diwali?

Photo Courtesy: Siddhu 2020 on Flickr

Floating candles, floral carpets, twinkling diyas (lights), all contribute to making your house more beautiful on Diwali. Now that we no longer burst crackers in my family, I tend to go slightly crazy with the number of lights and candles I light to celebrate this beautiful festival. I knew a neighbour who made her own colourful candles and placed them strategically to enhance the beauty of her home. Flower garlands also add to the festivity and cheer. Do you have other ideas? How do you decorate your house for Diwali? Share them with other Answerers.

How can you celebrate Diwali and still be animal and environment friendly?

Photo Courtesy: Shubharnab on Flickr

After reading about pollution in school and the reports that newspapers carried post Diwali, about how bursting crackers had adversely influenced the environment, I decided not to burst crackers anymore. It was by no means a happy decision because I love to burst crackers. Bursting crackers was a community thing. It was a great way of having fun with my neighbours and friends. But it had to be done. And while I still feel a pang at not bursting crackers, I’m quite glad that I decided not to. So now we have parties with delightful food and drinks and spend the night talking and may be dancing. Some of my friends also play cards through the night. So we are still having fun and Diwali is still a favourite festival but it’s not at the cost of the environment. Do you have a fun way of celebrating the festival that doesn’t involve bursting too many crackers that not only scare animals and small children in your neighbourhood but are also very harmful to the environment?

So go on and share your answers and tips and memories!

And of course, a very Happy Diwali to all of you!

Stay happy and safe.

- Bhumika Anand

Community Manager

Happy Diwali, everyone!!!

Photo by JanneM

Hi everyone ,

Yahoo! Answers is undergoing some planned maintenance on Wednesday, 03 November 2010, from 4pm till 8pm. Answers will be unavailable during that time. If there is any change to the schedule, we will inform you here with updates.

If you’re looking for something to do during the downtime, here are some ideas:

• Read other posts on this Yahoo! Answers Singapore Blog
• Explore something interesting on Flickr
• Watch the Asian stock markets on Yahoo! Finance
• Find new travel inspirations from Yahoo! Travel

Thank you very much for your patience!

You may have noticed we have added a little bit of colour to the grey face icons which show when no avatar or image is selected.  

Yahoo! is in the process of updating these default images across the network. If you haven’t chosen an image or if your Pulse profile is set to “hidden”, you’ll see one of the five variations of this new image to represent you. The colours are teal, blue, green, orange and purple. It’s totally random which one you get and is nothing to do with your gender or activity.

Please leave us your comments on this small change.

Have you ever wondered to yourself, “If only I had Yahoo! Answers right now… I could find out the answer to my question?” Now, the wait is officially over!

We’re thrilled to announce that we’ve created a brand new mobile site and it’s ready for you to use. Everything you love about Yahoo! Answers is now optimized for on-the-go availability.

Will it work on my phone?

The new mobile-optimized version of Yahoo! Answers makes it easy for you to keep track of points, open questions, and stay on top of what people are asking wherever and whenever the mood grabs you. Our new mobile site will work with most phones but you’ll see it at its very best on the newest phones, such as iPhone, Android and the latest Blackberrys.

See it in action

We’ve put together this short video, to show you why we’re so excited…

What does it do?

With Yahoo! Answers optimized for mobile, you can:

• Ask, Answer, and Discover questions as you would on the PC
• Vote and select a best answer
• Easily access your profile, points, and open questions to check on your activity
• Check out new open questions being asked every second
• Rack up more points when you’re out and about

We hope you’re as excited about the mobile version of Yahoo! Answers as we are. Give it a try today!

Flickr photo by Amsk

The economy has always played a major role in determining where one will go on a holiday, for obvious reasons of course.  Well, lately it’s been really “helpful” to those planning their next holiday.  I say this because the Singapore dollar has been appreciating in the past few months and is projected to continue to strengthen until the end of the year.

Because of this, Elena, our Finance Editor came up with this interesting question: where to spend that strong Singapore dollar on your next holiday?  Here’s an excerpt of what she has to say:

The dramatic rise of the Singapore dollar in recent months may be bad for our exporters. But it does give consumers one great question to ponder: where can you get the most bang for your buck when spending overseas?

In a research note, analysts at Singapore’s United Overseas Bank forecast that the Singapore     dollar would reach S$1.27 by the end of this year against the U.S. currency, and strengthen     further to S$1.23 by the end of 2011 vis-à-vis the greenback.

That’s generally great for travelers, but not all places will be equal in terms of value for money.     We talked to some economists and analysts on the best travel destinations from the foreign     exchange rate point of view. Here are their top picks:

Click here to read the rest of the article.

Having said that, I posted this question for the Answers community to think about and to answer: “Which travel destination provides the best value for money and why?”

What do you think?  Share your thoughts and suggestions to everyone, and let’s see how much further we can save from this.

Hi everyone, in observance of Breast Cancer Awareness month this October, I would like to share to you this really insightful post from fellow community manager Bhumika Anand (Community Manager, India).

October is the month of the pink ribbon.

In fact, I myself have worn the pink ribbon proudly as I know many women who have been afflicted with breast cancer. Some of them bounced back to life after surgery or treatment and a few others succumbed to the disease.

So when I decided to write a blog post about breast cancer, I was absolutely certain that it would take me less than ten minutes to do so. After all, I knew stories about all these women. And I thought I was mighty pink because as a woman I knew how to protect myself. Right?

Wrong. As I started to write this post, I realized how little I actually knew about this deadly disease though it had touched my life often enough, albeit indirectly.

Flickr photo by merfam

Worldwide, breast cancer comprises 10.4% of all cancer incidence among women, making it the most common type of non-skin cancer in women and the fifth most common cause of cancer death. This explains the number of awareness campaigns about breast cancer during the month of October.

And yet I was finding it difficult to write about breast cancer. So I decided to take a look at Answers.

It was no surprise that I found a list of commonly asked questions about breast cancer. I decided to post these questions so it could help women and men like me who know about breast cancer but are hardly aware of the facts relating to the disease.

Links to save a life!

Understand this cancer better so you can treat it on time if need be!

• How does breast cancer develop in women and what are the preventive measures for it?
• What are the symptoms of breast cancer and what are the consequences?
• What kind of tests or examinations should be done for breast cancer?

Three typical doubts about preventing and treating breast cancer

• Is it true that deodorants can cause breast cancer in women?
• Are there any Ayurvedic treatments for breast cancer?
• How exactly does breast feeding lower the risk of breast cancer?

Other useful links to understand breast cancer better

I may have breast cancer, what questions should I ask my doctor?

• http://www.medicinenet.com/breast_cancer/article.htm#1imayhave
• http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Breast_cancer

And here’s how you can help people with breast cancer: http://shine.yahoo.com/page/breast-cancer-awareness-2010!

So do you have a breast cancer story? Is there some knowledge about breast cancer you would like to share? Do send us your story at y_answrs_favorites@yahoo.com or leave us a comment.

Go pink!

Bhumika Anand – Community Manager, IN

Let’s all do our part in helping fight this disease, and we can start by sharing this post to family, friends and loved ones. In the words of Bhumika, let’s all “go pink” this October!

Many of you have topics close to your heart that you like to answer questions for on a regular basis.

My Saved Search is a great solution that helps you quickly find new questions on these specialist subjects.

To assist you in finding these questions we’ve now launched a new email notification to alert you when new questions arise from your saved searches…

The Saved Search email

We’d like to introduce the new Saved Search email.

By opting in to receive the Saved Search email we will send a daily update whenever new questions meet your search criteria.  You can opt-in to the receive the email from the Preferences – Privacy and Communications page.

Where there are questions available we’ll send through up to three questions for each search you’ve saved.  By clicking through to your Saved Search on that subject you will continue to see the complete list of questions which is updated in real time.

My Saved Search

If you weren’t previously aware of My Saved Search, you may not be aware that you can easily earn 20 points by saving just three searches. Here is an overview of how the process works.

How to save your search

You can save your search from the following areas:

• The Search homepage
• Advanced Search page
• My Saved Search page

What can you do with My Saved Search?

From the My Saved Search page, you can now:

• Save up to 10 searches.  The main pane displays the selected search in real time.  The last sorting option you use is saved the next time you log in.
• Edit your searches to keep them up-to-date
• Delete your searches when you no longer need them
• Drag and drop to arrange your Saved Searches to get the most used ones at the top of the list.
• Manage these searches from the new Saved Search page by editing or deleting
• Get your Saved Searches delivered as a daily digest email
• Have the Yahoo! Trending Topic of the day included in your search results.  You’ll notice one search already there which you didn’t search for.  We’ve given you a `trending search` to start.  This is a keyword based on what is trending from Yahoo! Search.  It changes on a daily basis depending on what people are talking about on the web.  The trending search can be deleted to give you full control of the 10 searches you save.  However, beware that once you delete the trending search it will be removed forever.

As soon as you have 3 Saved Searches on your Saved Search page we will give you 20 points!  However, this will only be awarded once.

So go ahead – let us do the legwork in finding questions to answer!

Have more questions?  Let us know.

To continuing improving your Yahoo! Answers experience we are introducing a few small changes this week…

Changing time to choose a Best Answer

Based on your feedback to be able to resolve a question quicker, we have now reduced the wait time to choose a best answer from 4 hours to 1 hour.  If you now receive multiple responses within an hour you can select one of those as your Best Answer, or choose to put the question to vote at this earlier stage.

The full lifecycle of a question won’t change – questions will still be open for 4 days and up to maximum of 8 days if you extend the expiration.  This change gives you the option to resolve earlier or put to vote earlier.   If you take no action to resolve or extend the question, the question will automatically go to vote for the Best Answer.

Optional Preview screen when answering questions

Many of you have commented that to you’d prefer an answering experience without having to see your response on the Preview page first.  We are now able to offer this…

If you are signed-in with your Answers account and have answered at least one question before then when submitting your answer you can choose to Submit your response immediately without going to the Preview page first.  We’ve kept the Preview page too, so you can still see how your response will look before publishing it.

What makes Yahoo! Answers unique is the avid involvement of the community it is YOU that provides the content so continue to ask, answer and vote!

It’s August and whether you are planning a holiday to some great, exotic locale or are just back from one, Yahoo! Answers is the place to celebrate your vacation! This August we are doing a special initiative in the Travel category where we invite you to share your fondest memories of landscapes, cityscapes, seascapes and skyscapes through your travel stories and anecdotes.

Spread over four weeks, with each week catering to one particular theme, this initiative will showcase the best holiday destinations and the most awesome travel stories that come from you! So start working on that travelogue of yours and include details like places to stay, things to see, what food to eat there, best shopping deals and the like. And don’t forget to tell us why it is among your favourite holiday destinations! We’ll be awarding 50 bonus points for the best story each week!

Not only that, we invite you to share your favorite photograph of the vacation on one of these Flickr groups:

Landscape group

http://www.flickr.com/groups/100naturallandscapes/

Flickr photo by neeZhom

Cityscape group

http://www.flickr.com/groups/26328425@N00/

Flickr photo by Christopher Chan

Seascape group

http://www.flickr.com/groups/seascape/

Flickr photo by -Gep-

Skyscape group

http://www.flickr.com/groups/98509261@N00/

Flickr photo by 24thcentury

Once you post your picture there, remember to leave us a comment with the Flickr link on the blog, or add the link in your answer. At the end of four weeks, your story and photograph could be featured on our blog or even be featured on the Yahoo! Front Page!

If you don’t have a Flickr account yet, simply go to http://www.flickr.com/ and using your Yahoo! account, create a new Flickr account. We encourage you to upload your travel photos on Flickr and then join the groups (those mentioned above) and submit your photos to the appropriate group.  Don’t forget to copy the link of your photo and use that in your answer!

This week’s question is about dreamy landscapes. Meadows full of flowers and green grass, a winding river, a roaring waterfall, awe-inspiring mountains, amazing rice fields or maybe endless deserts – what landscape inspired you the most and made for an unforgettable holiday? What was your most picturesque and pleasant holiday in the countryside?

Share your travel stories now and let’s have fun sharing and learning from each other’s travel experiences.

Following last week’s changes to Search and the Fans/Contacts system we now have a few more changes to share with you…

Edit My Preferences page

To keep public information and your personal settings separate we’ve made further changes on the `Edit my preferences` pages.  

As with the previous preference page you can still add your photo or avatar from here or change your screen name which will both be used across your Yahoo! experience.  We’ve made this page a little lighter to view by splitting out how you will be seen on Answers from your personal preferences on Privacy and Communications.  

The Privacy and Communications tab gives you control to receive specific notifications such as when `someone becomes your fan` or when `there are new questions for My Saved Searches` – and whether you allow fans at all. 

Hiding your profile

You may notice there is no longer the option to choose whether you `Show link to my Profile Page`.  This previously controlled whether you linked directly to your Pulse profile on Yahoo! 

This setting is now controlled across all Yahoo! properties from the `Privacy` settings on the Settings page on Pulse http://pulse.yahoo.com/y/settings