Online advice with a bang

GOOGLE has set up a new service this week called "Helpouts" that connects people seeking specific advice, to experts, in real time.

Illustration: Tom Jellett

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M I frustrated? Perhaps. Enough to be huddled over a webcam, talking to Yvette, a woman I don't know, who is charging me $US1.90 a minute for her "services".

Luckily for my wife (or more to the point, me), Yvette's services are as a creative writing coach, whose ad on Google's latest service "Helpout" promises to help "frustrated writers get started with that creative project".

Hang about, what's a Helpout?

It's the next evolution of Google. The search company's mission is to organise the world's most useful information, yet its engineers found that some of the most useful information was still in people's noggins.

So they set up a new service this week called Google "Helpouts" that connects people seeking specific advice, to experts, in real time - via a live video hook-up on your desktop, tablet or smart phone.

Think a one-on-one session with a yoga instructor, or asking a plumber how to unblock your toilet (while showing him your dunny with your iPad), or showing a nurse your screaming baby at 3am (when things are always much scarier).

It's like a (paid) personal helpdesk.

Some experts charge on a per-minute basis (like Yvette), others charge a flat fee per call - and Google will refund your money if the advice isn't up to scratch (they have an expert rating system as well). To make money they take a 20 per cent cut.

How does it really work? I was about to find out.

I entered my debit card details, picked a time (Helpouts are sold in 15-minute chunks), and waited for the mysterious Yvette to be teleported on to my computer screen.

I assume this is what my single friends feel like on internet dating: while I waited, I found myself self-consciously combing my hair, and getting the light to reflect on my 'good side' for the web camera.

And then she appeared.

Yvette: "Are you . . . the Barefoot Investor?"

Barefoot: "Yes".

Yvette: "Well, that's random".

Yvette turned out to be a thirty-something high school English teacher and children's author from Sydney.

She was personally invited by Google to be one of the first experts to offer Helpouts, and she'd had a few bookings since the site went live yesterday.

"I think this is the beginning of a brand new world - like the Jetsons cartoon show," she said.

She's on to something.

We're literally drowning in information - there are over 644 million websites, and more than six billion hours of video is watched on YouTube each month.

Every question has been answered thousands of times on the internet - from how to fix a leaking dunny to how to write creatively - and that's part of the problem.

You still have questions about things, don't you?

Maybe the web has trained us to be lazy, with goldfish like-attention spans.

Or maybe we just want someone to cut through all the clutter and tell us exactly what we should do.

(And the hundreds of money questions I get from people each week proves this to be true - case in point, see the reader question below).

Helpouts are a game changer for two areas: the delivery of health and education in real time, and for highly trained experts in any field (especially from developing countries), who can get paid Western wages.

So as we hit the fifteen-minute mark of our Helpout, I asked Yvette for one final piece of creative writing advice - and told her not to think too long about it - given she was charging me by the minute.

"You need to end with a bang," Yvette advised.

When the call ended, Google sent me an automated email that showed I'd actually been charged for a three-hour hangout.

It was obviously a glitch in their system, but still, I felt all the terror of a teenage boy who hadn't fully hung up from one of those saucy premium phone lines.

My parents would be furious.

Yet I don't live with my parents. It's actually much, much worse. I live with my wife.

And now I'm going to have to muster up all my creativity to explain how I racked up a $US342 bill on a webcam video service.

Tread Your Own Path!

QUESTION OF THE WEEK

Sleepless Nights

Hi Scott,

I've been losing sleep since I spoke to my accountant who said that we need $1 million to retire comfortably.

He may as well have hit me on the head with a brick.

My husband and I are in our mid-fifties and we only have about $400,000 combined in super. I feel sick, what options are there for us?

Jenny

Hi Jenny,

The first thing you can do is give your accountant the flick. The average super balance is around $200,000 for blokes and $100,000 for women. So you're actually doing better than most people.

The latest research from the peak body of super funds, ASFA, shows that the average couple needs $57,915 a year to have a comfortable retirement ($41,830 for singles).

How much of a lump sum do you need to retire on to achieve that? About $510,000 for couples (and $430,000 for singles).

Built into these figures is that you'll retire on at least a part-aged pension (which most people in your situation will get - remember it doesn't take into account the value of your home).

If you don't qualify for any of the pension, you'll need at least $1 million to retire.

You're doing fine. Keep working hard, contribute your maximum into super, and who knows, in 10 years time you could have enough money in super that you don't qualify for the pension!