Top Writers:
- Access to the Facebook Top Writer group, and (marginally) greater access to Quora staff.
- Personally approached by Quora researchers to give feedback to feature rollouts or previews (Janet Go’s answer to Which Top Writers have been actively engaged by Quora in conversations about the product and experience?)
- Separate review by Quora staff of moderation reports against them (The tribunal of the marshals by Nick Nicholas on The Insurgency)
- Admission to Top Writer meetups, and the Quill icon.
- No ads shown to them.
- Potentially, priority consideration of reports against content and users. (Stan Belot’s answer)
- Possibly consideration of their nominations for other Top Writers, but I have no way of knowing how much weight is given to TW nominations.
- A jacket.
- Other goodies, such as a printed book of Quora answers, or a subscription to the New York Times, are no longer offered.
That’s it to my knowledge. There are other classes of privilege for users on Quora, but they do not extend to all Top Writers:
- Trusted Reporting (Quora feature): the ability to instacollapse any answer.
- Access to the Facebook Writers Feedback group, and (presumably) greater access to Quora staff.
- Being one of the tableful of Quora users that get pulled for actual consultation by Quora staff during meetups.
- It is unknown whether Top Writer status on its own increases one’s PeopleRank (Quora feature).
Then of course there is the perception of privilege by the community, which is a vexed issue, but a distinct one.