Community Guidelines: What's the Point?
I recently wrote a blog about ActiveRain's guiding principles and the responsibility we have as users of the site & members of the community to maintain the platform, improve the platform, and ensure the platform maintains value for consumers and our fellow members. When reviewing the Activerain community guidelines, it is clear the principles and guidelines are tied in with each other. One of those guidelines is often a hot topic at Active Rain. Points.
One of the ActiveRain community guidelines states "The point system is intended to encourage and reward genuine effort. Points for blogging will only be awarded for your own original content. Examples of what doesn't qualify for points: jokes, recipes, inspirational quotes, poems, re-published marketing materials (newsletters, press releases, articles, etc), information from government websites, bible verses, large copied sections of the MLS, or posts that only contain links and keywords, but offer no value for consumers".
If the point system is there to encourage a direction that adds value to the platform, are those gaming the point system by taking points for press releases or quick news blurbs 10X/week, for example, then harming the system by putting in none of the "genuine effort", but sitting atop the leaderboard nonetheless?
I for one don't care a thing about personal points beyond the 500,000 mark (which gets you the coveted 'free' rainmaker account), but being the first face on the leaderboard can be huge when it comes to people using the site for referrals. Some also equate the amount of points on an account with the quality of the professional behind the profile. So those gaming the system & taking points for nonsense are in essence stealing business from the people putting in the genuine effort.
So what can be done? Personally, I have had multiple leadership positions in my life, and I run a ship on the belief that no one person, anywhere, is necessary for success. When people in organizations I've run have broken rules, "gamed" systems, or otherwise acted in a way that doesn't bring benefit to the organization, there's usually a warning, and zero tolerance beyond that. So for that reason, if it were my call, the people posting nonsense would get a warning to stop, and if that didn't work, their profile and all of their "work" would mysteriously disappear. Or perhaps more appropriate, all of their "work" pre-500k points would remain, and anything after would go POOF!
Some people say "who cares, it's only points" - but these people are usually the ones with over a million, not someone trying to climb the leaderboard sitting at 5,000 and wondering how they can climb when robo-posters are putting up tons of points each week. The point system goes from encouraging to discouraging when people are getting passed by those posting garbage or copy/pasting comments across all of AR. It's even more discouraging when there's no shot at ever reaching the top of a leaderboard because people aren't following community guidelines, and definitely not being one with the Weltanshauung.
So what's the point? What's a good way to correct what I think is definitely a problem? Do away with points altogether? Police the "robo posters" and get rid of them? Public shame? Total inaction? I'm not sure, but I know I think those not following the community guidelines don't want to be a part of the community - they are self-serving, not adding value, and not in line with ActiveRain. So should they be here at all?
Comments(8)