About badges "reward"

Fun Stuff
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I received a few days ago a new badge for being “an active member having posted at least once”in a year
I wanted to see if I had “won” other badges and opened the badges section
I discovered I was not alone to have won this “anniversary” badge: we are 1073.

So among 8 489 members listed on this forum, only a minority has contributed during a year at least once ?
Other members are all new ? Or read only posts without posting themselves anything ?

I did not know there were so many badges created by THS : 15 are listed in a section called “getting started”, 20 in a section called “community”, 4 last ones in a section called “posting”

I did not understand well why some badges were carrying suns, others hearts or smiles and read more about their signification.
Some hearted members are considered “higher love" or “crazy in love”. The difference between them ? Go to have a look. If you click on each badge, you know who is "admired" or “respected”. And why…

I’ve been amazed to notice that existed a badge for members who “flag” other members, that 30 persons have flagged other members at least once (may be more ?) and have been rewarded for that.

I ‘m curious : Is the member flagged informed by the team that another member has flagged him or her ? What are the consequences for the member who has been flagged ? Is s/he banned ?

1 Like
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Hi @Candide When a user flags a post the Admin Team can then review the flagged content to decide what to do. Options may include agreeing with the flag, disagreeing with the flag, and ignoring the flag. Additionally, staff can hide the post, triggering an automatic PM to the user encouraging them to edit the post; silence the user; suspend the user; or delete the post.

The actions taken depend on previous posting behavior and other aspects, each member is treated on an individual basis.

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Hi @Candide. Thanks for all those numbers! +1 for details!

I think you’re right that:

  • only a fraction of TH members are on the forum (100k vs 10k?)
  • most members on the forum don’t post regularly

You can get a glimpse of this by clicking on the “Members” button at the top of the screen (next to “Forum home”). Then sort by, I don’t know, “replies”?

You can also see “active” users here: About - TrustedHousesitters Community Forum

As for badges, I’m not really sure who looks at them, if anyone. Many may be defaults by Discourse, the forum software.

As for flagging, I was thrown by this at first, too. But then I learned that there’s a lot of spam that gets posted (or tries to) to the forums, but the mods and the trust system prevent them from showing up. I did see one get through once, and I think I sent a DM to a mod about it. I should’ve flagged it to get my badge! =) As a gamer, I’m #notSureAboutGamification.

Also, if a member feels another member is violating a community rules, they can flag them. Here they are:

https://forum.trustedhousesitters.com/faq

I used to think it’s a mod’s job to handle that. But one could argue that flagging—say a person using profanity—could save the mod’s time/energy by notifying them.

This Discourse post seems helpful:

  • Quote from that post:

    The goal here is for the community to be able to protect itself from the worst users, even without a moderator present. But it works even better with a moderator, as the moderator can accelerate the process by handling the flags as they come in.

Back to the top: Growing the TH community, strengthening it, and increasing community engagement are always TH goals, I presume. I’m sure Angela and the mods are always looking for constructive criticism and help.