A site that exists based on user generated content is a two-way street. Users provide the content, and the site owner is expected to return something of value. Since Baron deleted-removed-destroyed the valuable section with years of user reviews on books, brokers and software, the quality of posts has taken another step down. And why not? What did that action say to users about the value of their contributions to ET? How are they motivated to take the time and effort to upgrade the site?
I respectfully disagree that "reviews" per se offer anything in terms of content. Now - on the other hand, if Baron wanted to offer a noted author or subject matter expert an open thread where ET Members are allowed to ask questions... That would be a serious contribution to content. Q&A should be serious and respectful, as these authors/SME's are guests and should be treated as such. Baron - get on that !
Another thought I had was that continued membership to ET should be contingent on some sort of ratio of serious worthwhile content posted versus non-trading related chatter ( slings and arrows, insults, etc. ). For example, most electronic trading exchanges have some sort of message-to-fill ratio policy. 18-1 is typical. In other words, exchanges want to limit your use of their valuable ECN bandwidth resources without actually executing a trade. Maybe Mav's idea about some sort of review Algo could tie into this or accomplish this in some way. Goal is identical: discourage noise and encourage quality content postings. Problem is, I have reviewed the posts of many members where you literally have to scroll through pages of posts before you find anything posted which contributed positive and useful information about trading. And in my mind - that is the core problem. Too many trolls and punters drowning out serious trading discussion. And unfortunately, the serious members stop posting or go somewhere else. There are many good Members that I used to follow since 2002 that just don't bother any more - and that just sux. Another point - about half of my clients come to me as serious, professional traders who found out about me through monitoring my ET posts, but they are not ET members or more likely they are ET members who do not post. It's a problem if someone has to perform a string search or follow only certain ET members in order to find serious trading discussion on this website.
Well, I thought I would bring up another tight-wire act: Valuable posts vs. page views. AFAIK sponsors pay for page views and not for important posts, so financially speaking a guy like Surf is worth more than a profitable and insightful poster, who generates 1/10th of Surf's trolling page views... Bottomline is, controversial posters are better for a sponsored website than insightful ones... Correct me if I am mistaken...
Speaking for my own sponsorship, I pay a flat monthly rate that is not tied to page views or posts or any other metric. If Baron by good fortune works his way up to 100 sponsors who post frequently in order to generate views, then paying members or invited guests for top-notch content might make business sense in that scenario
Too many serious posters and things get boring because a lot of that content is technical and may go over other member's heads who are not trading that in specific niche or way. Too many controversial types and the post quality goes down while the page views and number of replies goes up. So.... all types of posters are needed for overall site success, hence the required tight wire act. :eek:
Baron Im having trouble contacting members directly..I know they want to contact me too...Can you help with this problem? mike
Mike, A change was made to your account, give it a try again and let us know if you still have a problem.
Suggestion 1 - To allow multiple nick-names per each registered user with ET (Therefore one when using a new nick-name could comfortably ask questions or partake discussions with any new topic that has not been familiar to him, without worrying/ causing any embarrassment.): http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Cunningham's_Law " Cunningham's Law states "the best way to get the right answer on the Internet is not to ask a question, it's to post the wrong answer." The concept is named after Ward Cunningham, father of the wiki. According to Steven McGeady,[1] the law's author, Wikipedia may be the most well-known demonstration of this law.[2] Cunningham's Law can be considered the Internet equivalent of the French saying "prêcher le faux pour savoir le vrai" (preach the falsehood to know the truth). In "Duty Calls," xkcd references a similar concept.[3] "