Much Ado About Points

There have been a lot of questions and comments on the topic of points, but this thread is solely based on suggestions. Mainly, what we can spend them on, other ways to use them, and basically anything you think would be a useful feature when using points.

Of course, you can comment your opinions of the suggestions, but you can ask questions in the original points thread here.

Here is a list of some of the suggestions we have now:

- Gaining points for posting stories, poems, etc.
- Giving points to other users for a story, poem, etc. you like
- Spending points for advertisements for your story
- Custom ranks
- Points for Mibbaverseries (as well as the return of birthday balloons)
- Points for recommendations for articles, stories, poems, etc.

Suggestions won't be added to this list unless supported by other users, because we want suggestions that we think many users will benefit from.

We encourage you to share your opinions about any suggestions so the points area can be a bit more flexible.

I believe on the original points thread Dujo said we'd be able to "buy" personal like... Idk what they're called, titles to go underneath usernames. I like that idea.

@ ladyschrei
They're called ranks. :)

What about points being used in comment swap? Maybe you spend points to get a comment and gain points if you give one?

@ ladyschrei
Ranks? =]

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This was my original post about an advertising idea, as a more effective alternative to the pimping/reccing threads:

Quote

I had an idea for another way to use the point system on the New Mibba.

One of the few ways to advertise your stories on Mibba is through the Pimping and Reccing threads, but those are not very effective. They only reach users on the forum, and your "ad" gets lost in in pages of links eventually.

What if we had a classified section on the site (off forum) where users could use points to buy ads to promote their stories?

We could have different sizes, the larger the ad, the more points it costs. For a certain amount of points, you could include the cover image for your story/article/contest/. Maybe include 100 word or less description with a basic ad. And unlike the advertising threads, I don't think they should stay up forever. Maybe 1-3 days, depending on how many points the ad cost, so we don't end up with hundreds of pages of backlog like in the advertising threads.

@ ladyschrei
Custom ranks! I'll add that to the list.

Custom ranks, that was it! XD Thanks guys :)

@ The Rumor
It sounds like a good idea, but wouldn't it kind of defeat the purpose of the comment swap? And, if it was fair, we'd end up with the same amount of points.

@ water's cascade.
Yeah, it's not a fully-formed idea but I wanted to throw it out there because there might be a way it could be used to keep the swap going fairly.

@ The Rumor
That would definitely help make the comment swap fair, so that's true!

@ The Rumor
I think that's kinda ... missing the point of the comment swap, isn't it? My payment is supposed to be my comment and their payment is supposed to be their comment. If I'm going to be trading points for it, I might as well do a journal version where I trade points for a story I would enjoy more.

We already have systems in place to prevent problems with comment swap. If those systems aren't working, I doubt throwing points at the problems will fix them.

Personally, I don't like the points for the comment swap idea. Like Dru stated, I think we already 'pay' to use the comment swap by having to comment someone's story. That's the trade-off, and I think that's fair.

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I think getting a point (just 1 point) for every story/poem/article recc you recieve would be nice too.

Audrey T:

I think getting a point (just 1 point) for every story/poem/article recc you recieve would be nice too.

That's an excellent idea!

Also, if you have a question and another user answers it, you could give them points, or if they made you a banner or something. Really, what I'm saying is that you could give a user points for any reason, without having to distinguish why in order to give them the points.

Audrey T:

I think getting a point (just 1 point) for every story/poem/article recc you recieve would be nice too.

As long as the system can detect if you recc your own stuff or not, because I know some users do that (me included)

@ KatieMosing
I think it would be a lot easier if we did it that way - for any reason, without having to distinguish why. There's an endless list of ways that users can help others, so it would be pretty simple if we could just...give points.

@ Audrey T
I love that idea! But would we have notifications of who recommended our article (because I don't think anybody's friends with everyone, so they don't know who recommends what)?

@ ladyschrei
Ha, that's true. xD

Hmm. I have an idea! How about we give users points for their birthday?

@ water's cascade.
I like that idea! Maybe not a huge amount, but Mibba doesn't really recognize birthdays now that the balloons are gone.

@ Kurtni
Yeah, not too big, but enough to show that we care about birthdays too! haha.
We'd just have to figure out a way to make sure that users don't keep changing their birthday every day xD Maybe, in the registration form, we should just put a note that the day and month can't be changed. And then we would have to disable changing your birthday. Would that work?

@ water's cascade.
I like this idea too, especially with the birthday balloons being gone. I think maybe like, 5 or 10 points would be fair?

And I like the idea of not being able to change the day and month. Maybe if this idea is implemented an announcement could be made and all the users could be given say, like, two weeks to change their birthdays (if the dates they have are incorrect, cuz I'm sure some users to do that).

idk, but I like this idea. :)

@ chai latte
That's a great idea. Two weeks is just enough time for them to change their birthdays. I'm going to add this to the list!

@ chai latte
I think the only issue with not allowing birthday changes would be some users register with fake birthdays, and change them to reflect their real age when they feel more comfortable with the site.

I'm sure Dujo could program something to where it can only happen once a year, or the points can be lost if you change the date of your birthday (Like now, if you delete an article, you lose the points for it)