Chef and Simon

I have a suggestion: On the editors best article page, there are some authors who joined Wizzley one year ago, wrote a few articles, and we haven't seen them around since, yet they have a badge and are on the front page.  (I'm not complaining that they have a badge)

There are other authors here, who in my opinion, have some very well-written, interesting articles and don't have a badge. They have written many articles and write everyday.

In my opinion, not that you want it, it would be nice to give these dedicated people some recognition for their hard work. I'm not saying this, because I feel that I deserve a badge. I'm saying it, because I think others have been overlooked.

From one badgeless author to another, I get what you are saying.  I have given up on Wizzley badges and EC awards.   I have been at this online thing a long time and I don't worry about awards anymore...they don't pay the bills. 

That being said, when I took a peek at the other badgeless authors on the best article page, I see I am in good company.  lol 

BTW, what is the difference between the Excellent Author award and EC award?   I haven't been around as much lately, so am not sure how things work. 

As Jo, the God of EC awards, has explained it to me, once you receive three EC awards you are then awarded a badge making you Excellent Author.  This secures your spot on the front page or ranking (placed before non badge authors) competing only with other authors awarded badges.  It has all the other meanings we've been told but in terms of answering your question Janet, I get where your coming from and feel this answers your question directly.

I like what Janet said! Well said Janet, I'm with you!

I feel what Brenda is saying and for some time felt it (EC or Badge Authors) are not a good sampling of our diverse body of work here.  Clearly my interest are different from the popular interest of this site and that's okay. Those convinced against their will are of the same opinion still.

I feel I've created a good sample of my work here and will wait to see if it begins to pay off or earn an amount of money worth working so hard for.  We are after all in it for the money are we not?  

That being said know this.  I will not compete with my fellow writers here. I've learned things can get messy when some of us work hard to compete for a spot or maintain one. I've watched authors get sloppy and toss articles up at mach speed while quality suffers.  

I have a good rule I follow, I don't write anything I wouldn't show to my own mother.  She knows who I am and would call me on it if I sold out.   

I have met some new wonderful writers here who I respect and like very much.   I'm a loyal friend to them, need anything just contact me.  

All of us are better, stronger, more interesting and successful than one of us!

I love writing here too. And I do like that the awards are not in-your-face sort of things like some other sites I won't mention. But I admit, I'm new to this game and my one EC thrilled me to death. I didn't take it as  competition with other writers, it was just a pat on the back from more experienced folks.

That said I do have to remind myself that I am here to try to make a living. I don't know if awards help to reach that goal, but the help from other writers has been invaluable. I'm sticking around, award or no award.

I spoke of accumulated experience not just Wizzley.  I agree with all that accolades business, who needs it.  HP was cluttered with it.  It only created a load of trouble as people did compete and it got dog eat dog.  I feel we evade all that bologna here. You can't really tell it even exist if a reader or visitor. Besides it is search results that bring folks here.

I don't feel this is a site for creative writing. I do that in other forms. I still say, it's a lot about the money.  I want to support Wizzley and myself (to some degree) by earning money.  It takes a lot of money to maintain a site like this.  Hats off to you all for the hard work in doing so.  I intend, expect and plan on doing my part to fill the bank 

Dear fellow Wizzleyans, 

first, there's only one Editor's Choice Award (no Excellent Author Award!).

We give this award to outstanding articles which we'd like to see on display in our EC gallery.

Sure, it is also a recognition of the authors' skills. But, at the same time, we know that your most useful recognition comes through increased income from your work. So we focus almost all of our improvement efforts on that part.  

When we consider an article for an EC Award, we look for a number of criteria:

• Interesting topic
• Useful content
• Excellent grammar, spelling, and sentence structure
• Appealing layout
• Great use of our modules
• Quality images, if possible by the author
• Relevant links
• Great ad strategy

In other words - a fantastic user experience according to Google's guidelines.

I'm truly proud to say that we have thousands of good articles and hundreds of great articles on our site, but many of them simply miss one or more aspects that would make them outstanding articles.

Nobody should lose any income because they didn't get an EC. Most visitors come directly to the page through the search engines and couldn't care less about an author's badge. There are plenty of instances where non-EC pages make more money than those with awards. It depends on so many different factors, but 'EC or not EC' ain't one of them.

The way I see it - one main reason for giving an EC is to show other authors examples of outstanding work. We may pick up a good strategy, or learn about some smart ways to use modules, and thus improve our own pages and the overall quality of Wizzley. (Which helps all of us in the long run.)

Unfortunately, as with all awards of this kind, there's always a certain element of subjectivity involved. It's too damn hard to make it right for everyone, and to consider all opinions. But that's the nature of the beast, so to speak.  

EC Badges don't mean we appreciate our other authors less. Nope.

Thank you all so much for your ongoing quality contributions to our site.   

Hugs and much love,

your Achim (chefkeem)

I am so new to this online writing business that I am not concerned about whether or not I win awards. I'm glad for the EC because it gives me someplace to go to see what are considered by some to be the quality I am aiming to achieve.

Thanks for listing the criteria, Achim - it makes it easier for me to assess my own work with respect to those I use as role models.

I really do enjoy being here and learning from so many helpful people.

It is great to have this discussion. It has been WAY too quiet around here lately!

Okay, I guess we settled that. I realize the type of articles that earn a badge probably aren't the ones that make money. I know I haven't written any articles that deserve one, because I just don't have the patience to do all the research and write a long article.

All of those badged articles that are on the front page make Wizzley look really good which it is of course.

I really enjoy reading those articles, so keep on writing them people.

"Wizzleyans" I'm SOOOO going to use that!

This discussion has been helpful. It has sometimes puzzled me what the award is based on, so I haven't concerned myself much with it lately. Chef's list is helpful. What people find an "interesting topic" sure is a subjective criterion.

As many of you have mentioned about your own contributions here, I am not here to fulfill my needs for creative writing. I do that elsewhere. I am here because I need to make a living which I am very slow at accomplishing. I enjoy the community as well and appreciate the advice and camaraderie of those who write here. I've also learned a lot by reading your articles, everyone!

I appreciate the hard work of Chef, Simon, et al. 

Chef, I hope your wife is okay.

It is very nice to be recognized for hard work and I appreciate the EC awards I've received, but what I like most about this site is the fact that we can come here and have a discussion about this type of thing and it doesn't get ugly.

This forum is fun to visit!  And that is one of the things that keeps me here.  I hope it never changes.

Good debate here, I have to add my two cents.

Major traffic comes from search engines and social media - I agree.

But being on first page of authors also gives you a link (I will not go into debate about relevancy, PageRank etc.) which authors on pages two, three and so on don't have. And this link in the eyes of search engines surely counts.

I have been on first page for few days in July when I was pretty active and most of other writers were not, so I have clearly seen improvement in traffic coming from search engines although the social interaction from other authors was poor.

I agree, having a board with writers who can serve as example to others, is great. But if this PR 3 link would serve to other (fresh, versatile, with interesting grammar;), most active, with most 'in demand' topics and so one) authors too, the authority of main site (Wizzley.com) could be more productive. Of course this would mean some additional work what has pros and cons for everybody.

Big news sites and Web 2.0 communities vary their front pages with reason. Although this is not exactly front page, it is indexed, it has PageRank 3 and it has pretty static content. In general I like the Wizzley's structure of the site, but this part is not its best looking from the eyes of search engines.

I believe BrendaReeves idea is worth of some additional thoughts.

I've been reading up on SEO the past few days so I even understand what Tolovaj means in this last post. (Hurray for me!)

This is a valid point  I have seen the impact on my traffic on another site to all my articles by having one of them get first-page recognition.  I wonder how much ranking the first pages of the different topics have; I don't know how to check. 

I am wary of expanding the recognition of quality work because I am afraid that we may start to get the wrong kind of competition that can muddy the community waters and there may be some who attempt to "game" the system.  I like the hand-picked control there is of EC because that is really the only way to maintain quality control. I don't know if the managers here will be able to maintain that for very long, however, when the number of pages increases beyond a certain number.