An important challenge here is finding ways for mashabiki to get feedback on what contributions they made are hot, and which were uninteresting to other fans.
medali are nice, but they are too coarse-grained to give feedback on contributions (you only know after wewe earn a medal, and wewe don't even know which contributions in that club caused wewe to earn a medal and which contributions were a waste of your time).
This is where dhahabu comes in. Your hottest contributions will earn dhahabu each siku (think of them as micro-medals), and wewe will have a private console that shows which are your hottest contributions.
Basically: medali are earned per club, but dhahabu is earned for each maarufu contribution wewe have made since joining fanpop and dumped into your piggy bank for wewe to hoard like Smaug au spend on various preciouses.
maarufu contributions will earn a lot of dhahabu each day, contributions that are semi-hot will earn less, and unloved duds will earn zero. What is "hot" will be determined kwa our dedicated army of humans and benevolent robots analyzing all activity on Fanpop.
We've worked hard to make sure dhahabu is fair. Don't worry, users who spam a club with a thousand identical crappy screencaps au junk, taka ukuta posts will not earn gold, and cheaters will be utterly... well, wewe don't cheat, so no worries there.
It's clear that there are many veteran mashabiki that have contributed across a wide array of clubs... Maybe they haven't earned a Legendary medal in one particular club, but, when added up, they have done a huge amount for mashabiki in dozens of clubs.
Since medali are per-club, but dhahabu is earned from all of your contributions, dhahabu is one of the best ways to recognize and reward those widely-spread-out veteran mashabiki with numerous contributions across many clubs. wewe don't even need to be a shabiki of a club to earn dhahabu for a great contribution in that club.
We'll be launching the first phase of dhahabu in the inayofuata several weeks. Your contributions have already been earning dhahabu as we speak, so once it goes public, many of wewe veterans will start out with a nice fat balance.
Here's another perspective: wewe don't need to use Gold. If wewe just want to use fanpop the way wewe always have, nothing will change, especially if you've racked up a few medals. You'll have enough dhahabu to do anything wewe want normally. wewe can just ignore that yellow number on your profile. But, if you've always wanted to deck out your profaili au send someone a nice thank-you gift, now wewe can, and because wewe earned it, it will be all the zaidi meaningful.
Gold can then be spent on:
-profile customizations like geocen's inayopendelewa klabu module, user profaili banners, background colors, and custom modules (each of these are very inexpensive, gold-wise). kwa now, you've certainly seen the trio of rodent engineers we employ here at fanpop HQ snacking in the staff kitchen. Imagine your own profaili super-banner taking their rotund prairie dog places!
Users who are already big contributors with red Fanatic medali and higher will be swimming in gold, Scrooge McDuck-style, due to their countless hot contributions earning shiny new dhahabu every day, so unlocking a profaili skin au banner will be a drop in the gold-bucket. wewe could probably buy it every saa of every siku without making much difference in your dhahabu balance.
New fans, on the other hand, should learn the ropes and get some experience with what the community is about before immediately going and blinging out their profiles.
For new users, it will also help guide them to the idea that fanpop is about contributing and collaborating with other mashabiki to build great shabiki clubs, and not about inciting drama.
We'll first launch with these profaili features as they are among the most requested. After this, we'll add:
-User name changing. Yes, apparently, a few people want this for some unknown reason. What the heck is wrong with bonerAlert89 ? dhahabu will keep this from going too crazy as it's hard enough to keep up with your 1,000 mashabiki and all their new names each week.
-voting for replacement club banners, icons, skins, and themes (very cheap in terms of voting per club, and users with medali in that club will be able to vote for free). Giving mashabiki control of club ikoni and banners has been one of the most requested features, but the concern was that the small percentage of nasty people may try to rig kura za maoni and vote unfairly if it was just implemented using a regular fanpop poll.
The reason for spending a little dhahabu to vote on club banners/icons/skins/themes is multi-fold: it will reduce vote cheating as cheating bastards will have a tougher time working the system, and it also makes sure that people voting really mean it, versus just spam-voting ugly banners on every club they come across. People with new/fake accounts won't have enough dhahabu to rig the vote. Of course, if wewe have a medal in that club, wewe have earned the right to vote for free. Club elections for banners/icons/skins/themes will come up every two weeks if new candidates are imewasilishwa kwa fans. The current "incumbent" banner/icon/skin will always be a candidate, along with any new candidates.
-profile skins, profaili themes, profaili super banners, and future items that are zaidi expensive, Gold-wise. zaidi on this later, but we are talking about profaili videos, gifts to other fans, fully-unlocked profiles [enter your own HTML] and much more.
Yes, profaili skins could look amazing au fugly, depending on one's taste, but in the opinion of the fanpop staff, any user who has achieved veteran status has demonstrated pretty good judgement and probably won't pakia a vomit-inducing skin. In any case, if you've earned thousands of Gold, you've definitely earned the right in our book to customize things a bit.
-Another one of many new items: the "Rose-Colored Glasses". Do wewe despise all skins, themes, etc? Does individuality and personal expression make wewe want to puke? This high-value dhahabu item lets wewe customize the fanpop world to how wewe want things to look. As the name implies, it only affects how wewe see things, not how other mashabiki see stuff. Unless, of course, wewe have enough dhahabu to gift your entire army of shabiki minions Rose-Colored Glasses...
-There will be an option to onyesha au hide your total Lifetime dhahabu earnings, which will be public kwa default. Lifetime dhahabu earnings is just the sum total of all the dhahabu you've ever earned, regardless of how much wewe have spent. The juu mashabiki who onyesha it will be ranked on a leaderboard.
Even if wewe spend some au all of your Gold, it does not reduce your Lifetime earnings number since that is all the dhahabu you've ever earned (and is not your current dhahabu balance, which is a private number shown only to you). wewe can also think of Lifetime dhahabu earnings as one's ujumla, jumla total fanpop score.
-new cheat-resistant kura za maoni and quiz! kura ya maoni rigging is a bummer. We'll give kura ya maoni creators two new options (they are optional and not required):
1. poll/quiz voting to people who have earned at least X Lifetime dhahabu au at least X medals. Voting is free.
2. This option requires people to spend a few dhahabu to vote in a poll/quiz (along with free kura for medal holders in that club). Don't worry, that dhahabu does not go into the kura ya maoni creator's wallet. kura ya maoni cheating will be dramatically reduced because cheating bastards won't have the dhahabu and medali to rig kura za maoni (since they are too busy trying to cheat instead of building real shabiki clubs). We don't see this option being used very frequently, but it can be used for important polls.
-new cheat-resistant 5-star ratings! Veteran mashabiki will remember 5-star ratings. If wewe vote something a 3,4, au 5, it will count the same as being a "Fan of it". mashabiki will be required to have earned at least some dhahabu to rate stuff and prove they are a real shabiki and not just a cheating bastard. We could rating to someone with medals, but that is hard on people who are real mashabiki but spread out all over Fanpop, so we'll go with a minimum Lifetime dhahabu number. Again, rating is free. It won't cost any dhahabu to rate; wewe just need to have earned some dhahabu at some point in time to prove wewe are a real fan. Aside from stopping cheaters, do wewe really want a n00b who knows nothing about fanpop and who has earned zero dhahabu to have the power to downrate your stuff? If they are real fans, they will be able to rate soon enough, and kwa then they will hopefully have learned the fanpop culture.
Nothing is 100% cheat proof, but it will greatly reduce cheating, and it makes it much easier to nail cheaters and ban them for life. Yes, cheaters can try to earn dhahabu on their cheater accounts, but that can take a long time if they have a lot of accounts, and it's easy to catch and ban them in the process. Cheating is certainly a lot harder with dhahabu than just creating a bunch of fake accounts instantly as is done now.
-spam-resistant walls and private messages! wewe will have an option in your profaili to block users trying to message wewe au write on your ukuta who have earned zero gold. This is in addition to the existing filters and block lists. Goodbye, spammers!
Your personal dhahabu console inaonyesha your hottest items that day/week/month will be hidden/private kwa default, but wewe can share it if wewe want to help teach new mashabiki what is hot and what is not.
Your contributions will earn dhahabu every day, and at the end of the week, wewe simply make one contribution to automatically collect your gold.
The first phase of dhahabu will be launched in the inayofuata several weeks. We'll be starting with shabiki profaili customization and then roll out club banner/icon voting.
medali are nice, but they are too coarse-grained to give feedback on contributions (you only know after wewe earn a medal, and wewe don't even know which contributions in that club caused wewe to earn a medal and which contributions were a waste of your time).
This is where dhahabu comes in. Your hottest contributions will earn dhahabu each siku (think of them as micro-medals), and wewe will have a private console that shows which are your hottest contributions.
Basically: medali are earned per club, but dhahabu is earned for each maarufu contribution wewe have made since joining fanpop and dumped into your piggy bank for wewe to hoard like Smaug au spend on various preciouses.
maarufu contributions will earn a lot of dhahabu each day, contributions that are semi-hot will earn less, and unloved duds will earn zero. What is "hot" will be determined kwa our dedicated army of humans and benevolent robots analyzing all activity on Fanpop.
We've worked hard to make sure dhahabu is fair. Don't worry, users who spam a club with a thousand identical crappy screencaps au junk, taka ukuta posts will not earn gold, and cheaters will be utterly... well, wewe don't cheat, so no worries there.
It's clear that there are many veteran mashabiki that have contributed across a wide array of clubs... Maybe they haven't earned a Legendary medal in one particular club, but, when added up, they have done a huge amount for mashabiki in dozens of clubs.
Since medali are per-club, but dhahabu is earned from all of your contributions, dhahabu is one of the best ways to recognize and reward those widely-spread-out veteran mashabiki with numerous contributions across many clubs. wewe don't even need to be a shabiki of a club to earn dhahabu for a great contribution in that club.
We'll be launching the first phase of dhahabu in the inayofuata several weeks. Your contributions have already been earning dhahabu as we speak, so once it goes public, many of wewe veterans will start out with a nice fat balance.
Here's another perspective: wewe don't need to use Gold. If wewe just want to use fanpop the way wewe always have, nothing will change, especially if you've racked up a few medals. You'll have enough dhahabu to do anything wewe want normally. wewe can just ignore that yellow number on your profile. But, if you've always wanted to deck out your profaili au send someone a nice thank-you gift, now wewe can, and because wewe earned it, it will be all the zaidi meaningful.
Gold can then be spent on:
-profile customizations like geocen's inayopendelewa klabu module, user profaili banners, background colors, and custom modules (each of these are very inexpensive, gold-wise). kwa now, you've certainly seen the trio of rodent engineers we employ here at fanpop HQ snacking in the staff kitchen. Imagine your own profaili super-banner taking their rotund prairie dog places!
Users who are already big contributors with red Fanatic medali and higher will be swimming in gold, Scrooge McDuck-style, due to their countless hot contributions earning shiny new dhahabu every day, so unlocking a profaili skin au banner will be a drop in the gold-bucket. wewe could probably buy it every saa of every siku without making much difference in your dhahabu balance.
New fans, on the other hand, should learn the ropes and get some experience with what the community is about before immediately going and blinging out their profiles.
For new users, it will also help guide them to the idea that fanpop is about contributing and collaborating with other mashabiki to build great shabiki clubs, and not about inciting drama.
We'll first launch with these profaili features as they are among the most requested. After this, we'll add:
-User name changing. Yes, apparently, a few people want this for some unknown reason. What the heck is wrong with bonerAlert89 ? dhahabu will keep this from going too crazy as it's hard enough to keep up with your 1,000 mashabiki and all their new names each week.
-voting for replacement club banners, icons, skins, and themes (very cheap in terms of voting per club, and users with medali in that club will be able to vote for free). Giving mashabiki control of club ikoni and banners has been one of the most requested features, but the concern was that the small percentage of nasty people may try to rig kura za maoni and vote unfairly if it was just implemented using a regular fanpop poll.
The reason for spending a little dhahabu to vote on club banners/icons/skins/themes is multi-fold: it will reduce vote cheating as cheating bastards will have a tougher time working the system, and it also makes sure that people voting really mean it, versus just spam-voting ugly banners on every club they come across. People with new/fake accounts won't have enough dhahabu to rig the vote. Of course, if wewe have a medal in that club, wewe have earned the right to vote for free. Club elections for banners/icons/skins/themes will come up every two weeks if new candidates are imewasilishwa kwa fans. The current "incumbent" banner/icon/skin will always be a candidate, along with any new candidates.
-profile skins, profaili themes, profaili super banners, and future items that are zaidi expensive, Gold-wise. zaidi on this later, but we are talking about profaili videos, gifts to other fans, fully-unlocked profiles [enter your own HTML] and much more.
Yes, profaili skins could look amazing au fugly, depending on one's taste, but in the opinion of the fanpop staff, any user who has achieved veteran status has demonstrated pretty good judgement and probably won't pakia a vomit-inducing skin. In any case, if you've earned thousands of Gold, you've definitely earned the right in our book to customize things a bit.
-Another one of many new items: the "Rose-Colored Glasses". Do wewe despise all skins, themes, etc? Does individuality and personal expression make wewe want to puke? This high-value dhahabu item lets wewe customize the fanpop world to how wewe want things to look. As the name implies, it only affects how wewe see things, not how other mashabiki see stuff. Unless, of course, wewe have enough dhahabu to gift your entire army of shabiki minions Rose-Colored Glasses...
-There will be an option to onyesha au hide your total Lifetime dhahabu earnings, which will be public kwa default. Lifetime dhahabu earnings is just the sum total of all the dhahabu you've ever earned, regardless of how much wewe have spent. The juu mashabiki who onyesha it will be ranked on a leaderboard.
Even if wewe spend some au all of your Gold, it does not reduce your Lifetime earnings number since that is all the dhahabu you've ever earned (and is not your current dhahabu balance, which is a private number shown only to you). wewe can also think of Lifetime dhahabu earnings as one's ujumla, jumla total fanpop score.
-new cheat-resistant kura za maoni and quiz! kura ya maoni rigging is a bummer. We'll give kura ya maoni creators two new options (they are optional and not required):
1. poll/quiz voting to people who have earned at least X Lifetime dhahabu au at least X medals. Voting is free.
2. This option requires people to spend a few dhahabu to vote in a poll/quiz (along with free kura for medal holders in that club). Don't worry, that dhahabu does not go into the kura ya maoni creator's wallet. kura ya maoni cheating will be dramatically reduced because cheating bastards won't have the dhahabu and medali to rig kura za maoni (since they are too busy trying to cheat instead of building real shabiki clubs). We don't see this option being used very frequently, but it can be used for important polls.
-new cheat-resistant 5-star ratings! Veteran mashabiki will remember 5-star ratings. If wewe vote something a 3,4, au 5, it will count the same as being a "Fan of it". mashabiki will be required to have earned at least some dhahabu to rate stuff and prove they are a real shabiki and not just a cheating bastard. We could rating to someone with medals, but that is hard on people who are real mashabiki but spread out all over Fanpop, so we'll go with a minimum Lifetime dhahabu number. Again, rating is free. It won't cost any dhahabu to rate; wewe just need to have earned some dhahabu at some point in time to prove wewe are a real fan. Aside from stopping cheaters, do wewe really want a n00b who knows nothing about fanpop and who has earned zero dhahabu to have the power to downrate your stuff? If they are real fans, they will be able to rate soon enough, and kwa then they will hopefully have learned the fanpop culture.
Nothing is 100% cheat proof, but it will greatly reduce cheating, and it makes it much easier to nail cheaters and ban them for life. Yes, cheaters can try to earn dhahabu on their cheater accounts, but that can take a long time if they have a lot of accounts, and it's easy to catch and ban them in the process. Cheating is certainly a lot harder with dhahabu than just creating a bunch of fake accounts instantly as is done now.
-spam-resistant walls and private messages! wewe will have an option in your profaili to block users trying to message wewe au write on your ukuta who have earned zero gold. This is in addition to the existing filters and block lists. Goodbye, spammers!
Your personal dhahabu console inaonyesha your hottest items that day/week/month will be hidden/private kwa default, but wewe can share it if wewe want to help teach new mashabiki what is hot and what is not.
Your contributions will earn dhahabu every day, and at the end of the week, wewe simply make one contribution to automatically collect your gold.
The first phase of dhahabu will be launched in the inayofuata several weeks. We'll be starting with shabiki profaili customization and then roll out club banner/icon voting.