Posts Tagged: karma

JapanSoc — 17 Comments
27
May 08

New Ranking System – JapanSoc Sumo!

Japan’s sumo season has come to an end, but the power users over at JapanSoc are just getting started.

What is JapanSoc Sumo?

It’s a new measure for ranking users so we can see who the biggest contributors to JapanSoc are. You earn points by submitting stories, voting, commenting, saving stories as “Favorites”, and for getting positive votes on comments you write. The more points you get, the higher up the sumo rankings you’ll move, until everybody recognizes you as an almighty Yokozuna!

JapanSoc Sumo

What happened to Karma?

Karma is still there, but is now merely an indication of a user’s recent activity. If I can ever figure out the magical Karma formula, I’ll try to include more factors than just submitting stories and voting into the equations.

How do you get sumo points again?

Here’s the breakdown:

  • 10 points – Submitting a story that hits the front page
  • 7 points – Submitting a story that doesn’t make the font page
  • 5 points – Commenting on a story
  • 3 points – Voting for a story
  • 2 points – Adding a story to your Favorites
  • 1 point – Receiving a positive vote on a comment

How many points do you need to move up the rankings?

Everyone starts at Jonokuchi, the lowest level sumo rank…

  • <1,000 points – Jonokuchi
  • 1,000 – 1,999 points – Jonidan
  • 2,000 – 2,999 points – Sandamme
  • 3,000 – 3,999 points – Makushita
  • 4,000 – 4,999 points – Juryo
  • 5,000 – 5,999 points – Makkuchi
  • 6,000 – 6,999 points – Komusubi
  • 7,000 – 7,999 points – Sekiwake
  • 8,000 – 9,999 points – Ozeki
  • >10,000 points – Yokozuna

10,000 points! You’ve got to be kidding me!

I’m hopeful that JapanSoc will continue to grow and and establish itself as one of the biggest Japan-related social sites of its kind. So, five or ten years down the line, any Ozeki or Yokozuna will be like JapanSoc gods to all the new users that join. And if you’re a blogger, you can be sure they’ll start reading your blog!

The current top ten power users are…

Juryo:

Jonidan:

Jonokuchi:

… and snapping at their heels are a bunch of regular contributors who I’m sure will break into the top 10 very soon! See the full Top Users List for more.

Leave your thoughts in the comments!

Addition: Points are updated every 6 hours, not instantly.

Miscellaneous — 5 Comments
30
Jan 08

Ramsay Ramblings 1/30/2008

Today’s ramblings cover Japan’s desire for foreign workers, a Japanese alternative to Adsense, the latest on JapanSoc, and an unexpected present.

Japanese businesses gearing up for foreign workers

I’ve just been watching my wife’s favorite TV show – no, not Aura no Izumi! – actually, she turns on the telly every night to watch World Business Satellite News, possibly the only news show I can stomach watching. The first segment on the show was about how companies are preparing themselves for foreign workers and what more could be done.

I was pleased to see a positive approach to the inevitable influx of foreigners. The program introduced a company developing language tuition software to help foreigners learn Japanese, and suggested following Germany’s lead by giving lessons on culture and history to help ease the transition into Japanese society. It also discussed the need to make finding accommodation easier, and talked about how nurses may be hired from the Philippines if they pass the same exams required of Japanese nurses.

There was also a documentary about airlines and how JAL is cutting costs by recruiting and training flight attendants from Thailand, another sign that companies are willingly hiring foreigners, regardless of whatever position the government takes on the immigration issue.

MicroAds – an alternative to Google Adsense

I was over at Ameblo the other day, a popular online blogging community in Japan, and noticed the following ads. They look remarkably like Google Adsense adverts, but obviously a Japanese competitor of the big G. They belong to MicroAd, which is obviously doing quite well to score a spot on Ameblo.

Microad - Adsense competitor?

I was going to study the Japanese MicroAd homepage and give you more details, but I figured they would only be useful if you blogged in Japanese and had a Japanese-reading audience, which rules most of us out. :???:

Japansoc updates

JapanSoc is buzzing with activity, and I’m enjoying looking through the articles people are submitting. You’ll notice I’ve set up Top Users page with ranks us by “karma”. The current karma formula is based on votes and submissions over the last 7 days, so now you know how to increase it! If any of you are having problems uploading an avatar, just email it to me (nick AT longcountdown DOT com) and I’ll put it in manually. Finally, don’t forget to include the JapanSoc voting button in your blog posts if you want more ’socs.

A big thank you goes to Nipponster.com for including a JapanSoc submit button on the Nipponster toolbar. More on this in a later post.

Buy someone a chair, get a desk in return

About five years ago, I bought a friend a big black “President’s chair” for his office, and today I was surprised to receive a nice new desk in return! It was probably the best present I could have hoped for since I was actually looking to get a new desk anyway. So folks, remember, if you want to make someone happy, buy them some office furniture! You never know, you might just get a big filing cabinet or a fancy new desk in return! :-D