Medium Badges, Stars, and Community

Josh Yates
Jul 23, 2017 · 3 min read

I received an email about becoming a Medium member. The discover exclusive stories from top writers did not appeal to me. I’m more interested in receiving the unusual writer’s ** high ** when my articles are published to Medium.

A few of Medium’s nice features are the stats page, noteworthy picks, green hearts (recommendations), and publications.

This article shares some insight of how a non profit successfully generated more income for their project and developed a community outlet for their users. If the higher powers of Medium read this article and implement some of these suggestions, fill free to contribute to SETI@home as a generous thank you (tax deductible).

http://setiathome.berkeley.edu/

I began contributing to SETI@home on July 01, 1999, but only with my computer resources. Distributing computing has always fascinated me the same way Buckmister Fuller was finding ways of doing more with less. Eventually, I became hooked on the SETI@home project by using some of the fun features and have been contributing for over 18 years.

SETI@home staff built a simple web platform which allowed users to do more than look at radio signal workunits processed by the user’s computer. SETI@home staff created the ability for teams to compete:

SETI@home staff created the ability for a registered user to create a profile:

SETI@home staff created badges for individuals who contributed a lot of their computer resources to the project:

https://setiathome.berkeley.edu/team_display.php?teamid=110064

SETI@home staff created green stars for individuals who donated a monetary amount to the project:

https://setiathome.berkeley.edu/sah_donate.php

SETI@home staff created community message boards:

Medium’s member-only content might become more attractive with some small additions. The SETI@home features worked for their project, so maybe the Medium staff can develop some ideas that are more attractive than discover exclusive stories from top writers. Top writers do not give me my writer’s ** high **, but a little badge for being a Medium member might be a good hit.

Josh Yates

Written by

Disabled USMC Veteran

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