I’m going to keep this short and sweet. 9rules, the community I was admitted to based on the quality of my site content, has recently made a change in policy. This quote sums it up:
…participation in either the new member area or my.9rules is required for all members…
Tyme White
Essentially, in the interest of “fairness”, only people who participate in the social network aspect of 9rules will be permitted to be part of the content community. Now this is entirely the prerogative of 9rules leadership and members to make such a change in policy, but I think it is foolish. Breeding a closed community that only feeds off of its own ideas is intellectually disadvantaged compared with the open community that takes insight and discussion from all reasonable sources. Indeed, the shift toward a closed participation-based system gives more voice to people who wish to have more voice, which, paradoxically or not, decreases overall quality. Historical wisdom tells us that the people with the most to say aren’t always the ones with the most important things to say; in fact, one could make an argument that sheer quantity is often inversely proportional with real quality.
In any case, this brave new 9rules is the additional reason I needed to part ways. The preexisting reason is simple and much the same as I originally expressed: the “quality” defined by 9rules has been leaning more toward “good fuzzy community” and away from “insightful, well-written content”. The maturity level of the community as a whole is less than I would like, which could be a result of my expectations being too high or just simply an indication that I don’t fit in with the vision. Either way, prudence guides my departure.
Their loss.
The way I’ve interpreted the statement is that the focus is on creating community at all levels, using quality content as the bridging element to create discourse and to make new connections with like-minded people. The end goal is, I think, to create social opportunities to connect on any level at all.
I think it’s always been somewhat unclear whether 9rules is a “badge of quality” or a “group”. As a badge it carried prestige in the early days because of the member sites that were part of Round 1. As a group, its identity was in flux as everyone tried to figure out what it was supposed to be about. With new new announcement, the decision has been made: if you are unable to spend the time creating a relationship with other other members or with the community at large, you’re probably not going to be a good fit.
I’ve decided to stay, though my participation is limited primarily to talking to other members about how to do stuff with our various websites, and sharing what I know. It sounds like you’ve made the decision to retain your independence and maintain your own standard of quality, which I applaud. Best of luck!
I took my leaf off today. I don’t want to have community participation mandated to me.
Time (Tyme?) will tell how this move works for them.
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