Changes to User Created Content

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Last updated: Saturday July 13th, 2019

Edit: August 24, 2018. To allow teachers to create content for their students, I've waived all restrictions for creating quizzes.

I made some small changes to the site today that I probably should have done awhile ago. Going forward, users will need to reach level 10 to comment and level 15 to create quizzes. The purpose of this is to reduce the labor required to run the site. I hope that it won't inconvenience too many people. These levels are super easy to obtain, and I think it will reduce the amount of low quality content.

Unfortunately, user-created content has been a mixed bag for JetPunk. Earlier this year, I finished the picture quiz editor. It took a few hundred hours of work to create. I was hoping that this new format would bring a larger audience to our site. In some ways, it has. The number of quizzes created has gone up by a lot. But the total traffic to the site has stalled. This means that our moderation labor and server costs are higher than ever, but our revenue has not kept pace.

Sadly, user-generated quizzes don't bring in a lot of traffic. Over 95% of new visitors to the site land on one of the quizzes that we've created ourselves. What this means is that users aren't promoting their content outside of the site. With more quizzes and the same number of users, each quiz gets less attention.

In all, the number of new user-created quizzes has increased by 85% since 2016 but traffic is only 25% higher. To save time, we could stop moderating quizzes, but then we'd be inundated by quizzes like "how many times can you type the word poop in 15 seconds". And yes, people submit those types of quizzes all the time.

In any case, I hope this explains my decision to slightly restrict quiz creation and commenting. I love working on JetPunk and hope to keep the site going to years to come. Changes like this will make it possible.

-The Quizmaster

29 Comments

+34

Level 75

Jul 30, 2018

That makes a lot of sense, and I whole-heartedly support this change. Thanks a lot for your efforts Dan, and all the best for Jetpunk!

+13

Level 44

Jul 30, 2018

I would definitely agree with the changes! It looks overall like you are also protecting the users with some of those changes (primarily making people reach level 10 before commenting), and I'm grateful for that. Hopefully JetPunk will still be alive for many years to come :)

+12

Level 80

Jul 30, 2018

This makes complete sense. It is interesting to read the % increases in traffic and content creation too... oh and for the record I typed 13 poops in 15 seconds on a blank email. Am going to think about who to send it to now...

Level 94

Aug 1, 2018

this is what separates all of us from the top members^ I only managed 11.

Level 42

Jul 30, 2018

That is a much-needed change, in my opinion, Dan. But in my humble understanding, you could probably make interactive quizzes and let more user-generated content make its way to the front pages to ensure that users remain encouraged to create interesting quizzes that draw more people.

Of course, I could be wrong there. Another point I would like to make is for keeping comments and quizzes made by users who were not at the levels specified at the time of posting, provided they were posted before this change. Thanks very much for bringing this change into JetPunk.

Level 42

Jul 30, 2018

And here when I say this, I make a special case for my own changes-pending quiz on countries that are not recognised by every UN member, or de facto nations who are claimed by de jure ones.

Level 66

Aug 7, 2018

I think there is merit to this suggestion. I have on occasion posted links to my own user-created quizzes on my own social media, but I'd probably do more of that if more of my quizzes were worth points.

+13

Level 83

Jul 30, 2018

For the record, you do a great job on this site man. Thanks for the work you put into it.

Level ∞

Jul 30, 2018

Thanks!

Level 88

Jul 30, 2018

Changes seem perfectly reasonable to me. If you can't even get to Level 15, you probably shouldn't be creating quizzes. And adding the cutoff for commenting will hopefully get rid of the spammers (not that there are many of those--you do a pretty good job on that already!)

Level 76

Jul 30, 2018

Good decision! However, if your workload moderating quizzes and comments is reduced, I expect you to make more quizzes! :D Thanks for all the work you do, we all appreciate it.

Level 70

Jul 30, 2018

A very understandable decision Dan! I was going through the recent-user quizzes today and only found good ones (=clear description, type-ins used etc.). If people want to create a quiz, they really should have a feeling for JetPunk, so I absolutely support the changes!

Level 42

Jul 31, 2018

I would like to see more user-generated quizzes on the first page because as a matter of fact nowadays everything on the featured list is QM-made. Maybe Dan could give other people a chance too?

If he doesn't agree then sure he can delete it but maybe he can give it a shot. Especially when the quizzes are in a series and aren't that forgiving with type-ins because people are riding them to full points which is unfair in parts.

+17

Level 81

Aug 4, 2018

Agree with the changes. Though there are a lot of reasons why user-created quizzes don't get nearly as many hits as the featured quizzes. The site makes it harder to find user-created content, those quizzes are worth no points, they don't feature as prominently in search results (sometimes they are invisible in search results), sometimes they are not tagged or incorrectly tagged and users have no option to tag the quizzes themselves, only picture quizzes receive thumbnails, and, of course, they are never featured on the front page. Also there are lots of user-created quizzes deserving of a front-page feature that never get one for various reasons. I'm not sure if endeavoring to promote user-created quizzes more would increase traffic to the site at all. If it did, it probably would not be that big of an increase (but I could be wrong, user content can be fun both for author and consumer). But it would at the very least increase the proportion of traffic that goes to those quizzes.

Level 41

Aug 4, 2018

Level 66

Aug 7, 2018

I do think featuring more user-created quizzes is a good idea. I don't know if it would increase traffic, but I would think it's at least worth a try. And also more variety of quizzes featured - more fandoms, more niche stuff, and maybe lighten up on the geography quizzes for awhile. But that's me.

Level 81

Aug 4, 2018

Also... I actually have promoted a couple of my quizzes outside of the site. Including my Transformers quiz which I posted on a couple fan forums and brought a hundred or so users to the site that way. But that quiz eventually did get featured. And I've only done this a few times. I also remember posting my Pop Music by Synopsis quiz and my Places My Car Has Been quizzes on my Facebook and a couple of other places.

Level ∞

Aug 13, 2018

That's why I ended up featuring your Transformers quiz!

Level 66

Aug 7, 2018

Thanks Dan for the work you do to maintain the site! I think these restrictions make a lot of sense, and implementing them was a good idea.

Level 57

Aug 13, 2018

Thank you very much for your work on Jetpunk. Reading comments, there seems to be a mix of views between split of your and user-created quizzes as featured ones. How about increasing number of featured quizzes daily to, say, 6, maintain # of your contributions and taking opportunity to add more user quizzes. It should only increase your workload marginally, whilst encouraging creators to "stick with it". I'm approaching 600 quizzes submitted (some esoteric, I admit), and just had my first quiz featured.

Level 62

Aug 21, 2018

Those changes make perfect sense. Thanks for doing so much to keep this site as great as it is.

Level 91

Aug 26, 2018

Thanks for all you do here. I hope it continues for years to come.

Level 32

Aug 29, 2018

good idea.

Level 61

Oct 1, 2018

Hey QM I was just looking through the user-created content and found a bunch of featured quizzes reuploaded by someone else named zoedad. Not sure if there’s anything you can do about it, or if it really matters, but I felt like it should be brought to your attention nonetheless.

Level 50

Nov 23, 2018

I've lost the option to do quizzes untimed. Is that just me not seeing it, or was the option removed? If so, could it please be brought back? Thanks!

Level 61

Nov 29, 2018

It’s the square button next to the answer box.

Level 68

Dec 29, 2018

I created a quiz over 2 years ago when I probably was lower than level 15. However, when I search it up, it doesn't appear. This is the link to the quiz. I recently updated it and it still doesn't show up. Any reason why this problem occurs? (It only shows up if you exclude "countries by" from the quiz title)

Level 16

May 22, 2020

There should be a link to -share-quiz on social media like whatsapp, facebook etc. That will increase traffic to the site.

And hopefully we may also see an app for Jetpunk too 😉

Level 51

Apr 9, 2021

You might be losing your touch, QM, because quizzes like "How many times can you type poop in 20 seconds" are still getting released.