How to get popular on the shard

[Koloss17]

I want to know how to measure your popularity on the shard and how to get popular in the shard.

to start, I’ll lay out the variables. We have reputation, followers, time on the shard, posts, and your mark on the shard. Let’s start with rep, because it is the first one I put, and it is probably the simplest.

Reputation on the shard is usually an indicator of your popularity. People give you reputation because they like a post of yours. And so, those that have more reputation have more people that like what they post, indicating how much other people appreciate them on the shard. But the thing with that is that you can only give one reputation per post. It is a smart system, but that means that someone that liked a post way more than someone else will give you the same feedback. That is why you need to factor in followers.

The number of followers you have are the number of people that decided that they like enough of your content to stick around to see more. So obviously one follower is worth more than one rep. It’s a simple enough thing.

At this point, we should address posts. Posts are obviously the things that you post. They are your content. Each post is a chance to get rep and followers, but not every post will get you that. So what is the significance of your content count? Content can vary in significance, so it isn’t a great tell of a person’s popularity. It just gives you chances to be popular and to increase your popularity. What really matters is the amount of posts over time. That will show you how active any given sharder is. The more active a sharder is, the more people will notice them within that time. That will increase their popularity and make it more likely to get followers and reputation. Basically, the more active you are, the more popular you will get in a shorter amount of time.
 

So you can see how important time is here. Time is something you cannot change (unless you are using bendalloy or cadmium). That means the only question is what you do with that time. It can also be the perfect thing to base things on. Over time, how quickly does this person get rep? Or followers? Earning popularity is all about time. The faster you get popularity, the more likely you are to be popular. Now the good news is that the longer you are on the shard, the more likely others are to see your posts and give you rep. So just being on the shard and posting some already helps. 
 

Now for the biggest, best way to get popular on the shard. Making your mark on the shard. What I mean by that is having a legacy, of sorts. Something that people will immediately think of when they see your name pop up. That can be formed through a small event, like challenging Chaos, or over a long time, like being the nicest person on the shard. These things will get you noticed, which will give you more opportunities to get rep and followers, as well as give you that title on the shard, something people will remember you by. If you get a moment like that or make a legacy for yourself, it will be the easiest way to earn your popularity. 
 

Now that we have all the variables established, we need to know how they affect each other. 
 

Rep affects nothing, interestingly enough. It is only affected by things, which actually makes it a great indicator of popularity.

Followers increase rep, because more people will see your content automatically. Otherwise, it is affected by other things.

Your mark on the shard will affect your reputation and your followers very positively. 

Posts will increase opportunities for rep, followers, and a starting or carrying out of your mark on the shard. It isn’t too valuable on it’s own, but paired with time, it is really useful. 
 

time will increase opportunities for followers and reputation. On its own, it is a small booster of popularity, but as soon as you pair it with things, it can be quite useful.

reputation over time will be affected by a lot of things, possibly even a big event that you caused on the shard that caused a spike in rep over a short period of time. Since it is wildly differing over a short time, it is better seen over the long run. Over the long run, it can be compared with other graphs to show how those things affected it. It is again a great indicator of the sum of all the other things you did over a period of time.

followers over time shows how many people wanted to see more of your content over a period of time, so it is actually a great indicator of that form of popularity. This affects your reputation over time.

posts over time is something that will easily affect your reputation and followers over time. It all depends on the quality of the posts, but more posts means more chances for rep and followers, as established before.

Now that we have all of that mess, we now know two things.

1. reputation over time is a great indicator of how popular a given person is. It does not fully capture how popular a person is, though.

2. the best way to get popular is to make your mark on the shard, but there are other ways.

 

Spoiler

Thank you for coming to my TED talk

 

 

 

 

[Ghanderflaffle]

Um. @Condensation you kinda blew up, explain your popularity. 

[Knight of Iron]

2 hours ago, Ghanderflaffle said:

Um. @Condensation you kinda blew up, explain your popularity. 

Roleplays. Great way to be popular, when you're active in every storming roleplay. If people see a lot of you in a lot of roleplays, you're already reaching a large-ish audience already. Though roleplays don't often give rep, so it kind of upsets that idea partly.

[Lunamor]

In my opinion, the best way to become popular is through sheer amount of content. The more you post, the more people will see you. Having varying types of posts (ex. In forum games, rping, theorizing) helps a lot as well.

[AonEne]

1 hour ago, Knight of Iron said:

Roleplays. Great way to be popular, when you're active in every storming roleplay. If people see a lot of you in a lot of roleplays, you're already reaching a large-ish audience already. Though roleplays don't often give rep, so it kind of upsets that idea partly.

As someone who was The RP Person a year or so ago, can confirm that they're good for getting people to know you but bad for rep.

Also, I don't always follow someone based on wanting to see more of their content. Sometimes I want to see more, but don't want the notifications.

[Aspiring Writer]

8 hours ago, Koloss17 said:

That can be formed through a small event, like challenging Chaos

Yep. That certainly made people remember my name. Wish the Shard kept track of all the reps, followers, and harder information with dates and all like google does with... everything. It would be so interesting to see all the data. 

I will say if you want rep points, Memes, fanfic, art, and other creations are a big one, as most people will want to like something with that much effort and the joy they had seeing it (And even small stuff like messed up quotes.), then it goes to theorizing and posting on the discussion boards, especially if you had a good idea or point, and RPs and games don't really give much. For posts, it's actually the reverse, where RPs give you plenty (games don't count as posts, so RIP that), Theorizing, especially if you're like @Frustration and really active, will give you plenty (Koloss, if you remember, the first time we met, you were surprised by me having 400 posts in two weeks from nothing but the Cosmere threads. Wow, have I slowed down.) and creations are really time-consuming so you can't put them out at a constant rate.

I have no idea how to get followers (This coming from a guy with over thirty), and I tend to PM people who follow me what made them decide to, what thread/post, and some of them legit just shrug. The leaving your mark thing and constant posting is probably the closest thing I can see to a viable reason. I will say I tend to follow people who I see a lot, have lots of posts (Which is a sign that they are highly active for me), and I like what I see. However, things can be complicated when you take into account people decide to follow someone because they're friends with someone you follow or because they are popular, or a lot of other factors. Following people makes as much sense as the people following them, which is basically none. Because when have humans made sense?

I am still a fairly new person to the Shard (Only been here a little over four months) and am clearly somewhere in the middle of the whole popularity scale, smaller than those like Fadran, Frustration, Honorless, Storming AON ENE, but bigger than Cynical and... others. However, the ones who are bigger are also people who have been here far longer, and the people I am bigger than have been here even less than I have. So as time goes, if you have left enough of a presence, you will start to grow, from what I can tell, especially since people will rep old posts, particularly memes, which get repped even after several months.

And one's mark... no idea. I definitely did not think that I would end up being best known by my whole 'pinging Chaos' fiasco, no matter how funny it is looking back on it. Completely unintended, and I had been trying to build myself to be more of a theorizer or a writer, so i was plenty surprised when that event was what stuck. So I don't think you can really control what your mark will be. Pretty sure Fadran got popular with his RP FotT and had no idea it would blow up. So, my advice for a mark is just trying and do whatever it is that you do, and eventually something will stick with everyone. (You're already somewhat known for the Tin Cult and fun questions.)

[+Slowswift]

All y'all saying that RPs don't get you rep weren't around when the Oregon RP was active, were you?  

[Aspiring Writer]

2 hours ago, Slowswift said:

All y'all saying that RPs don't get you rep weren't around when the Oregon RP was active, were you?  

I would like to emphasize the was in that statement.

[Frustration]

@Aspiring Writer good points, but I think activity is more important than time.

There are older Sharders who just aren't as known by the newcommers, and as the younger sharders are more active, being popular with them means more.

@DramaQueen is so popular that people waited two months for her return despite not even being on for a year.

@AonEne is one of the only old sharders that are still active enough to be popular with the new crowd which is why she is so popular, both old and new recognise her.(Being a mod doesn't hurt either)

@Channelknight Fadran and I have only been on for a year and a half which isn't much commpared to the ten years the shard has been up, but we've been more active than those who have been here longer.

[Channelknight Fadran]

Just now, Frustration said:

@Aspiring Writer good points, but I think activity is more important than time.

There are older Sharders who just aren't as known by the newcommers, and as the younger sharders are more active, being popular with them means more.

@DramaQueen is so popular that people waited two months for her return despite not even being on for a year.

@AonEne is one of the only old sharders that are still active enough to be popular with the new crowd which is why she is so popular, both old and new recognise her.(Being a mod doesn't hurt either)

@Channelknight Fadran and I have only been on for a year and a half which isn't much commpared to the ten years the shard has been up, but we've been more active than those who have been here longer.

I was lurking for a hot three months, tbh.

[danex]

I don’t know why people measure popularity so much in online communities. It really doesn’t seem super healthy. I don’t see the need to make friendly communication into competition. Just seems to create unhealthy dynamics.

If it was up to me I’d remove the reputation and follower features entirely. I’d replace reputation with reactions, you could react to a post with numerous different emojis or something, so if you found a post thoughtful or funny, you could react to it with the proper emoji. It’s better than reputation in 2 ways, it’s more specific, so you know exactly why people reacted, and then it doesn’t keep a record of it on your profile, so there’s no competition or anything.

I’d replace followers with friends, you send a friend request and if they accept, then you both receive notifications from the other person. It’d be the same thing as people who follow each other, except there wouldn’t be a counter on people’s profiles for how many friends they have. 

*steps off soap box*

This isn’t an actual complaint or anything, just my thoughts on the subject. I’ve been on the internet long enough to know that’s this is just the way things work, and my solo opinions aren’t gonna change any of it. 

[Frustration]

Just now, Channelknight Fadran said:

I was lurking for a hot three months, tbh.

I got active really quick, which is how I met @RShara who quickly corrected my Odium is passion thought, and continued to impress me with her knowledge becoming the only Sharder I ended up following.

[AonEne]

3 minutes ago, Dannex said:

I’d replace reputation with reactions, you could react to a post with numerous different emojis or something, so if you found a post thoughtful or funny, you could react to it with the proper emoji. It’s better than reputation in 2 ways, it’s more specific, so you know exactly why people reacted, and then it doesn’t keep a record of it on your profile, so there’s no competition or anything.

This is actually going to happen around the next site update, though some reactions will add to your rep count.

Honestly, I agree that it can be taken too far. People don't need to try to get popular; we should just be friends with one another imo. But that's only my opinion.

[+Slowswift]

1 hour ago, Aspiring Writer said:

I would like to emphasize the was in that statement.

Fair enough.  

[RShara]

1 hour ago, Frustration said:

I got active really quick, which is how I met @RShara who quickly corrected my Odium is passion thought, and continued to impress me with her knowledge becoming the only Sharder I ended up following.

*Blushes*

[The One Ring]

18 hours ago, Koloss17 said:

I want to know how to measure your popularity on the shard and how to get popular in the shard.

to start, I’ll lay out the variables. We have reputation, followers, time on the shard, posts, and your mark on the shard. Let’s start with rep, because it is the first one I put, and it is probably the simplest.

Reputation on the shard is usually an indicator of your popularity. People give you reputation because they like a post of yours. And so, those that have more reputation have more people that like what they post, indicating how much other people appreciate them on the shard. But the thing with that is that you can only give one reputation per post. It is a smart system, but that means that someone that liked a post way more than someone else will give you the same feedback. That is why you need to factor in followers.

The number of followers you have are the number of people that decided that they like enough of your content to stick around to see more. So obviously one follower is worth more than one rep. It’s a simple enough thing.

At this point, we should address posts. Posts are obviously the things that you post. They are your content. Each post is a chance to get rep and followers, but not every post will get you that. So what is the significance of your content count? Content can vary in significance, so it isn’t a great tell of a person’s popularity. It just gives you chances to be popular and to increase your popularity. What really matters is the amount of posts over time. That will show you how active any given sharder is. The more active a sharder is, the more people will notice them within that time. That will increase their popularity and make it more likely to get followers and reputation. Basically, the more active you are, the more popular you will get in a shorter amount of time.
 

So you can see how important time is here. Time is something you cannot change (unless you are using bendalloy or cadmium). That means the only question is what you do with that time. It can also be the perfect thing to base things on. Over time, how quickly does this person get rep? Or followers? Earning popularity is all about time. The faster you get popularity, the more likely you are to be popular. Now the good news is that the longer you are on the shard, the more likely others are to see your posts and give you rep. So just being on the shard and posting some already helps. 
 

Now for the biggest, best way to get popular on the shard. Making your mark on the shard. What I mean by that is having a legacy, of sorts. Something that people will immediately think of when they see your name pop up. That can be formed through a small event, like challenging Chaos, or over a long time, like being the nicest person on the shard. These things will get you noticed, which will give you more opportunities to get rep and followers, as well as give you that title on the shard, something people will remember you by. If you get a moment like that or make a legacy for yourself, it will be the easiest way to earn your popularity. 
 

Now that we have all the variables established, we need to know how they affect each other. 
 

Rep affects nothing, interestingly enough. It is only affected by things, which actually makes it a great indicator of popularity.

Followers increase rep, because more people will see your content automatically. Otherwise, it is affected by other things.

Your mark on the shard will affect your reputation and your followers very positively. 

Posts will increase opportunities for rep, followers, and a starting or carrying out of your mark on the shard. It isn’t too valuable on it’s own, but paired with time, it is really useful. 
 

time will increase opportunities for followers and reputation. On its own, it is a small booster of popularity, but as soon as you pair it with things, it can be quite useful.

reputation over time will be affected by a lot of things, possibly even a big event that you caused on the shard that caused a spike in rep over a short period of time. Since it is wildly differing over a short time, it is better seen over the long run. Over the long run, it can be compared with other graphs to show how those things affected it. It is again a great indicator of the sum of all the other things you did over a period of time.

followers over time shows how many people wanted to see more of your content over a period of time, so it is actually a great indicator of that form of popularity. This affects your reputation over time.

posts over time is something that will easily affect your reputation and followers over time. It all depends on the quality of the posts, but more posts means more chances for rep and followers, as established before.

Now that we have all of that mess, we now know two things.

1. reputation over time is a great indicator of how popular a given person is. It does not fully capture how popular a person is, though.

2. the best way to get popular is to make your mark on the shard, but there are other ways.

  Hide contents

Thank you for coming to my TED talk

 

That was a long, but really good post. I agree with most of what you say, but there are a few things I want to point out:

1. Some people follow basically anyone who follow them. So if you have a lot of follower, it might just means you followed a lot of people (it's the same for reputation sometimes, but fewer people do that, and it could be hard to determine who give you the rep in the first place, so I'll ignore that for now)

2. Sometime people set up an account for sometime but didn't use it. And then one day the person remember that they have an account and starts to post really often. So it can be hard to tell if someone is a long time lurker or just a slow poster

As for how to increase your population on the Shard, there's one thing I want to add

Post in more board, it might help as there are many who only stay in theory discussion, and people who only visit the community section

[Koloss17]

Also apparently make a post about how to get popular gives ya rep. Huh.

as to @Dannex’s point, I don’t necessarily care a whole lot about popularity, just about rep. I like advancing through the titles. As for the emoji ideas, I’m not a huge fan of emojis. I think emoticons are cooler, personally. A lot more variety and possibilities while also staying uniform with the rest of the post :/. I don’t like the auto-emoji thing, because then I can’t do the simple smiley >:[.

[Knight of Iron]

21 hours ago, Koloss17 said:

Also apparently make a post about how to get popular gives ya rep. Huh.

as to @Dannex’s point, I don’t necessarily care a whole lot about popularity, just about rep. I like advancing through the titles. As for the emoji ideas, I’m not a huge fan of emojis. I think emoticons are cooler, personally. A lot more variety and possibilities while also staying uniform with the rest of the post :/. I don’t like the auto-emoji thing, because then I can’t do the simple smiley >:[.

I'm a big user of the simple smiley too : )

Edited December 29, 2020 by Knight of Iron

[The Sovereign]

On 12/27/2020 at 8:15 PM, Slowswift said:

All y'all saying that RPs don't get you rep weren't around when the Oregon RP was active, were you?  

 

On 12/27/2020 at 10:22 PM, Aspiring Writer said:

I would like to emphasize the was in that statement.

[Chinkoln]

From what I have noticed, the best way to gain reputation is to post on the Sanderson Memes thread or some other thread that is popular. If you have a good post you can get upwards of 10 or 20 rep.

[Voidspawn]

On 12/27/2020 at 7:52 AM, Koloss17 said:

challenging Chaos,

you forgot to @ mention him

 

also you get people to follow you by following them

[Honorless]

Reactions other than upvotes are actually coming? That's nice.

Hopefully Follow is replaced by Friend Request, it's just so much better in so many ways.

[Frustration]

5 hours ago, Honorless said:

Reactions other than upvotes are actually coming? That's nice.

Hopefully Follow is replaced by Friend Request, it's just so much better in so many ways.

I think following has it's uses.

[Koloss17]

11 hours ago, Frustration said:

I think following has it's uses.

Personally, as a leader of a cult, I don’t mind a following. But that’s just me.

[Aspiring Writer]

4 hours ago, Koloss17 said:

Personally, as a leader of a cult, I don’t mind a following. But that’s just me.

All hail the Tin Theology.