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Our Public ChartLists area is amazing. If you haven't looked at it recently, you really should. Lots of great people taking the time to share their analysis work with the world essentially for free.
And while I really do appreciate and enjoy the Public ChartList area, in the back of my mind, I always knew that we - StockCharts - could make it even better. I want it to be a place that rewards hard work by the authors, encourages them to continue sharing their charts, and makes it easy for the readers to find content that matches their interests.
That last part in particular is a weak spot in our current system. The current Public ChartList page is overwhelming to new readers. Which list do I look at first? Which one talks about what I'm interested in? How reliable is this author?
And, on the author side, making your list really stand out from the others has always been a bit of a cat-and-mouse game with the rules. How can I get lots of votes? How can I add graphics to my list description? How can I tie this Public ChartList that I've worked so hard on into my blog or my website? etc. etc. etc.
Recently, we announced some rules changes for the Public ChartList area that were intended to help with some of these issues. After careful consideration, I've decided that just changing the existing rules wasn't enough. So we've scraped those plans and we started working on something much bigger - a complete rework of our Public ChartList area that will reinvigerate both the authors and the readers. At a high-level, it will try to accomplish the following goals:
- A continual reward system with many levels - not just the single "Hall of Fame" designation.
- An easy-to-use categorization system that helps users find content they want to read quickly.
- An iron-clad voting system that will eliminate voting fraud.
- A list ranking system that is based on more than just simple voting.
- A notification system that lets readers know when content they are interested in has been updated.
I will send out more specifics about these features when they are closer to completion. However I hope that these high-level descriptions are enough to get both old-timers and new-comers excited about the future.
The other main goal of this project is to have the actual "work" of a Public ChartList author be the same as it is right now - to create great charts and analysis. Rewards in the form of readers, votes and high ranking should happen automatically. While that been true in the past, with these coming improvements, it will be even more true in the future.
When? Well, we're hoping to have the new system ready by February 1st - but there is still much work to do and it might March 1st before all the dust settles. I'll put up another post when things are closer to completion.
- Chip
