So, Trust Levels are set automatically based on a list of criteria. But some users may just not engage in certain ways while being otherwise highly engaged. There’s no specific criterion that matters or not. I’d prefer this:
Criteria can be marked as required vs sufficient
A percent or portion of sufficient criteria gets to the TL
So, if there are 10 criteria to get to a TL, I’d like to say that anyone who meets 9/10 gets promoted (as long as they meet all that are marked as required).
For example, someone who just isn’t marking a lot of “likes” but is in every other way a stand-out forum participant. We could push them to mark likes more, but maybe that’s not really the point. If they meet all the other criteria, that’s good enough.
Of course, we could do manual promotion, but I’d like to see this portion-based setting as an option.
The criteria for TL1 all relates to reading, it’s arguable that if users aren’t reading then they probably don’t need the added TL1 features.
TL2 similarly requires visits, reading, three replies and one like given/received. It’s a fairly low bar.
TL3 is unique in that it can be gained and lost, but the “powers” given to TL3 really do require the level of regular engagement that TL3 expects. Is there a specific problem where someone needs TL3 rights, but doesn’t fulfill the criteria?
The criterial looks like this:
Must have visited at least 50% of days
Must have replied to at least 10 different non-PM topics
Of topics created in the last 100 days, must have viewed 25% (capped at 500)
Of posts created in the last 100 days, must have read 25% (capped at 20k)
Must have received 20 likes, and given 30 likes.*
Must not have received more than 5 spam or offensive flags (with unique posts and unique users for each, confirmed by a moderator)
Must not have been suspended or silenced
And is evaluated over 100 days, with a grace period.
Being asked to average 0.1 replies, 0.2 likes given and 0.3 likes received daily is a fairly low bar. On larger communities point 4 is tougher, but if a user is going to be given the right to rename and recategorize topics it’s likely you want them to be familiar with a reasonable proportion of the content being posted.
Indeed, I was only really thinking of TL3. The main issue in this case is visibility of the TL3-only lounge category. In the case where the idea came up, we have off-topic stuff we don’t want associated with anything semi-public. We like having a place for the most active participants to connect on off-topic stuff that would be otherwise unwanted noise on the forum.
I guess to be picky, it’s the visiting and liking items that seem the least key. I don’t want to exclude someone from the lounge category just because they miss one of those, nor do I feel there’s a specific one that is less-essential. So, someone who visits less often but then participates fully in everything. Or someone who doesn’t mark likes a lot but does everything else. Or maybe we add extra criteria so that they could substitute (I could think of some extra things that would signify dedication to make up for less-frequent visiting for example).
So, really, the question is one of making access to the lounge category slightly less stringent.
You can change the permissions, as well as the message in the welcome topic for the lounge. That’s just a nice out-the-door feature, you can change it to fit your needs. Maybe consider making a new “off-topic” category and allowing TL2s, if you happen to use lounge for something else.
I don’t think we want to open the lounge to TL2 folks, but we might consider it or make a TL2-level off-topic area.
It just separately seemed to me that instead of strict list of criteria which must all be met, that using “80% of these criteria met” perhaps with added criteria… just seems more flexible. It would allow additional activity and engagement measures to substitute for others.
Maybe this is too complex, and I’m overthinking it.