Beginners Guide to Dooyoo. [Version 3] (Helpful Advice for New Members)

Member Name: The Duke

Product:	Helpful Advice for New Members
Date:	09/04/01 (129 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Rewarding in many ways, Fun, Helpful

Disadvantages: Eats time, Addictive, Some people abuse the system

Hi there! So you've taken the plunge and joined Dooyoo! Well, what can I say? In the time I've been a dooyoo member (just under 4 years now), I've grown to enjoy writing opinions, and reading them as well. There are some very good writers out there in Dooyooland, and a wealth of information for you to take advantage of.

For those of you who may be slightly unaware of what you've actually signed up for, Dooyoo is a site that lets you give your opinion on various goods, services and topics. For each opinion that you write, dooyoo currently offer 30 "miles" (or 3p) paid to you for every Dooyoo member who reads one of your opinions. You'll not get rich though, and it's best to view dooyoo as a hobby that might build enough up over a few months to treat yourself to something nice like a DVD or a CD.

Ok, so how do you get started? I'm here to offer advice, and some things I've noticed myself. These are not the "law" by any means, but I think I'm right in assuming that a lot of the users follow these guidelines themselves. I'll also try and clear up any slang or jargon that you might see floating around on dooyoo.

¤ Tip 1: Your Profile.

Your profile page is like your HQ in Dooyoo - on this page you have all sorts of statistics and info about yourself (most of which you must provide yourself). On this page there will be details of how many opinions you've rated, commented upon, your account balance (in dooyoo miles) and a list of the ten most recent opinions you've written or updated. You can select which pieces of information you want to share with dooyoo member and what you want hidden (via the check boxes beside each piece) and it's advisable to think carefully about what you want to display for your own security.

I have found that most people include a picture of themselves as well as an e-mail address, and some descriptive blurb. The picture doesn
9;t actually have to be of yourself, but can be something that gives an indication of your character and personality ? cartoon characters, famous people or even some dodgy scribbling that you did when you were a kid are all valid as your avatar.

The same goes for the descriptive blurb - you don't have to mention anything about yourself to a really personal level, but instead could include a poem, a simple list of interests or a few thoughts on current affairs or Dooyoo itself. The more you give out, the better really, but be careful not to write too much - people are only really interested in learning a bit about you - they will learn a lot more by simply reading your opinions believe it or not.

Finally, back to the email address point; it's worth putting an email address in and making it visible. First of all, it gives Dooyoo a means of contacting you if anything should go wrong, but as importantly, give other members a chance to contact you. I signed up for a Hotmail account specifically for posting on the web (although there are other free email providers out there - try Yahoo or Lycos), and as I am the Computers Guide (at time of writing) other users can email me with queries and general contact. It also saves people posting off-topic rubbish on your opinion comment threads (more on this later).

These would be the pieces of info I would prefer every member to display, but it's not law and only my personal opinion. You can add more such as the URL to your personal web site, your date of birth, the URLs (addresses) of your 3 favourite web sites etc. It's up to you how much you want to display, and you can go back and change your profile page whenever you like, by selecting the "modify profile" link on your profile page. I've found that the people who seem to do better on the site do take the time to set up their profile properly, rather than leaving it blank and uninteresting. Be wary of the security aspe
ct though when displaying personal information.

¤ Tip 2: Getting started.

Before you get down to writing any opinions, take some time to have a look at some opinions to see what the rough standard is. Reading the other opinions in this category is a good idea, as is browsing the "Tips/Guide to writing Dooyoo opinions" category. Then perhaps browsing the "Premier opinions" in a category that interests you should give you more than a rough idea of what makes a good opinion here on Dooyoo. If you read lots of opinions, don't forget to rate honestly. You'll find that the standard of writing here on Dooyoo has risen since the first members joined way back in May 2000, and even my own, personal standard has improved since I joined.

¤ Tip 3: Reading and Rating Opinions.

There are currently 4 ratings you can give ? Very Useful (VU), Useful (U), Somewhat Useful (SU) and Not Useful (NU). These are not invisible, and anyone can see who rated what on an opinion. Rating honestly is paramount, and this is where your email address comes in handy. If you feel you have to rate NU then leave a comment explaining why, and that the person can inform you of updates to their opinion by contacting you via your profile page. This reduces any chances of being named a "revenge rater" which is A BAD THING here on Dooyoo. I'll also point out here that you can leave a comment at any time, no matter whether you've rated VU or NU, and constructive criticism is always better than abuse, which could land you in trouble. Commenting though, is a purely personal thing and you can comment as often as you wish. Comments should be restricted to the topic of the opinion, and if you wish to pursue a more community based conversation, there are other avenues to explore (more on this later).

A lot of people as well as Dooyoo have their own method for deciding what constitutes VU, NU etc. but these tend to be based ar
ound the main rating guidelines with a dash of individuality. The important thing to remember is that your agreement on the topic should not affect the Usefulness rating. Say, for example, I write an opinion on how money should be banned, and we should all worship 100ft high inflatable balloon animals - if I put forward good arguments as to why I think this, with a balanced viewpoint, then if you found it helpful or useful, you rate is as such. You don't rate it as NU simply because you are a devout Capitalist, and disagree with my point of view. Many apologies to any Capitalists out there who may take offence at the previous comment. No matter what you decide your rating system is, make sure you stick to it, that it's consistent and most of all, fair.

If you find yourself reading some a lot of some members' opinions, you can put them into your circle of friends (CoF) which will give you easier access to them from your profile page, although this is not the only use for the CoF, and many members use it for other things such as pointing out newer members or under-read (in their opinion) members etc.

Don't feel you have to read every single opinion you come across. I tend to stick to a few topics I have an interest in (for example, mine would be Internet, Computers and Software) as well as a few members I have in my CoF. This provides me with more than enough reading, although if I do need different information, I will dip my toes into other areas.

¤ Tip 4: Writing opinions.

Ok, so by now you're ready to start writing. What do you do? Most people find it easier to write their opinions offline in a word processor or text editor. This is what I do - I use Microsoft Word personally, but others use pen and paper, or Notepad. I prefer Word because it has a spell checker and can easily get rid of 90% of my spelling mistakes. I also find that by writing an opinion offline, I tend to take my time, getting my facts righ
t, and making sure it's spaced out and easily readable in the Dooyoo format. It's all down to pride; I think that Dooyoo will bring in more visitors, and members if the opinions posted on it are seen to be well written than if the spelling and grammar are sloppy (although I do appreciate that no-one is perfect, and that the odd typo, and grammatical error do appear here and there).

So you've got a topic you wish to write about - how do you go about it? There are two main ways of thinking. The first is to browse a few opinions in the category to see what other people have said, and to see if you can add any more to what is already there. The second is to try and avoid outside influences and write one yourself without influence from anyone else. It's up to you to choose, but make all work your own!

Always try and write a balanced viewpoint on any topic. If you feel you had a bad time with a product or service, providing as much information (both good and bad) can help a great deal. Simply ranting about something is not helping any members, so it's in your best interests to write to the best of your ability and try not to rubbish the subject of your opinion simply because you had a bad experience. If you're seen to be ranting, other Dooyoo members don't tend to rate too highly. The more information you can tell people in your opinion, then obviously the more useful they will find it. While it's not possible all the time, try to write your opinion as if the reader won't be reading any other opinions on the subject - include as much relevant info as you possibly can. The key word here is "relevant" and will be explained later.

One thing I've noticed about these opinions is that in the "Advantages" box it usually says something like "None" or "I can't say". If you originally bought the product because it was cheap, or if you used the service because of a good pr
evious reputation, then say so. There's nearly always going to be a reason why you used a product or service in the first place and balanced opinions are always more readable than rants.

Another thing is "churning" - some users throw out 20 opinions a day to the minimum 75 word limit - while not against Dooyoo law, this is frowned upon by other Dooyoo members, especially in today's environment where the amount of reads that people get has dropped over the last year. One final point on this subject - you'll notice that some opinions are long, and some are short. Make your opinions as long as it has to be, as long as you put as much as you can into it without venturing into the realms of adding stuff for the sake of making a longer review. This is known as padding, and some members do frown upon it. Try to let other people know something about the product or service that they won't find out from simply visiting the relevant web site or reading the packaging. Remember that "relevant info" thing I mentioned earlier? Sometimes, you might find yourself wandering into the realms of critique when reviewing "art" type things like books, music or films. Remember that Dooyoo is supposedly a consumer resource for ordinary people and not a source of information for specialists so be wary about going into too much detail about, say, the psychology of a character in a book or film. It might be clever and interesting to you, but it is "Useful" to a consumer? I suspect not!

This is only a brief overview of writing opinions ? there are other categories on Dooyoo giving advice on writing opinions in general and in specialist categories such as Internet.

¤ Tip 5: Getting Reads.

This goes back to Tip 3. You have to put yourself about, as it were - read opinions, rate honestly and leave comments. By raising your profile, you are letting more people know you exist. In turn, people will visit your
profile page, and read some of your opinions. Even the most talented writer will not get many reads if they do not raise their profile, and people do seem to frown upon those who post opinions and expect reads but don't give anything back to "the community". If you do this, and your writing is good (or more importantly, that you're saying interesting, useful things in your opinions) then you should have no trouble in racking up the reads.

¤ Tip 6: What now?

Well, you've started! Continue to read and rate and, most importantly, enjoy yourself and have fun. You can update your opinions, and if you find that some of your opinions may be out of date due to new information you have, don't be afraid to go back and add to, or rewrite your opinion. If you have further queries, feel free to ask around the site. Some members are considered knowledgeable enough in some topics to become "Community Guides" for a category. They're there to help, so make use of them! Most of them have email addresses or Tooyoo Guestbooks (see below), so don't be shy!

¤ Tip 7: The so-called community spirit.

Believe it or not, there is more to Dooyoo than simply reading and rating opinions. There's an entity commonly referred to as "Dooyoo community spirit", but strangely, most of this takes place off the site on what I refer to as "satellite sites".

There are two which I am aware of, and visit regularly. It's called "T2" and can be found at http://www.crosswordcheats.com/tooyoo/ this is a "guest book" site, created by Dooyoo and Ciao member ILoveJackDaniels. It's basically a site where people can leave you messages and you can reply to them. It's free and easy as pie to use. Sign up today, and leave the address of your guestbook (GB) in your profile so that people can get in contact without tainting the comments threads of your opinions.

The
second is the recently opened "Opinionators" which can be found at: http://opinionators.co.uk/mainboard/index.php It's a good site for discussing both Dooyoo and Ciao opinion sites and the topic of 'opinionating' overall. Again, registration is free and you'll not get any spam from the board owner.

People seem to think that the community is a huge plus for Dooyoo and that's true to a certain extent as many members organise meetings across the UK and Ireland and friendships and relationships have been formed here on Dooyoo. I've been to many myself and I've always had a great time. The community is also a huge negative aspect, too as it seems to breed unnecessary competitiveness and desire for power. People become unwilling to rate the correct way through fear that their standing in this community will suffer (and their earning power alongside it). My advice here is that if you forget about any earning power (at 3p per read, you're not earning a lot for the time you out into the site, are you?) and just get on with having a good time, but remember that the peer review system (i.e. honest rating of other's work) is paramount to Dooyoo being able to offer information to other people.

¤ Tip 8: "Argh! This Dooyoo site is really buggy and annoying!"

If you've already dipped your toes in the waters of Dooyoo, you might notice that Dooyoo isn't the best presented of sites. Of course, the members continually hope that the Dooyoo backroom staff will eventually pull their fingers out and get this site back to the stable, easy to use status that it enjoyed until September 2002, but each day, our hope gets that little bit dimmer.

Here's a few tips which should enable you to present your work best and get around the stupid (and totally unnecessary) bugs on this site.

a) Writing your opinions and posting them can sometimes mean a lot of characters appear as question mar
ks. There have been many discussions on this, and it seems that no-one has an ideal solution. What works for some people, doesn't work for others. The problem has almost been totally removed, but just to be on the safe side, use one of these solutions:

Microsoft Word: You can write your opinions in here as normal, but you must turn off (or change) the Auto Correct settings. Don't enable smart quotes because they are not recognised as 'proper' HTML characters and will be replaced by the dreaded question mark. There are other options in there that you can turn on and off to help you produce a better looking opinion.

Microsoft Notepad / Wordpad: Some people use this with no trouble at all, although I find that weird line breaks enter your opinion and you have to spend lots of time fixing it. If you're not getting any joy from Word, you could try this option, although you lose your spell checker.

Outlook Express: It's hard to believe, but there's at least one member who writes their opinions in OE. They swear by it too, claiming never to get any formatting problems and as a bonus, they can make use of OE's spell checker.

b) When updating opinions, you may find that weird line breaks appear for no reason at all. In this case, I've found that editing your opinion using your preferred method above (which I assume you've saved onto your PC), and then cutting and pasting this edited version (rather than editing the version stored on Dooyoo) enables you to update an opinion without any further formatting problems.

c) The way in which the site is run these days means that any mistakes made around the site can take ages to put right. This includes any abuse you might see (copied opinions, inappropriate language, inappropriate rating etc.), and my current pet hate, off topic opinions. Off topic opinions are not good for you or for Dooyoo and are definitely not useful to anyone browsing this site
looking for information. Make sure that anything you post is being posted in the correct category. Again, if you're having any problems, ask a Guide. If you see something that you feel is inappropriate, then do not hesitate to contact Dooyoo at dooyooteam@dooyoo.co.uk or contact a Guide who will be glad to pass on your thoughts.

d) You'll have noticed that the first few paragraphs in people's opinions do not have capitals in them. This is a bug within the software which displays the opinion (your formatting is actually all present and correct in the database). If you think that a lack of capitals is irritating and makes things hard to read, you can make sure your own opinions are capitalised by going to charlie~consumer's fix at:

http://www.chuckleweb.co.uk/fixit.php

I don't tend to worry about it because I don't think a lack of capitals makes things that bad actually.

e) Finding things using Dooyoo's search engine is practically impossible. However, there is a better (although not perfect solution): Yes, it's Google, the people's friend! Not many people are aware of the power of Google, but did you know that it can search the content of specific sites?

Go to http://www.google.co.uk and select the "Advanced Search" link to the right. Then, type what you're looking for into the appropriate box in the "find results" area at the top and don't forget to type "dooyoo.co.uk" into the 'Domain' box which is about the 5th box down.

f) Don't waste your time asking for new Computers products to be added. User's suggestions for this category are basically being ignored and any time spent trying to get your new piece of equipment added will be time better spent down at the pub.

¤ Tip 9: Have fun.

I don't need to tell you how to have fun, do I? Dooyoo is a mostly friendly place, so why not browse, enjoy writing and
sharing your experiences, and make some new friends?

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