Forum Ranks for users

[jackdack]

I'm setting up a forum and need to allocate ranks for users e.g. New Member, Experienced Member, Senior Member (ranks are assigned based on number of posts) etc.

What rank names do you use?

Thanks

[successlieswithme]

it depends on ur forum theme.

if u building a foot ball forum u can use local football team name,national football team name, one good international footbaal team name
like that u can use as u wish.

if its for students:
kids, college,univerisity like that choose as u like

[FourDegreez]

I've used bronze, silver, gold, etc. in the past. That's a bit boring, though. These days I use medieval feudal classes and titles. A member starts as a serf and might progress to commoner, and eventually to squire, baron, lord, etc. Female alternates for the ladies, of course. I've even considered having a penalty status "leper". lol

[jackdack]

some interesting ideas, thanks

[rogerd]

A theme-based approach is a bit more intersting than "new member", "member", etc. Just about every topic has some kind of status progression associated with it.

I've also used that field for special classes of members, i.e., I assigned a member manually to a specific class. For example, on this forum, one could assign GoogleGuy to a "search engine rep" class to show that he's a legitimate SE guy.

[aghill]

I run a small but active forum, and like to have fun with them. I'll change them every so often when I get the urge. For example, the members with 3000+ posts now have "Too much free time" for a rank. ;)

[Automan Empire]

Coming up with unique ranks, that fit the site's theme, is a great thing to do to help "brand" your site.
Having a "contest" to come up with them will give you an active, fun thread with more ideas than you can implement. Plus, this token participation in board "business" by regular members can only help people feel more bonded to the forum community.

[Gargen]

Rank Title Minimum Posts

Site Admin -
Mod -
Newb 0
New User 10
Novice 25
Active user 80
1337 300
Forum God 500

I run a programming and graphic design site

[spaceylacie]

My members are competing to reach 1000 posts(it's a new board) so they can become "Champion of the Board". It was a member's idea and I thought it was a good one. They are even keeping tabs on each other to see who will reach it first. Besides that I just have the basic stuff... new member, junior member...

[Automan Empire]

Lacie just made me think of the "dark side" of forum ranks. Some people make prodigious numbers of virtually useless posts just for the sake of increasing post count. Beware that incentives for posting do not reward quantity at the expense of quality. The only thing less attractive than an underactive forum is one that is absolutely buzzing-with nothingness.
-Art

[faltered]

I agree with the theme. I have two small forums and although they're still getting off the ground, I've had feedback from members about how much they like the rankings' names.

For the gardening related one I use:

Seedling
Sprout
Annual
Perennial
Weed

You get the drift. It's cute and gimmicky, but it seems to work.

[jamie]

dark side...

i know what you mean, our forum is of noticeably higher quality, since we took all ranks and post counts off.

[shashank_hi]

I've started a Biotechnology forum and the ranks are those related to protein transcription -
DNA
hnRNA
mRNA
Polypeptide Chain
Protein.

Can't think what shoule be the mod and admin?
Mod can be hormone, any idea for admin - Brain probably, but not as good.

[spaceylacie]

About quality posts... I was under the impression that mods were supposed to handle this part. Between racing to be "Champion of the Board" and the fact that my board is about a subject that started in a non-English speaking country and is only recently spreading to the US, UK, and Australia... many posts leave a lot to be desired. We've been picking and choosing which to keep and which to delete.

I have a feeling that we're doing things the hard way.