FAQ
What is TechSpy?
TechSpy is a social tech news site where you can read and discuss all the latest news. The site is updated 24 hours a day, 7 days a week by the community. Our members search the net for the most interesting stories, and hundreds of stories get submitted by TechSpy contributors each day. The most interesting stories get featured on the TechSpy homepage where they are rated by a temperature score reflecting the popularity of each story.
TechSpy is also part of the NewsBoiler network, a network of social news sites all powered by the NewsBoiler news platform. Each site in the NewsBoiler network has its own passionate community of enthusiasts who are dedicated to each site's topic.
Why become a TechSpy member?
As a member of TechSpy you can participate in discussions as well as contribute news stories to the site. You will also get access to the pending news area which lets you read news stories before they go live on the main site. We also run monthly contests for our members. Becoming a member only takes a few seconds and is completely free.
Click here to Join.
Who writes the news?
TechSpy is a community driven website, which means all news stories are posted by our members. Stories must have a valid source, which can be found via the Read Full Story link beneath each story. Instead of just having a handful of staff members TechSpy has thousands which search the net for the most interesting stories. This way TechSpy is able to cover many more news stories each day than traditional gaming news site.
Can I post news?
All members can submit news tips to the site but only TechSpy Contributors are allowed to submit actual news posts. To become an TechSpy contributor you must first take a short test to make sure you understand the basics behind news posting. If you pass the test you can start to submit news stories to the pending news area. However you will not become an official TechSpy contributor until 5 of your news stories have been approved by the community.
Can I post news from my own site?
Millions of hits are sent out each month to small and big websites from TechSpy. This makes TechSpy a great place for webmasters to get free traffic and pick up new readers. You can add a TechSpy share it button on your site or you can join TechSpy and become a contributor. However you will have no special privileges as a webmaster and you will have to follow the same rules as all other TechSpy members. Our administrators and mods also reserve the right to edit both the url and the text of your articles if necessary.
What is the purpose of the pending news section?
Before a news story can go live on the site it must first be reviewed and approved by the community. Only TechSpy contributors and administrators are allowed to approve news stories.
Who approves the news?
The news featured on the TechSpy homepage is approved by the community. However our administrators monitor the site on a daily basis and will sometimes remove approved stories from the homepage if necessary.
What are the different member roles?
Member:
This is the role you start with when you first sign up. As a Member you can post comments, submit news tips, and participate in other site activities.
Contributor:
Contributors can post news stories as well as review and approve news in the pending news area.
What are the temperature signs beside each news article?
With hundreds of news stories being posted on TechSpy each day the more important stories can easily get buried by the less important stories. To solve this problem all stories are rated by temperatures to shows how hot a news story is. When a news story reaches 100° (degree Celsius) its temperature sign will turn red to make it more visible. The temperature of an article does not directly reflect the number hits it gets. The temperature is decided by an algorithm which looks at the combined attention a story gets and the nature of this attention over different time periods. This way the system can predict if a story is hot or not just a few minutes after it has been posted on the site. A system that only relies on how many hits a story gets which is used by most news sites is not as effective as it can go many hours before a story show up as hot, even though it was "hot" from the minute it was published.
| 0-49° |
Your average news story. |
| 50° |
When a story hits 50° it will be featured on the home front page (FP) |
| 100° |
When a story reaches 100° it turns red to show that the community has shown interest in the story. |
| 250° |
When a story reaches 250° it is definitely of above average interest and importance. It is also likely to have generated a lot of user comments and the temp sign becomes redder. |
| 500° |
A story that reaches this temperature is of interest to a large portion of the community. |
| 1000° |
Only the biggest stories reaches a temperature above 1000° |
How does the speech bubble system work?
All new members are given 3 speech bubble containers that will be visible on all posts. A member with 3 speech bubble containers is allowed to post a maximum of 3 comments per news article. As comments are made the speech bubbles will turn yellow, representing how many comments a member has made per news post. Members who post comments of low quality or ignore the forum rules will risk having their comment limit reduced, while members who receive positive feedback from other members and makes useful and interesting comments will be granted more speech bubble containers. The amount of speech bubbles you get is decided by the number of positive and negative votes you get from other members.
What is CRank?
The CRank or Contributor Rank determines how many news post you can make each day. With a Crank of 5 you can post a maximum of 5 stories within a 24 hour time frame. The more news you posts the higher your CRank will get. If you edit your news post according to the TechSpy Guidelines your Crank will increase faster. On the other hand members who keep ignoring the TechSpy posting guidelines and just copy and paste text from other websites without doing the proper editing will get their CRank lowered. See the TechSpy Guidelines and News Posting Tips for more info about proper editing of news posts.
What is Member Trust Rank?
All members have a trust rank , however this rank is not visible. A member’s trust rank determines how their votes get counted. A member with a high trust rank will have more influence than a member with a low trust rank. The trust rank is put in place to add more stability to the system and to protect our members against "cyber trolls".
What are TechSpy Members Points?
All your actions on TechSpy will give you Member Points. Here is a list of how many points each action is worth.
|
Action |
Score |
 |
Add Comment |
10 |
 |
Add Tips |
10 |
 |
Tips Used |
30 |
 |
Tips Reached 100° |
50 |
 |
Tips Reached 250° |
125 |
 |
News Post lvl1 Added |
30 |
|
News Reached 100° |
100 |
|
News Reached 250° |
250 |
 |
Approve submission |
10 |
 |
News Reached 500° |
500 |
 |
News Reached 1000° |
1000 |
 |
News Post lvl1 Approved |
100 |
|
News Post lvl2 Approved |
200 |
|
Tips Reached 500° |
250 |
|
Tips Reached 1000° |
500 |
 |
Reported Submission |
10 |
 |
Blog Post Added |
80 |
 |
Register |
100 |
 |
Visit |
30 |
 |
Add Alternative Source |
10 |
 |
Add Forum Post |
20 |
 |
Add Forum Reply |
10 |
 |
User Review Added |
30 |
 |
User Review Approved |
100 |
