Chat is back and links are here and future changes
January 27th, 2008 by MarcI have toiled away to bring some new features to Vote4Cause. One is old and one is new.
Chat is back. There is a flagging feature now in effect. If someone says something you feel is inappropriate, click the flag link for that message and it will notify a moderator to look over it. Hopefully this will rectify the few bad messages that were floating around before. I hope this feature won’t have to be used too much.
The new feature is links. I am hoping that people will submit relevant internet links for the non-profits here. By sharing interesting links, visitors that are new to an organization can easily explore what the various causes are doing. Anything that is relevant is appropriate. For example, YouTube videos, photos, news articles, upcoming events, etc.
Finally, Sea Shepherds won last round. I have yet to post information about the winnings for a couple of reasons. Most importantly, it is apparent that there was click fraud that artificially drove up the purse. I guess this was inevitable. However, Vote4Cause will not be able to function with the current incentives in place. It would be against the policy for Google advertising and is unfair to the advertisers. As I have not received anything from Google yet, I am waiting to see how much they ultimately send before I send out money to the causes that have won and have not received their purse yet.
After this round, I will be switching to a donation method that is not tied to the advertising money generated. It will likely be something like 1 cent for each vote that the winning organization gets. I am open to other suggestions too. While it is unfortunate that I have to do this, I think this will have some advantages (like knowing exactly what each vote is worth and immediately knowing what the purse is at the end of a round AND allowing this site to continue).
It is unfortunate that this change needs to happen, but it was something that I didn’t foresee and I think can be overcome. I want to continue running this site and would love to hear what everyone thinks.
January 27th, 2008 at 5:28 pm
Marc,
I can chat but I cannot successfully vote. I have emailed you twice. Why is this happening?
January 27th, 2008 at 8:34 pm
A question about links…I think it’s a great feature. But my question is this: How about links that are for other charities similar to the charity in question? (i.e., The fistula foundation is similar to http://www.matercare.org, which is a click-to-donate site. The two charities are separate, but they have similar functions.) Would this be appropriate for links? Or should they directly relate to the charity where it’s being posted? Also, is someone moderating the links if one is posted that others don’t believe to be relevant?
January 27th, 2008 at 8:41 pm
Ingrid/Lila, I am looking into the voting issue.
Kathleen, I would say that it should be submitted as a separate cause. The links should somehow relate to the organization that it is linked to. People will be moderating the links to make sure that they are relevant.
January 28th, 2008 at 1:22 am
Great that the chat is back!
I have a qestion about the new donation method:
If it’s one cent for every vote for the winning organization, hoe about the money generated from the votes for all other causes?
5000 votes for organization A (in first place) and 4900 for organization B (in second place) means $50 for organization A,
but 8000 votes for organization A (in first place) and 100 votes for organization B (in second place) means $80 for organization A. Less votes made, less money generated from the ads, but more money to the cause?
Somehow I like it better when also the votes for the non-winners generate money for the winner. I often vote for small charities just to get them higher on the list so people can get to know them. I like the idea that even voting for them generates money for the winner, whomever that may be. In the end they are all good causes.
January 28th, 2008 at 1:38 am
Each vote doesn’t actually generate 1 cent, so it is somewhat arbitrary in that sense. Essentially, people were clicking on ads simply because it would increase the purse size. This is unfair to advertisers and would get Vote4Cause kicked out of the ad network. The 1 cent for each vote for the winning cause is simply a way to unlink the purse amount with the advertising revenue. I am open to other suggestions though. If I changed it to x cents for every vote cast in the round (not just the winner), then the per vote amount would have to be very very small.
January 28th, 2008 at 5:26 am
How about the idea of $ for the top five vote-getters each round, based on number of votes received? This would encourage interest in other charities that may not be slugging it out for #1 and #2.
January 28th, 2008 at 6:15 am
Chablis wrote: “How about the idea of $ for the top five vote-getters each round, based on number of votes received? This would encourage interest in other charities that may not be slugging it out for #1 and #2.”
It might work, especially with a longer votingperiod. (And it gives non-animal organizations a chance too.)
January 28th, 2008 at 8:02 am
When I vote, I redirect to this url: http://www.vote4cause.org/cause.php?id=81&voted=ERROR1&chat=true
But my vote does not get counted. Chat works fine.
January 28th, 2008 at 8:48 am
But if you link the donation to the number of clicks… where will the money come from? I assume it’s not out of your own pocket, but has to come from ad revenue. So, if the amount that you get from the ads is less than the amount generated by X votes… won’t you be in the hole and have to cover the donation yourself?
I would be concerned that anything tying the number of clicks to the purse size would encourage more click fraud. Maybe make it a fixed purse size each round… like $100 per round. Then, if your ads make more than $100, you can have a ’super’ round at the end of the month for the extra money that was made above the $100 per round.
Just thinking out loud here.
I hope you get paid by Google soon, I’m surprised you sent the donations before collecting the money…
January 28th, 2008 at 9:59 am
Chablis and Kamilla. I would love to give money out to more organizations. The reason I have decided not to do that in the past is that the purses are small enough where I thought it would have the most impact all going to one cause for each round. I do agree that spreading it around would make the site less competitive and give more organizations a shot.
Sherri. First of all, sorry for not responding to your e-mails and messages. You have been really supportive, I have just been really busy with everything. As for the comment, I would be in the hole, but I think with trial and error, there must be some vote=monetary value that should work and be scalable. So, as the site gets bigger, there would be more votes for the winner, but also there should be some more revenue. I think this would take some trial and error to find. I would use extra money to pay off costs associated with running the site and to pay for rounds where the revenue doesn’t cover the purse.
The other option was the fixed pot each round… however, if this gets bigger as the site grows, this would be a form of linking the purse size with ad revenue. Especially if there was an expected ’super’ round.
As for Google, I thought they tracked ‘bad’ clicks in real-time. I am new to this program. But it sounds like they can review this before sending out checks. I haven’t sent anything out after Kiva’s win because I was waiting for Vote4Cause checks, but it will give me a chance to wait for Google.