Late last night I got an email from Tyme over at 9rules, informing me of the revised membership agreement that I have to accept in order to stay as a member of 9rules. Sadly the new agreement has some requirements that pretty much eliminates me as a member.
The new rules try to force all members to participate and communicate with each other in the new members area.
Let me be clear – participation in either the new member area or my.9rules is required for all members, requested by members.
To be honest, I don't need yet another timesink and I really don't like to be coerced into participating in a community that I have yet to see any benefit of. In fact, the only interaction I've ever had with any of the 9rules members, inside the 9rules network, was my introductory post when this site was accepted as a member other than that I have yet to see any value in the 9rules membership at all.
So, I guess members like me are the ones that other members has been complaining about in the members section:
Members spoke out about their displeasure concerning members that they never interact with and never hear from, yet all member entries carry the same weight on 9rules, which is not fair.
And here I was, thinking that delivering "quality" content was the requirement. How silly of me, I was clearly mistaken.
21 Comments so far
Tyme White, on October 5, 2007 at 3:05pm, said:
Your response: Just a quick note from me, I have decline the agreement as this is not something I want to be a part of.
Compared to responses from members that received the same email:
"I wholeheartedly agree to these terms, and I think it's great that 9r has taken this step."
"9rules is great resource and a wonderful place to meet new people."
"I've decided this isn't for me; I think you are dead-right to insist on participation and due to being so busy I've really not had any time to contribute..."
"I have been quiet recently in the community and will rectify this now."
"I know my participation has been pretty very good, but I'm definitely going to make an effort to start contributing way more frequently."
See the difference? You definitely made the right decision. Your site has been removed. Good luck to you.
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Christian Mohn, on October 5, 2007 at 3:25pm, said:
Well, thats is why I declined the new terms. I know I made the right decision as I don't want to spend the time required to be an "active" member, nor take part in a community I never really felt i belonged to.
The 9rules badges on this site has been removed, and I also insist you delete any cached content you might have on the 9rules site based on my original content.
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shep, on October 5, 2007 at 4:39pm, said:
I think it's funny how there are a lot of people abandoning 9rules. They used to say they were about quality, but now it seems that quantity is their goal. Just because people are participating in your network (which I'm sure you're generating ad revenue from, maybe that's why you tell them they have to participate, more impressions=more money) doesn't mean they are actually saying anything. 9Rules is quickly becoming a joke to me.
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h0bbel, on October 5, 2007 at 6:41pm, said:
Shep: You could couple it with this recent 9rules blog post of course. I don't know if thats the motive for the changes, but there is always room for speculation.
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Scrivs, on October 5, 2007 at 6:44pm, said:
If we were about quantity wouldn't we be adding members? And what does a post about advertising have to do with any of this?
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Christian Mohn, on October 5, 2007 at 7:51pm, said:
At least it's good to know that I'm not the only one that has problems with the membership agreement.
Brad Fults, of h3h.net, shares my take on this, so does Dan Lockton.
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Robin, on October 5, 2007 at 8:58pm, said:
I remember there was actually a time I wanted to be part of 9rules... but now their collection of sites seems too big and now I would rather stay away from 9rules.
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Robin, on October 6, 2007 at 2:31am, said:
Oh, and also, Tyme seems to be a bit arrogant and bigheaded, at least from his comment up there...
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Scrivs, on October 6, 2007 at 5:04am, said:
Actually she isn't arrogant or bigheaded at all, that would be me.
Imagine not getting anything out of a community you never participated in or even bothered to know what is going on. I know, I know, it's kind of hard to imagine, but it's possible. Sorry you were mistaken Christian, it happens to the best of us.
And let me be the first to apologize for taking anymore of your time here. I agree wholeheartedly that timesinks suck. I thought the same thing when I was getting my Bacherlors and Masters.
Robin, for a guy/girl your logic is sound. When things get smaller like the size of our 9rules Membership I tend to think that things are too big as well.
I know, I know, it's hard to imagine.
Dammit, already too much time responding to an entry and comments. Freaking timesinks...
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Christian Mohn, on October 6, 2007 at 8:13am, said:
Scrivs: I'm sorry but I didn't think joining 9rules was the equivalent of joining a social network with participation requirements. When I realized that was the case, with the new revised membership agreement, all I did was to reject them and explain why.
As for bothering with participating, well I never really understood that it was a requirement. After all, I thought the content was the order of merit in 9rules.
Your responses to this has made me realize that I did indeed come to the right conclusion but I fail to understand how anything I've said or done warrants such a sardonic reply. Then again, I'm just some moron who rejected the revised membership agreement, instead of making false promises to "get involved" to stay a member of your little club.
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matthew, on October 6, 2007 at 11:31am, said:
I have similar thouhts.
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Christian Mohn, on October 6, 2007 at 1:29pm, said:
Oh, and my comment on brokencode.com goes to show that leaving 9rules has been on my mind for quite a while.
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Marco, on October 7, 2007 at 5:07pm, said:
I decided to decline the new terms as well as I feel participation is awesome but not when it's mandatory. I kinda dislike most things that are mandatory really. It's like saying: You MUST have fun or you'll get in trouble. Doesn't feel right to me really.
The sarcastic responses to your post are a bit disturbing too :(
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Christian Mohn, on October 7, 2007 at 11:20pm, said:
Marco: Exactly. For my part one of the problems is the amount of time it eats away from other things in my life. I don't have room for it.
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Scrivs, on October 7, 2007 at 11:49pm, said:
Umm...Robin:
1) You called Tyme a guy.
2) Called her arrogant.
3) Called her big-headed.
You passed judgement on someone you know nothing about based on one comment and therefore you get the reply you get from me.
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Montoya, on October 8, 2007 at 5:34am, said:
I just wanted to mention something because I don't like my words being misread and then have someone running around the net with a poor impression of me. I said in the 9rules notes that I didn't buy the crap people were saying unless they had babies to take care of. I had hoped that family people like yourself would have taken that to understand that if you have a family then you definitely don't have time to contribute to 9rules and that's fine. I didn't appreciate you failing to read that and attacking me in return, but I'm here to say that I don't see anything wrong with you leaving for the sake of time commitments and I don't think poorly of you at all. I hope that helps.
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Christian Mohn, on October 8, 2007 at 8:32am, said:
Montoya: I'm sorry, but you are right. I did misread what you said, most likely due to the fact that I don't refer to my kids as 'babies' anymore (they are 7 and 10).
My only intention with this was to be fair and leave since I couldn't make a bigger commitment to 9rules than what I already had and that would violate the revised membership agreement.
As I've said before, it was never my intention to blame it on 9rules at all, it's solely my own decision. What disappoints me is the reaction I have received after doing this post, but I'm sure thats also my own fault.
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Montoya, on October 8, 2007 at 3:09pm, said:
That's okay, these things happen! I just want to say, don't mind the people who berate you for your stance on this, everyone has a right to their choice since obviously this is a big change and it put a big demand on members. You'll be successful regardless of what networks you join, and I want to wish you the best with your blog!
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Christian Mohn, on October 8, 2007 at 3:24pm, said:
Thanks, Christian!
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9rules and Building Evolving Communities - Asymptomatic, on October 15, 2007 at 1:48am, said:
...action that the 9rules maintainers have had to the poor response to their actions. Take for example Christian's experience.
The responses in the comments there from Tyme and Scrivs, two 9rules maintainers, seem openly host...
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Chrissy, on October 17, 2007 at 4:04am, said:
Wow, that first response by the 9rules person is surprisingly unprofessional. Her words were decent enough but the shitty tone was obvious.
I never really understood the value of 9rules either. Good riddance!
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