A review of Constant Content's New Authors Quiz
Having way too much free time on my hands at work, I've been signing up for various websites that will pay me for writing. I work as a teacher of English language in Japan, and wanted to say a few words about the New Authors Quiz one must take before signing up as a writer on Constant Content.
It's Excellent.
The PR guy reading this can stop sweating; this is a positive review. The quiz is short, to the point, and has a design which will stop non-fluent English writer in their tracks.
Working with English teachers of Swiss, Slovenian, and Japanese descent, I feel qualified to comment on this issue. The ability to speak English semi-fluently does not translate to a perfect understanding. There are nuances of the English language which must be understood implicitly if you want to work with tone and style on an article.
The test perfectly covers the type of error that someone lacking true fluency will make. I don't think it would violate any trust to say generally that what's covered is punctuation and grammar. Specifically, I noticed problems that I see very commonly among ESL speakers. For example, a full understanding of context is needed to know whether a word should be pluralized, and if so, where to place a possessive comma. A non-fluent speaker will never be able to correctly place it 5 times consecutively. What was covered on my test was a sort of parallel issue, but I chose pluralization because it's something my ESL students (and non-native teachers) have issues with. Also because I don't want to get in trouble on my first day at CC!
This sets Constant Content apart
I like that they include this test. It lets you know up-front that they are not kidding about quality standards. It also saves them the huge stress of trying to identify poor content later.
I do wonder why other sites like Squidoo and Hubpages don't implement such a system. I suppose because the articles here don't reflect as much on the conglomerate, in theory. I think that idea is false, however, as I definitely avoid Squidoo pages no matter how many of the top search results they make up. There's no point clicking on a domain which I know lacks content and will not answer my query.
