Reminder on Requests
Hi everyone,
We have to delete about 5-10 requests a day that are well-meaning, but do not adhere to what we're looking for for requests.
Requests are NOT for:
- asking people's opinions (like "What is your favorite..." or "What do you think about...")
- very basic information (like "How do you spell..." or "What is a circle?")
- spam (obviously)
- help on HubPages (especially on things adequately answered in the help section!)
Requests are ONLY for two things:
- detailed information on a specific topic, that doesn't seem to be addressed well elsewhere on the Web
- specific advice on a very specific issue (NOT related to HubPages itself)
The result of a request should be a great Hub that many, many people could find useful.
If you want to ask for people's opinions, or if you need help with HubPages, feel free to start a thread on that in the Forums.
Have a great weekend,
JasonI initiated a thread on the same topic "Requests feature: do it serve the purpose it has been created for?" few days back and reactions were somewhat mixed type but majority favored that requests should be moderated as answers to all request do not transform into quality hubs.In fact making a request related to personal querries/interests tend to defeat the purpose for that requests section is intended.I favor a thorough scruitney of all requests.
I'd just like to add something to what Jason said:
Please, before making a request, check to see if that or a similar one has already been submitted. For example, we've been getting a lot of "How to make money online" or "How to make money with HubPages" requests, and I've been trying to remove them before anyone answers, as there are several open requests on those subjects already.
Thanks,
MaddieI have recently had two requests deleted on the grounds that they were "asking for opinion", whereas my intention had been to elicit reponses that, although they might start with an opinion, would continue with full justifications of that opinion.
My suspicion is that the deletion was more on the grounds that the topics in question were highly controversial, namely Islamic fundamentalism and anti-Semitism.
There seems to be plenty of room on Hubpages for hubs that express a point of view, as well as ones that give facts. Indeed, the "point of view" hubs are surely more likely to contain original material than many of the factual ones, which are, one suspects, merely restatements of facts that have been gleaned from sources such as Wikipedia. All those recipes for example?
I would be interested to see a statement as to what Hubpages means by "original", in terms of the balance between fact and opinion.Indexer:
I'm sure if you ask around you can find plenty of hubbers who've had their requests deleted for similar reasons, on much more "benign" topics. I assure you the deletion of those requests had nothing to do with their supposed controversial nature, as you can clearly see by the fact that a rephrased request on the same subject that you made a few minutes later remains.
If you'd like to hear other hubber's opinions, you are welcome to start discussions on said topics in the appropriate forum. However, the requests section is designed for the purpose of eliciting quality evergreen content that will continue to be useful to users and draw outside traffic for months and years to come.Maddie,
Thanks for your reply, which I'm perfectly happy with. I fully appreciate your difficulties in managing this section of Hubpages, and I'm all in favour of your efforts to ensure that quality hubs are produced in response to quality requests. As you say, rephrasing a question seems to be the way to get a request accepted.I made the request "What's your favorite fictional band?" which is clearly defined as what you do NOT want requests to look like. But my goal was for people to make a hub about a fictional band. How do you recommend that I rephrase the request or similar requests in the future?
The idea is that I'd love to see a hub about Bleeding Gum Murphy and a hub about The Rutles or a hub about other fictional bands that don't have a good source of information somewhere on the web. Would it be more constructive for me to make 400 requests, one for each fictional band? Or is it more constructive for me to say "Write a hub about your favorite fictional band?"
Any ideas?Mroconnell -
A request that yields Hubs with titles like "My favorite fictional band" are not good, because no one goes to Google to search on what the favorite anything is for complete strangers. Hubs with "My favorite..." titles never get any search engine traffic; you might get direct traffic from your fans or other Hubbers, but Google & Yahoo will probably never send any visitors your way.
On the other hand, a request that yields Hubs on specific detailed information on fictional bands might attract search engine traffic, and thus would make for good Hubs. It's not hard to imagine people searching for information on specific fictional band names, or lists like "Best fictional bands" or "Popular fictional bands".
So, making your request either:
* the names of the fictional bands ("Bleeding Gum Murphy") would be the best, but might require entering in a lot of individual requests. Maybe you could limit to those bands you are specifically interested in learning more about.
* requests along the lines of "Best fictional bands" or "Popular fictional bands" - I can imagine Hubbers either reprinting those requests exactly as a title (which would work well) or use them as a springboard for Hubs like "Bleeding Gum Murphy" and the like, which also works well.Thanks. You want requests to be phrased like hub titles. That seems pretty easy!
