How Gather Works: Why are there so many Gather groups? (July 5, 2007)

The following is my opinions based on observation of the site, of the successes and behaviors of others, and on my own intuition; it is not guaranteed to currently be or remain accurate, and does not represent Gather's official position, policies, or practices.

I run a number of different groups, and keep an eye on many more, and time and time again, I hear people asking questions about how Gather works, why it works, and why it doesn't work the way they'd rather.

Therefore, I've decided to start a series, 'How Gather Works', which will hopefully answer some of the questions members of Gather have about how Gather handles its personal affairs.

Today's question is:
Why are there so many Gather groups?

Everyone has the ability and freedom to create, maintain, and administer to as many Gather groups as they want. Furthermore, in Gather's FAQ, one of the implied methods of earning points is the creation of and posting to groups. Why does this help your point total?

One possible answer involves the fact that one source of Gather Points comes from where an article is viewed. It is theorized that one benefit of a Gather Group is that it provides people with an additional location to view articles from; it is also theorized that reading articles by clicking on their links in a group post provides some small benefit to the group owner, or that posting an article to a Gather group provides its owner with some small benefit.

Whether these are true or not, the fact remains that when an article is posted to more locations, there are more locations in which a person can read it. (There is a notable potential for backlash - if the 'groups' line is too long, people might not see the article on the screen at first, and might be more likely to browse elsewhere instead of commenting.)

One frequent argument I've seen is that Gather should allow a limited number of groups per individual topic (for example, only one 'roleplaying' group, only one 'science fiction' group, etc.) in order to limit the number of groups one has to join in order to reach a target audience. The basic problem with this argument, as I see it, is that managing this would either require that Gather create and manage all groups itself, or that it build tag-filtering software to disallow any group with a pre-existing tag (which would inevitably result in people using the group name as a tag), or devising some even more impractical solution that results in all of the problems of the previous two solutions with less of the rewards.

To create your own Gather group, simply click the Groups link in the Gather menu, then click on the Create a Group link. You'll be asked to provide a name, a username, and other information to help you get your group off to a good start, and then will be able to invite your connections to join your newly founded group.

Happy Gathering!

---

Do you have opinions or suggestions to share involving the way in which Gather currently works?  Do you have questions about topics you'd like to see discussed in more detail? Ask them here, and I'll try to cover them in my next How Gather Works article!

All contents of 'How Gather Works' are based solely on Austin Cushing's personal experiences, opinions, and beliefs, and are not representative of Gather's actual policies, practices, or mission statements. Austin Cushing is not a member of the Gather Guides team and does not speak on their behalf.