The Member HelpCenter™ for 08/28 - Have a Question? or Need Help?
August 28, 2010 09:07 AM UTC
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Welcome to the Member-to-Member HelpCenter™ -- Where other Gather members help you with your Gather-related questions or problems! Enter your question below and receive a response from other members! gather.com | Today's Glitch Report: When deleting a 'parent' comment from your discussion thread, the modal popup verification window may not close properly. Parent comments are comments with replies posted to them. When deleting a parent comment, a verification window appears. After verifying that you wish to proceed, the popup window may not close without clicking the “cancel†or “close†link. |  |  |
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Comments: 93
Welcome to Today's HelpCenter™ Discussion Post!
The original Gather help series -- assisting members since 2006.
Need a little help, or have a question?
Can't find something? ...or figure out how something works?
Ask other members!
"I keep hearing about how Gather used to be a site for writers, and at one time there was a 'home page' like many other sites currently have...so, just what was Gather like when it started?"
However, this home page was eventually replaced with the personalized home page that you see today.
Gather also catered heavily to writers, as well as photographers and musicians in its early days, and many of the major contests and promotions on the site focused on these talents. For a brief glimpse into the Gather of yesteryear, please review the links and information in the timeline below:
Note: Some archived Gather pages load very slowly.
March 5, 2005
Gather, Inc. acquired the gather.com domain name and implemented its first public web page.
· View the FIRST Gather page »
May 12, 2005
Gather modifies the existing public page and adds a sign-up option for notification when Gather begins accepting members.
· View the first Gather sign up page »
August 3, 2005
First beta service goes LIVE, and is christened the “Christo†release.
· View the brand-spankin' new Gather.com »
· Read the initial welcome to Gather from Tom Gerace, Founder and CEO »
· Read more thoughts on the new site from Gather's future President, Carl Rosendorf »
October 21, 2005
Gather begins allowing access to member content from search engines and other online services.
· Read more »
November 1, 2005
Gather starts gaining some initial attention from the press, appearing in local papers and online information and news sources.
· View the Boston Globe Story (archives) »
· View the full Boston Globe Story (tmcnet) »
· Seattle Times »
· GigaOM »
· Bloggers Blog »
November 24, 2005
Minor changes are made to the site, including the addition of member and content stats, and “Editor's Picks†replace “Featured Articles†on the home page. The new release is dubbed “Kleeâ€.
· View the Klee Release »
January 17, 2006
Former U.S. Senator Bill Bradley joins Gather, and sits on Gather's Board of Directors.
· View the Board of Directors for Gather »
Gather moves out of 'beta' status with their first major site update. Top level site navigation is changed, the ability to create groups is added, as well as extended email notification options. The new release name is “Magritteâ€.
· View the Magritte release »
· Read more on group publishing »
· Read information on featuring group content »
March 1, 2006
The Gather Citizen Journalism Scholarship Contest is announced. Entries were judged by Arianna Huffington.
· Read more »
March 8, 2006
The Gather Travel Writing Contest is announced.
· Read more »
March 27, 2006
Gather kicks off the “Ask the Author†series, inviting best-selling and highly popular authors for live chats with the community. Authors included Stephen M.R. Covey, Bill Bradley, Krista Tippett, and Dean Koontz.
· View the Ask the Author series »
April 3, 2006
An improved content search engine and indexing process is implemented on the site.
· Read Tom's announcement »
April 12, 2006
The first live chat is held with Tom Gerace, Gather's founder and CEO.
· View the transcript »
End of Part 1.
Additional installments will be published throughout the day, and in tomorrow's edition. Stay tuned for more great Gather history, including cut-throat competitions, sailing the high seas, gun battles, report cards...and drama!
Due to the sheer volume of Gather history I've compiled, I will need to split today's “Featured Question†across multiple comments...and days!
The series will conclude in tomorrow's edition.
You too Nancy! ...enjoy your day today!
Thanks Peter! ...and stay fabulous! Â
Thanks Sandra...I'll be covering all of the time through 2008.
Hopefully it provides some insight into why people feel as they do about the Gather of today.
Â
Thankfully it's moving backward though...
Orange bubbles are still here!
...or are you referring to orange bubbles way back when?
I'm waiting for the 'drama' part
It's comin'.... gun battles don't intrigue you?
I'll publish Part 2 in about an hour.
I loved reviewing the first CEO chat. Even back then you could see the spin cycle beginning to turn.
I'll have to read that first CEO chat later tonight. ;o)
Nope...I promise, there was a gun battle! (at least one)
Hint: It is heard, but not seen.
I meant that the gun battle is heard, but not seen!
I still have no idea......
Then later they started videos.
Nope!
The gun battle is located in Part 2 below.
I am looking forward to "detainment in Cuba". *snicker*
Get my email?
Hello Marianne! ...I'll go check.
I see it! ...I'm heading off to read it now.
I have sent you a response.
Part 2 - Gather history continued...
May 10, 2006
Gather implements a small but significant site update (code name “Lautrec”). This update brings the ability to redeem Gather Points™ for the first time, including gift cards, charitable donations and the "cash program" for members earning at least $50.00 per month.
· View Tom's preview of the upcoming changes »
· View the official announcement post »
· View more about member compensation »
Jun 27, 2006
The “Amazon Shorts” program is unveiled. This program allowed authors to compete for inclusion in Amazon's (amazon.com) short story/essay program. Selected authors would have their work listed on Amazon and available for download in electronic format for 49 cents.
· Read more »
July 4, 2006
Gatherstock! - Gather's first Fourth of July Picnic.
· View the festivities with Col. Possum »
July 14, 2006
Another major site update is released. This update brought significant changes in navigation, a new shared home page (arguably the best of all Gather home page designs), group banners and 'branding', and a personalized home page and administrative dashboard referred to as "My Gather". This release name was “André”.
· View Tom's preview »
· Read Tom's introduction to the new release »
· View the newly designed home page »
August 29, 2006
The 2006 Book Review Contest is announced (and incidentally the only book review contest Gather has held). The Grand Prize Winner received a stateroom on Gather's anniversary cruise to Bermuda.
· Read more »
September 1, 2006
The 1st Gather'Ing' with Tom Gerace in New York City. GatherIngs was a program designed to coordinate real-world meetings between members.
· Read Tom's invitation »
· Visit the GatherIngs group »
September 6, 2006
Gather launches its first television ad campaign. Ads ran throughout the month of September on CNN and Fox News programming, including the The O'Reilly Factor, Larry King Live, Lou Dobbs Tonight, and Anderson Cooper 360°.
· View the ads...and the controversy »
End of Part 2.
Additional installments will be published throughout the day, and in tomorrow's edition. Stay tuned for more great Gather history, including the birth of greatness, the sinking of dreams, digging up readers, detainment in Cuba...and of course...drama!
Drama! Drama! Where's the drama!!!
It's there! ...and there's a LOT more coming.
In some cases, you may need to scan the comment threads.
Did you know these comment boxes expand in Chrome?
"Did you know these comment boxes expand in Chrome?"
I'm a wizard, remember? Â
You can also get comment boxes to expand in Firefox & IE.
That's a great ping Matthew...but I'm not surprised that it hasn't been looked at or approved. As you'll see going forward in the Gather timeline, the last open CEO chat was 2 years ago, and Tom has abandoned almost all interaction on the site.
In my opinion, it's not about him being busy elsewhere...it's about him wanting to be anywhere but here.
Thanks Darlene! - There's a lot more to come.
It's easy to see how early members have become disappointed in Gather's direction over the past couple of years.
Wow! - thanks for the thoughtful comment Darlene!
...and thanks for stopping by today! Â
As the 'story' of Gather unfolds, you'll see many great things come and go...mostly GO however. :-(
Hello Lisa!
The removal of the home page stripped the site of its sense of 'community'...in my opinion.
Plus, I think it reduces the number of new members enrolling in the site.
There are only slightly more than 850,000 accounts on Gather, which is really surprisingly low considering the enrollment trend Gather had previously.
The other advantage of the homepage was that it was an incentive for people to produce high-quality content with hopes of getting it featured. And it was a nice non-monetary award for those who were featured.
I really wish they would bring it back!
Hello Ryan! ...it has changed quite a bit since the beginning.
Not just in how it looks, but in the direction as well.
Larry - I haven't received an email notification for you since August 13.
Have you published anything since then?
I'll check out your latest work Larry.
Have your points stopped, or slowed down?
Larry,
You will receive an email notification for EVERY reply that your comment receives (if you have chosen this option). However, the same is not true for other notifications.
For example, you may only receive ONE notification for content (photos, specifically) that your friends have published, even if they have published more than one.
Thanks for stopping by Lee! ...there will be more tomorrow. Â
Thanks Renda! ...There will be more tomorrow!
Gather will need at least 1 million regular subscribers to support its business model, said analyst John Blossom with Shore Communications. Its true strength is in community as content, he noted.
"Rather than aggregating the content as the value point, it's the community itself that represents the most important aggregation," he said.
That stood out for me too.
Sadly, Gather still doesn't have 1 million regular subscribers. Â
...and of the 850,000 accounts they do have, only a fraction of that amount are likely active.
Thanks for stopping by! ...I'll be publishing a LOT more in tomorrow's edition.
The best is yet to come!
Hmmm...I have enough, so that could be arranged! Â
I hope that you do as well Janet...thanks!