Changes to Top Contributor and other distinctive forum titles

Updates Announcements
#1

Hey developers,

We’d like to inform you today about some changes to the “Top Contributor” and “Lead Top Contributor” roles, as well as the addition of a Post Approval team, on the Developer Forum.

Top Contributor changes

For the past year and a bit, there was an invite-only Top Contributor program that was intended for top developers on the platform and other awesome community contributors. This group was initially deployed as a help desk for less experienced developers on the forum and for reviewing New Member to Member nominations. After a few months of launching this program, we found that this was not an efficient way to handle these processes and that the program caused too much noise for the developers in the program, and so the purpose of the program was gradually reduced and was only maintained very passively as a communication channel after that point.

Today, we are refreshing the meaning of Top Contributor and turning it from a program into a forum title with a defined purpose. We have now automated the Top Contributor program to be based on actual contribution criteria on the forum, rather than it being an invite-only program. We use strict criteria, along with manual review of the automated selection, to ensure that our selected Top Contributors are developers who often seek to assist their peers and contribute positively to the forum and the Roblox community as a whole.

The Top Contributor badge, title, and flair on the Developer Forum now signify that a particular developer frequently makes positive contributions to discussions. The Top Contributor group serves to acknowledge and reward their dedication to high-quality discussion.

As a result of the above changes, Top Contributor is no longer responsible for forum nominations or providing feedback to New Members. It is simply a forum title reinforcing the fact that these are some of the best contributors in our community, without any additional responsibilities over regular Members.

Lead Top Contributor is now Community Sage

Additionally, the role that was previously known as “Lead Top Contributor” will now be known as “Community Sage” (@Community_Sage). This small, hand-picked group of users works hand-in-hand with the Developer Engagement Team to ensure that the forum maintains its integrity as we seek to accommodate higher numbers of developers.

The reason for the rename is that “Lead Top Contributor” was deemed to be somewhat obscure related to their actual position on the forum. Community Sage brings the name closer to the meaning of the role: veteran community members that have a high understanding of how the forum works. Aside from the rename, there are no changes to the responsibilities and permissions of Community Sages.

Post Approval team

Lastly, as you may be already aware, the post approval procedure (through which New Members can file posts in categories they do not have posting access for) has been changed slightly. This is now no longer managed only by the Community Sages, but by everyone in the @Post_Approval group. The Community Post Approval team now supports the Community Sages during post approval to make sure that users continue to have a great and swift experience getting their posts approved as the forum grows.

We look forward to seeing how these changes help to shape the DevForum and highlight quality contributions.

Thanks,
Developer Relations

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[Italian Translation] How to rank up on the Roblox Developer Forum - Come essere promossi nel Roblox Developer Forum
July 2019 Recap: Big changes and lots of hype!
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#3

Community Sage is such a cool name!

49 Likes
#4

Community Sage sounds like an RPG boss

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#5

This seems like a great change! Especially for post approvals as before it could take a while to be seen.

RIP the Top Contributors though.

4 Likes
#7

Not really a big fan of the change. I personally believe that Top Contributor roles shouldn’t be automated, and it should stay invite-only.

9 Likes
#9

Congrats to all the other 75 new top contributors.

15 Likes
#10

Is a manual approval process not effectively tantamount to an invite-only process? The automated system is essentially bringing up recommendations that actual people choose whether or not to take.

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#11

Interesting to see Top Contributors becoming automated. With the forum becoming more open, it seems like it would’ve been hard to be picked out manually for Top Contributors, so this seems like a positive change that will help those who spend a lot of time and effort helping others be recognized out of all the other members.

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#13

Thanks for the clarification on these changes, I was quite surprised to be a Top Contributor.

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#14

Keep in mind that Top Contributor won’t be easy to achieve at all. Also keeping it invite only will be extremely hard to maintain with the thousands of new users coming to the forum, but I do respect your opinion.

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#15

Community sage is a rather interesting name for a development forum, but automating the Top Contributor rank is good. I know several people who deserve it a lot; congrats to them.

#16

It’s good to know that the Top Contributor program is now a signal of experienced developers who are around to help newer developers with their own problems in and around the forums, as well as with development inquiries in general. The previous program was ineffective and didn’t serve much of a purpose, but now it can be thought of something like a place you can seek help from (not to say the rest of the forum is incapable of doign such).

As the forums grow, it’s necessary that these programs become automated for scalability purposes and the programs be kept updated for better interaction with the Developer Forum. It’s nice to know that the programs are being given something of a reason to continue existing, rather than being left idle and broken.

:tada:

Woo, I was one of the 75 new Top Contributors.

13 Likes
#17

Surprised to see I was awarded the role, since I don’t feel I contribute enough to deserve the title. Nevertheless honored that I was awarded it, and congrats to every other Top Contributor!

Could that be due to the mix-up caused by the initial split of Top Contributor, and Lead Top Contributor? I do remember sending a DM I thought would go to the Top Contributors (which at the start were just a few people), which ended up getting sent to a large group of people due to the previous Top Contributors now being Lead Top Contributors. Apologies to anyone who got that, can only imagine how many other people didn’t notice that until it was too late and their messages were sent to every Top Contributor.

Edit: It may also be good for future Top Contributors to get some sort of sign that they had their title changed automatically from whatever it was previously set to to Top Contributor. Not a major issue at all really, but one which I’d still keep in mind. Not like it’s necessary with these icons on our avatar icons.

5 Likes
#18

From what I understand the automatic part is just showing who meets criteria. Someone still manually approves the suggested users.

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#19

I love the new recent changes to the forum. Makes it even more open to everyone. Congratulations to the recent promotees!

#20

Can you tell us more? We have very high standards for the Top Contributor criteria, and there is an additional manual review step on top to check that no one gamed the system / has a bad history on forum.

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#21

Out of curiosity how is the Post Approval team handled? If I recall correctly it was effectively open to top contributors before, is that still the case or are they entirely separate?

2 Likes
#22

It is great and motivating but In my opinion making an automated process for this doesn’t sound nice because I am worried of that people will bot their main account’s posts’ likes and make them seem like really helpfull comments.

In addition I have a question. Is there an ip tracker on the devforum to prevent too many login attempts from one IP adress. If not I think these automated systems can be a problem

About the Community Sage since most of the roles’ members are getting selected automaticaly is there a reason for Community Sage’s are hand picked?

Overall I think this is a great update and I am glad to hear this. I am just curious about why Community Sage’s are hand picked.

Last of all congratulations to all new 75 Top Contributors :tada:

#23

We’re working on a post that describes each forum rank (visitor, new member, member, top contributor, community post approver, community sage) and how to go back/forth between ranks.

10 Likes
#24

This addresses my concerns with the automatic process. I was a bit concerned that members (both new and full) might game the system in order to achieve the Top Contributor rank.

1 Like