Hey there, I have been away from the steem blockchain for a while, due to unforseen circumstances. Have I missed this place? Yes! so much. I've been busy working on a project with some colleagues. I have also battled with some challenges, which I wouldn't want to share on a public platform. It’s probably not what you are thinking. If there's anything I learnt last year, it's to take every problem as an opportunity to grow.
I would be talking about 1Ramp today. In 1Ramp's latest update, I was delighted to see many new features. Which included the introduction of an update that made an already existing feature accessible for every user. In this article, I'll be reviewing the recent version of 1Ramp (v. 1.3). This update was released about 3 days ago, on the 5th of February, 2019.
Repository
https://github.com/hapramp/1Rramp-Android
What is 1Ramp?
If this is the first you've heard of 1Ramp, it is a social media platform for creatives. It also rewards creatives when they share their works with others in their communities. The community feature makes it possible for creatives to learn from one another in a niche. As a social media platform based on Steem, it rewards its users with Steem's currencies.
I'll be reviewing the android version of the app, that is available on Google play store. As mentioned earlier, attention would be given to the recent updates. The three primary updates are:
(i) Leaderboard
(ii) Contest creation (now open to all)
(iii) Ratings
(i) Leaderboard
When I play smartphone games, I'm really delighted when they have leaderboad. It helps me know how well I'm playing the game. And I usually check the leaderboad to see if anyone had beaten my high score. That was the case with Piano Tiles, when I downloaded the game.
Consequently, there's now a leaderboard for contest participants on 1Ramp. I think leaderboard mechanism suits the competition tab on 1Ramp. It creates a competitive spirit towards participating in competitions. And that's what every contest creator wants.
The leaderboard is found at the top of the Competition's tab page. It shows the top three winners of 1Ramp competitions, including an option to see the complete rank list. A user's position on this list is dependent on the worth of the prize won. A participant may have won different prizes, yet a person with one prize would be above him/her. Yeah, that is because it is money first. And that is due to the variation in contest prizes.
The first person on the list is rupeshkumar390 who has won two contests, with first and second positions. While thecuteghost has won three contests, with first and second and third positions respectively. Lastly, the third on the list, manoldonchev, has won only one contest.
(ii) Contest Creation
Creating a contest on 1Ramp is just like writing a post. Previously, only accredited users had the ability to create competitions on the app. Now, this feature is opened to all. There are now three options when you want to write a post. The options are blog, short post and create a contest.
When you click on the "create a contest" option, it leads to the text editor where you are prompted to write the competition title, description and rules. The title needs to be a catchy one, yet not too fancy. For example, the title "Finish this story" competition usually hosted by the 1Ramp team is a simple writing contest. From the title, you already know that there is a story that needs to be completed.
The description section is where you explain what you want the writer to do. A few explanatory words is what is needed. As for the rules, you don't have to be very rigid. You can make some rules optional, so that the participants can be creative. That notwithstanding, there has to be rules to serve as a guide.
After writing the competition title, description and rules, you'd have to proceed to the next page. It is in the next page that you would select the communities that can participate, add tags, include judges, contest duration, prizes and competition banner.
1Ramp has 8 communities, and you can only pick 3 in a contest post. For a writing contest that involves explaining what you think goes on in a photographers head, the literature and photography communities can be selected. I might include the film community too. And add related tags to the posts.
You'd have to pick not more than three judges. For the writing contest I just talked about, it would be reasonable to have a judge knowledgeable in both photography and literature. If possible, they can be two different persons. That would make the contest more interesting, as it would improve the possibility of picking the correct winners.
The contest duration is simply the time when the competition would kick off and when it would end. What I like about this feature is that you can set a contest that would start in a few days time. This would give you time to get some visibility for the contest even before it kicks off.
As for prizes, it's compulsory you set a prize for the first position. You may also set for second and third positions, or decide to give out consolation prizes. It's usually best to give out what wouldn't hurt your wallet. It is not reasonable to set unrealistic prizes.
Competition banner. That is what usually attracts me to read the information in a contest. An attractive banner sends the right message. While an unattractive banner may not yield the intended result. I love beautiful things, who doesn't? When I see beautiful things I always want to know more about it. An attractive banner reflects the time and effort invested by the contest organiser.
My Competition's tab
There's a new tab on 1Ramp that shows contest posts that are created by a user. The tab can be found on a user's profile, immediately after the drafts tab. This is really nice, it makes it possible for a user to easily track his or her previous contest posts.
Suggestion
When a user participates in a contest on 1Ramp, a post is shared to the steem blockchain. I think it would be better if it is optional. An option to post as comment could be included. When it appears as a comment on the contest post, other steem users can easily see others participating in the contest.
(iii) Ratings
There's been several updates on 1Ramp's rating system since my review of the feature - Reviewing 1Ramp's Unique Features. The rating system has been improved. It was made not to include vote weight that is less than 20% in it's rating calculation. With that update, you wouldn't find ratings of posts below 1-star as it were before. Below is a pictorial representation of the update on Rating.
The rating feature now shows dollar equivalent of a rating. When you click on the people that have rated a post, it also shows their vote weights and the value of their votes.
Suggestion
The rating feature is still a work in progress. The improvements in the feature has been amazing. There's been a different problem I've had with the rating on 1Ramp. When you click on the rating button the five stars appears, and you can decide to give a 1-star rating, 2-star rating, 3-star rating, 4-star rating, or even a 5-star rating. When you click on 1-star rating, you can easily change it to any other star. But the issue here is when the rating option is accidentally clicked you'd have to select a star, then "unrate" it later. I suggest that users should be able to exit the rating process by tapping outside the stars area.
Another issue is that a pop up should appear when you are trying to rate an already rated post. I ended up rating a post multiple number of times with different stars. It was quite discouraging, since I wasted my voting power.
Conclusion
This update left me speechless. There have been so many updates since my last post on 1Ramp. 1Ramp continues to show that it has a listening ear with these updates. I'm particularly fond of the contest creation which has now been made available for all. It goes to show that there's no form of favoritism on the platform. As for the leaderboard, it makes contest participants feel happy. It kinda tells them, "you're doing well," when they move upwards in the leader board. The ranking feature has improved, unlike when I downloaded 1Ramp many months ago. Back then I had a post with a very low rating, I think it was less than a star. The improvements are topnotch.
There have been several updates on 1Ramp, Partiko and eSteem, since I last featured them in my "Clash of Steem dApps" series. I'd try to write a post in the series soon. As I'd always say, a healthy amount of competition vitally stirs up improvement. The end users usually benefit when there is a healthy amount of competition.
Official links
• 1Ramp website
• 1Ramp on Github
Series Backlinks
• A Review of 1Ramp App Updates
• Reviewing 1Ramp's Competitions + App Updates
• Reviewing 1Ramp's Unique Features
Clash of Steem dApps (featuring 1Ramp)
• Contest Hero vs 1Ramp's Competitions (Clash of Steem dApps)
• 1Ramp vs Partiko (Clash of Steem dApps)