Reason for submissions getting archived Thread

For some reason, I often get my news submissions archived. The email by indieDB states:

There are many reasons why news is archived, the main ones being poor formatting, grammar, not relevant, spam, lacking images, videos, download links etc.

It then gives me a linked guide of how to avoid this, which confuses me further as every single point doesn't apply to my article. It has shots, the grammar is correct, it's informative, relevant, paragraphed neatly etc. What confuses me more is that the latest entry on the front page is a news post with 3 lines and 2 screenshots.

So my suggestion is when an admin clicks ARCHIVE on a news submission maybe add a reason so the writer knows what to fix.

Edited by: ChrisDtk

You do have my attention. Supporting this!
The first time I got mails news only being Archived the linkage confused the hell out of me. Until recently I just gave up on getting to frontpage. A hint from the Archiving Admins/Moderators would be very helpful on whats the reason.

Every article is reviewed on per case basis.

To note, some devs change/break formatting or add media content to their articles after they already were archived or authorised. Some exceptions are displayed only on Indie DB or only on Mod DB (or Slide DB) if they have only 2 pictures and little text, for example. Well-written articles are usually shown on both Mod DB and Indie DB as a reward.

Most of ChrisDtk's and TheD3X's articles are authorised but also many have been archived because of no to little media included.

As for hints.

Your article has higher chance of being frontpaged if it contains
- at least 2 pictures or 1 video (animated GIFs are considered cool looking hybrids but 1 GIF may be not enough)
- centered media (centered images, videos, etc)
- wide/large-sized media (video standards are as follows: 560x315, 560x420, or upscaled: 600x338, 600x450; vids larger or smaller than that usually have to be resized)
- a decent amount of text
- fresh media, new videos, new screenshots etc are more valuable than the same Kickstarter video posted 3rd or 4th time in a row
- correct word wrapping, no white lines before headers, no divs unwittingly aligning the text to the left, etc sorts of formatting often overlooked or simply shrugged off

... and much more.

following the above guidelines only improves your chances - it never guarantees your article can be authorised for the front page especially if it has only 2 pics or 1 short video or just text with links and no media.

The more media and of higher quality the better chances, understandably.

The site editor and moderators/admins can correct the formatting of your articles - but not really add new media for you. The more new screenshots and fresh videos the better. 1 picture or 2 pictures may be not enough, but as mentioned earlier, each submitted article is reviewed and revised on case-by-case basis, so what looks good enough is usually frontpaged.

Edited by: feillyne

I support having a reason for the archive as well, it would really help authors improve.

As for the 'at least 2 pictures rule', Yea. Don't listen to that. Have at least *6+* pictures if you want to be put on the front page. More is better.
ALWAYS have a movie. Don't have a movie? Make one. Now. Just has to be 60 seconds of something mildly interesting. come on, do it now!

Maybe its just me, But I have noticed the indieDB staff really loves more pictures. Can't blame them, the news articles I see with tons of pictures are always more fun to read then the ones that are just walls of text.

Not all your pictures have to be screen shots either, A couple of banners/logos can make the news look good too.

If you really want to know what to do, Check out all the posts that got headlined: Indiedb.com and try and follow them.

That's not a rule, that's just a hint.

Edited by: feillyne

I appreciate this attempt to explain how to properly do a news posting to ensure maximum chances of the front page.
Past experience has taught me that many of my shared items are not even visible to the public here on moddb.
Which I suppose is why it can sometimes be helpful to have an external site as the primary "source" of news and share only "important updates" here on moddb.

I have a guide here with my thoughts on getting your news authed first time every time.
Hope it helps.
News and Features a Guide blog - TKAzA - Indie DB

TKAzA:
Thank you very much on that wonderful blog post. I am taking this into consideration when writing new Updates.

As to feillyne - Thanks on that clarification as well, I improved over time, so that recently more post got authed than arched may be a cause of this. Now let me take as an example, the 1.7.0 News post - that one got archived, even including Media. I had to mail about a reevaluation of it to get it authed. So the point would still stand - after all, its our writing that gets better by your moderator input!

Another tiny bugreport I'd like to address:
Using Maxthon, the Editor used in creating new posts malfuntions, formatting duplicates the text and causes complete confusion. Is there any way around it?

TheD3X wrote: As to feillyne - Thanks on that clarification as well, I improved over time, so that recently more post got authed than arched may be a cause of this. Now let me take as an example, the 1.7.0 News post - that one got archived, even including Media. I had to mail about a reevaluation of it to get it authed. So the point would still stand - after all, its our writing that gets better by your moderator input!

That is very strange, did you include media after the news was already archived? Could be a mistake on my part so sorry about that.

TheD3X wrote: Another tiny bugreport I'd like to address:
Using Maxthon, the Editor used in creating new posts malfuntions, formatting duplicates the text and causes complete confusion. Is there any way around it?

Does it happen in the WYSIWYG editor or the HTML Source Editor? It's always more advisable to use the HTML Source Editor (for news/forum posts, etc anything as the WYSIWYG editor is broken in more ways than it healthily should):

I've never needed anything much more than a short 1-2 minute video to make the front page:
eg: Indiedb.com

One of the things to note when doing news, is that tables don't work, but

I would be all in favour of a simple feedback system if it gets archived straight away. Something short and simple such as "not enough pics", "Bad grammar", "Formatting issues", "boring"... anything really other then a slap, else we're just guessing as to what the issue might of been and doomed to repeat it.

Hey hesky1, your news article at the time of archiving contained only 1 picture. It's advisable to post as much new fresh media & content as you can if you would like to have your news featured on the front page. At least (at least) 3-4 pictures or one 2-3 minute video with a few passages of raw text would suffice.

Articles with 1 vid only without any text or with 1 picture or even 2 pics have very little chance of being frontpaged.

Ah cool! That's all I needed in terms of feedback. Will endeavour to produce more pics/video in future posts. Cheers Feillyne.

Exactly. I would love it if when your news gets archived you could just get a simple reason msged to you like 'your news article at the time of archiving contained only 1 picture. It's advisable to post as much new fresh media & content as you can if you would like to have your news featured on the front page. '

Maybe just give the moderators a dropdown box of the most common 7 reasons and an 'other' box that lets them fill out a reason.

I have not had many problems recently but I am sure it would help everyone else.

Well, I think better explanation for the "archived" status in general would be reasonable. I had a tutorial archived that had absolutely no formatting or spelling errors, but it was still archived and I didn't even really know what it meant, especially since it was authorized normally and I didn't get an idea what I did wrong. That you HAVE to add images is generally quite a stupid rule, especially for tutorials and also for news. I think that clean plain text without formatting or spelling errors should be enough.

No it isn't enough. Many developers add not just well-formatted error-free articles, they also take their VERY precious time uploading and embedding brand new & fresh media - and if you, Yldrania, authorised every article that is nothing more than just words you would bump every last quality well-made media-rich article down and off the front page thus hiding them and preventing them from receiving their much deserved spotlight.

Generally readers will glance at the news to find something eye catching (images, .gifs, video) then read further if they see something they like.

Its always best to use images to explain what your showcasing, for tutorials this is even more important.

Videos work even better as you get the information to your readers / viewers in a more direct fashion.

Edited by: TKAzA

The current media standards are:

IndieDB

5 media pieces embedded; screenshots, renders, concept art, static or animated GIFs, Sketchfab previews, audio excerpts (NB you can also upload mp3 files not just vids to your Videos section) or one, at least one minute long, video, embedded in the article and not merely linked via a preview image, the video has to be playable. Only your own media, someone else's let's plays and art should be added only as bonus or extra. Sometimes dev posts that include "inspiration" art from other games may be featured, but well, in the end, every article is individually reviewed. Sometimes code snippets are also treated like they were media pieces, depends on the final quality of the news to be or not to be featured.

ModDB

4 images or 4 media pieces of other kind embedded, or one long enough video embedded (embedded not just linked or replaced with an image link). Someone else's good let's play videos are allowed in featurable mod news, as long as the modder does not try to take a front page spot every day of the week or something.

Double-featured news

Double-featured news is high quality indie news (media-rich, text content rich) that was frontpaged on two or three or four sister sites, for instance indie news that was homepaged on both ModDB and IndieDB even if it was not modding related. To have your news piece double-featured, your article has to be of substantially higher quality than one of the above standards, for example include both videos and images, or be a long article with tons of images included. Newcomer's news that needs exposure and higher quality news of regulars can also be bumped to the top of the front page: the time and date when you submitted your article does not matter, it is the news quality that does.

The above guidelines apply to all community news. News pieces posted by staff members (DBolical staff), technical issues news, site update announcements, special features and sponsored posts are all exempt. Exceptions are made for community news that is just below the standard (4 images indie news, 3 images mod news), but posts of that sort are almost always single-featured on one sister site, and almost never double-featured.

If you see any community news that does not follow those guidelines, it is most likely because the author, ignoring news quality standards, removed the staff-embedded or self-embedded yet obligatory media, or the media has been broken by a third party and does not show up, and you can report those cases via a quick PM with a link included in your message: Moddb.com

Edited by: feillyne