Merit Badges on Writing.com

This article will help to explain the following –

1)What is a Merit Badge?
2) The different types of Merit Badge
3) What is the relevance of Merit Badges on Writing.com?
4) How to get Merit Badges
5) How to give Merit Badges
6) Where do I find my Merit Badges?
7) How to Commission a New Merit Badge
8) What is Community Recognition & how does it relate to Merit Badges?
9) What are achievement Merit Badges and how to get them?
10) Physical Merit Badges
11) Free Merit Badges!

1) A Merit Badge is a virtual token on Writing.Com which takes its inspiration from the badges Scouts and Guides would collect for completing tasks or achieving a goal. A Merit Badge appears as a round symbol with a picture inside denoting what the badge is for.

2) There are seven categories of Merit Badge which are as follows -

General – These are badges for all occasions – any member can send any of these. The descriptions are usually self-explanatory.

Kudos & Quotes – These badges are for encouragement or to congratulate – any member can send any of these.

Genre – There is one of these for each of the different item genres on WDC – e.g. Travel, News, Music etc – any member can send any of these.

Astrology – There is one of these for each sign of the zodiac – any member can send any of these.

Type – There is one of these for each of the different item types on WDC – e.g. Poetry, Campfire, Wordsearch – any member can send any of these.

WDC Official – These are the sites’ official badges – members can send some of these, but most are only given out by the WDC staff for official site run contests and activities.

Group – This is the largest collection of merit badges and have all been commissioned by individual members to represent a group or activity they run, or are a part of, or simply to represent themselves. Some of these can be sent by all members, but most of them can only be sent by specific members – usually those who have commissioned them.

3) Merit Badges are virtual tokens which members like to collect for fun, to encourage them to challenge themselves, or to increase their community recognition tally. Members may also like to send them as tokens of recognition, appreciation, friendship, or to raise funds by way of WDC’s virtual currency – the Gift Point, or GP. Members often also like to express their interests, writing style, or personality through the badges they collect, send, or commission.

Avidly collecting, sending, or commissioning Merit Badges is not an essential part of being a Writing.com member, it is entirely optional. However you may find yourself becoming addicted over time!

4) Merit Badges are given from members to members. Only members of WDC can send you a Merit Badge. You cannot send yourself a Merit Badge. You can get Merit Badges by

- Entering and winning contests, both member run and site run
- “Winning” them in games and activities
- Being given them by other members
- “Buying” them from other members who are offering them for sale.

There is no rule against asking another member to send you a Merit Badge, or offering to buy one off somebody, although in general most people wait to be offered or sent one.

5) In order to give someone a Merit Badge you can either –

- Go to the Community Tab in your Portfolio, click on “Give a Badge”, click on the badge you want to give, then click on “Jump to Bottom”, enter the Username of the person you would like to gift the badge to, enter a description of why you are giving the badge, then confirm and pay.

OR

- Click on the Portfolio of the person you want to give a badge to, go to their Community Tab, then click on “Give a Badge” and follow instructions as above.
Sending a Merit Badge to another member costs 10 000 WDC GP’s. This is the equivalent of one American dollar, or 78 British pence.

6) Your Merit Badges can be found in your Portfolio under the “Community” tab.

7) Members can make a request for a New Merit Badge of their own choosing to be designed and created by The StoryMistress .
This costs 500 000 Gift Points
In order to request a badge, this form should be completed –

SURVEY

Commission a Custom Merit Badge  (E) Order a custom merit badge from the StoryMistress for the community, yourself, or a group! #1976223 by The StoryMistress

8) Community Recognition (sometimes abbreviated to CR) is displayed as a number in brackets after a member’s handle – Jellyfish . It relates in general to how active a person is on Writing.Com.

Community Recognition Points are awarded for various things on WDC, one of them being one CR point for each qualified Merit Badge received. In order to be a ”qualified” badge, it cannot be given to a single person by the same member within a 7 day period.

So for example

I give Schnujo's Doing NaNoWriMo? a Merit Badge on Monday 5th August – it’s qualified and will count towards her CR

I then give her another merit badge on Friday 9th August – she still gets it, but it isn’t qualified and does not count towards her CR

Another scenario

I decide to give Adherennium - Maybe Writing? A badge on Monday 5th August and it counts towards his CR

I then given him another badge on Thursday 15th August and that counts towards his CR too because 7 days has past since the last one I gave him.

There is nothing to say that you can’t give the same member more than one merit badge within a seven day period – but most members would prefer that it counts towards their “number tally” – or Community Recognition. Sometimes you will see people saying things like “I will ensure the Merit Badges given as prizes for this contest will count towards your CR” – and that is what they mean.

9) Achievement Merit Badges are awarded to Members by Writing.Com for their involvement. Members must meet the criteria for these badges and cannot be awarded them by any other means (such as buying them with gift points or winning them in a game). This makes them slightly different to the list of recogntion Merit Badges above.

Achievements relate to things like posting a certain number of times on the Newsfeed, How many items you have reviewed, or how many years you have been on the site. You have to participate a lot to gain these kind of badges!

To check if you have accrued any achievement badges, go to “My Account” in the side bar, then “Achievements”.

Easier to accumulate are the “Streak” badges. There are four types of Streak badges – Visit Writing.Com, Send a Review, Post on the Newsfeed, Post in a Forum. For every seven days in a row you complete one of these tasks, you will automatically receive the relevant badge. There is no limit to how many of these you can be awarded. If you miss a day, the streak resets, and you will automatically start again. There is no stipulation to how long your newsfeed or forum posts must be.

10) A physical Merit Badge is the real life version of your virtual token! It comes as a small pin badge with the relevant picture on the front, which is sent to a member’s home through the mail by the Writing.com staff. Physical Merit Badges can be sent anywhere in the World. To order the physical version of one of your badges, click on the relevant badge in your Portfolio under the Community tab, and click the link to order it. You can also choose to send another member a physical version of the badge you are gifting them when you purchase their badge as per the instructions above if you wish to. Sending a Physical Merit Badge costs 32 500 WDC GP’s.

11) The free Merit Badge is very important! Once every 30 days, you will be able to send a virtual merit badge of your choice from the collection available to you for free – it will not cost you any GP’s. You may as well make the most of this offer – and make somebody’s day!

1365 words (without Writing ML)

Written for "WDC L'il Helper Contest"