Welcome to our community based on true-life stories, or “fieldreports.” To participate, you need to become a member. If you haven’t already joined, then Sign Up.
The best way to start participating is by Reviewing. This is a simple process in which you read a FieldReport and give it a rating from 0 to 10 using the review slider.
To start reviewing, hit the Review button. You’ll get two randomly selected categories to choose from. Click on either category and the Review screen will come up. (If you don’t like either of the categories you were offered, you can click on More Choices, up to three times a day.)
FieldReport’s review system is designed to give every submission a fair chance and reward quality, without regard to popularity. That’s why you can’t directly choose what to review.
This is the heart of the Review Process. Read the FieldReport on the screen, and use the slider to give it a rating. When you’ve filled in this screen, hit continue and confirm your choices.
If you want, you can leave comments about this FieldReport on the final review screen, you can also “Give it a Nudge” if you think it’s underrated.
As a reviewer, you are acting as an impartial judge in the FieldReport Contest. If you should happen to be presented with a FieldReport you recognize, please review it as impartially as you can, in fairness to everyone.
If you want to help out a favorite FieldReport, select it OUTSIDE the review process and click “Give it a Nudge.” This guarantees that the FieldReport you have Nudged will get a further chance at reviewing. It also alerts reviewers to the fact that someone liked this FieldReport enough to Nudge it.
Nudging a FieldReport costs 3 review credits, and you can only Nudge someone else’s FieldReport, not your own.
To write a FieldReport or any other kind of work, hit the Write button. You can also open the Write screen by clicking the name of a document on your Me Page.
The Write screen has multiple fields, allowing you to enter the Title, Body, and other parts of your work. Note that the Body entry area has a special button at the bottom, allowing you to upload text from a Microsoft Word file. You can use the Write screen to create and edit both fieldreports—your entries into FieldReport contests—and Posts—which can be blog entries or any other kind of document you want people to see when they visit you on the site.
You’ll notice that one of the fields on the write page is called Author. FieldReport allows you to write under up to three pen names, or “personas.” If you want to change the authorship of this document, use the persona selector at the top of the screen. (You’ll find more information about personas at the end of this Quick Start Guide.)
At the very bottom of the Write screen (you’ll need to scroll) are four buttons. Use Save as Draft if this is a private work in progress. Click Publish as Post if you don’t want this document entered in contests, but you’d like people to see it when they visit your persona profile. Press cancel to quit your work without saving changes.
Click on Enter as FieldReport to enter your work into FieldReport contests. To enter, you will need to have filled out all required fields on the Write screen. You also need to make sure your work meets Submission Requirements.
Now that you’ve entered the contest, you’ll be taken to the Me page of your current persona, where your entry will be visible in the fieldreports listing.
You can enter as many fieldreports as you like. But you need to have five review credits to submit each one. (You earn these by reviewing on the site).
You will be able to make changes to your fieldreport until it has received a score through FieldReport’s reviewing process, a period of about two weeks.
Each member in FieldReport can use up to three personas. These function like writer’s pen names within our community. Using personas, you can publish yourself anonymously on FieldReport and even win prizes without revealing your identity to the public. Here are the most important things to remember about personas:
For more complete information, see Personas in the FieldReport FAQs
