Community Recognition

The Community Recognition Program is a way to recognize each person’s contributions to the Silverlight community. Answer questions or moderate in the forums, submit content to the gallery or showcase, and comment on a video are all ways people can contribute to the site.

Read the FAQs for more information.

Recognition Levels

The Program awards points for each person’s contributions to the site. As a person earns more points, he or she will progress through five different levels, starting with Member and ending with All-Star.

Points	UserName	Level
Member	Member	1 to 750
Participant	Participant	751 to 2,000
Contributor	Contributor	2,001 to 7,500
Star	Star	7,501 to 15,000
All-Star	All-Star	over 15,000

Hall of Fame

In the Silverlight community we have a number of people whose contributions help developers from all over the world. Visit the Hall of Fame page and view the stars.

If you’d like to rise through the levels and see your name in the Hall of Fame, all you need to do is participate in the ways listed below.

How to Earn Points

The program is very simple. Various activities on the site have points associated with them, and when a community member does that activity he or she will receive that many points. Specifically, here’s the current set of activities and points for each:

Location	Activity	Description	Points
Forums	Reply	You reply to a thread started by another member	2
	Answer Post	Your reply is marked as the answer	10
	Mark Post as Answer	You mark a post as the answer	1
	Moderate a Post **	You approve a post	1
Blogs	Aggregated Post **	Your weblog post is aggregated on the Community Blogs page	5
Content	Create Original Content	You submit an entry which is accepted for the site	100
Showcase	Submit an Entry	You submit an entry which is accepted for the showcase	10
Gallery	Submit an Entry	You submit a sample which is accepted for the gallery	25
Videos	Comment	You submit a comment on a video	1

Frequently Asked Questions

Do I start with any points?: As many members have already made valuable contributions to the forums, we have awarded 5 points for every post you have made prior to the program’s commencement. This is the baseline number of points that you start with.
Can I lose points?: Yes. There are four situations where you can lose points. First, if one of your posts is marked as the answer but later unmarked, you will lose the 10 points. Second, if you mark a post as answered but it is later unmarked, you will lose the 1 point. Third, if you submit a reply which is then deleted, you will lose the 1 point. Finally, if you breach the Terms of Use, you will lose 50 points.
Can I find out where my points are coming from?: Yes. A new tab called "Community Recognition" has been added to your profile, and that tab shows your points total for each area where you can earn points.
Won’t some people try to manipulate the system?: A. Yes, and where we determine that is occurring we reserve the right to either deduct points or ban the account.
What does "By Invitation Only" mean in the above list?: There are some activities on the site that only a subset of members can perform. For example, there are about ten community members that have their blogs aggregated on the French front page, which is not an activity that every member will be able to do.
Will you be expanding the set of activities that points can be earned from?: Yes. Over time we expect to expand this list of activities.
Where can I see who are the experts on the site?: Visit the Hall of Fame page.