Site News & Announcements

New Merit Badges And New Badge Tools!

Greetings Members,

We're pleased to announce new Merit Badges and more Merit Badge tools!

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:: New Merit Badges! ::
Based on suggestions from our members, we are pleased to introduce the
following 10 NEW Merit Badges:
         Appreciation,   Imagery,   Inner Beauty,   Judging,   Newsletters,
         Success,   Philosophy,   Campfires,   Groups,   and Web Pages.

Remember: You can gift Merit Badges to another member by accessing
the "Shop: Merit Badges" link in the "Gift Point Tools" pull down menu or
visit it directly at:
         http://www.writing.com/main/badges.php


:: New Merit Badge WritingML Tag! ::
Members who have received one or more Merit Badges can now include
them in their items and message forum posts with a new WritingML tag:
         {badge:######}
The "######" should be replaced with the Merit Badge's ID number. This
can be found below the badge image when viewing its detail screen.

The "badge" WritingML tag also supports random rotation of all publicly
viewable Merit Badges that you have received. The following WritingML
tag will show a random Badge each time it is loaded:
         {badge:random}

If you wish to display more than one random Badge in any one post or item,
you'll need to add a number after the word "random". For example:
         {badge:random1}
         {badge:random5}
         {badge:random10}

The "Image Limiting" member preference, which limits the number of images
shown in a forum post, also limits the number of Merit Badges per post.
The system will show the allowed number of images and badges separately.
For example, if you set the limit to 3, you will see up to 3 Images and
up to 3 Merit Badges per forum post.

Please note: Only the recipient of a Merit Badge can display it. The "badge"
WritingML tag will only work within your own Items, including Static Items,
Message Forums and posts, etc. The tag will NOT work in email. Additionally,
more formats for the "badge" WritingML tag may be added in the future.


:: New Public / Private Option Merit Badges! ::
More than 1,500 Merit Badges have been handed out since their release a
few months ago. Merit Badges are awarded for a variety of reasons,
some very personal in nature and others more on the humorous side.

To better accommodate our members, Merit Badges can now be marked as
"Privately Viewable" by the recipient if he/she wishes. Marking a
badge private will keep it for the recipient's viewing only. Merit Badges
can be switched from "Publicly Viewable" to "Private Only" or vice versa an
unlimited number of times with a quick click from its details screen.


:: ** Please Remember To Update Email Addresses! ** ::
If you're still using your OLD Stories.Com email address anywhere, this is an
early reminder that email service for Stories.Com addresses will end 12/31/03.
This will, for the most part, remove a lot of the SPAM being sent to our servers.

To ensure yourself a smooth transition, it is important that you update your
contact information anywhere you are still using a Stories.Com email address
before the service is turned of. (For our newer members: We changed our
address from Stories.Com to Writing.Com 1/1/03... this note is only intended
for members with accounts started under our Stories.Com domain name.)

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
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Thank you for your continued support of Writing.Com!
  ~~ The StoryMistress and
         The StoryMaster

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