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New Community Site Offers Views From the Trenches
roby2358 writes " TrenchMice is a new community-moderated website that provides 'inside opinions and insights' about businesses and employers. But instead of the reporting bias toward management and venture capitalists that is so common in the mainstream media, on TrenchMice the opinions and information come from posts by the people in the trenches. Users — who can post anonymously if they choose — can provide topics, scoops, or comments, and there is a thorough rating system. To keep the site from turning into a 'whack-a-company' fest, users build up 'Cred' (something like Karma) as they provide insights on companies and employers. The site is based in Seattle and most of the early content is about Seattle companies, but they have ambitions to grow nationwide, with a goal is to see if a site based completely on open-source technology, and rigorously community moderated, can run on a pretty much automatic basis. Could be an interesting model for future social sites if it takes off. Full disclosure: I know these guys and have posted on the site, but I don't work for them."
It's called the major media. When you watch the politics headlines on CNN, or read the business section in your local newspaper, or consult your favorite website for the latest stock tips you are being given a look at how the employers want you to see their companies. From those points of view the trench mice are rarely mentioned as they're ultimately not important to the profit margin, stock price, or corporate merger goals. If the trench mice are mentioned in the major media you can be sure it is only to fulfill the poster child requirements. Corporations, like casinos, need a few superstar good stories and a few superstar bad stories just to keep the PR windmills turning.
the NPG electrode was replaced with carbon blac
What's the point of this site? I'm not flaming, I'm just not totally clear on this. Is this supposed to be a forum where the low guy on the totem pole offers his "insight" into where the company should be heading? Or is it a "vent about your lame boss" site?
The reason I'm asking is: Who will read it? Who is the intended audience?
I just went to the site and saw a bunch of names of people I've never heard of, and with almost 100% probability will never hear of.
I've seen sites with "critical mass" hurdles. But for this site to *begin* to have meaningful data to a majority of visitors, it would need millions of viewers.
------ The best brain training is now totally free : )
Anyone can post anonymous comments. But to post major pieces of information about a company ("scoops"), you have to be a member of the site. And if you're a member, other members rate your credibility.
So any _one_ piece of information can be wrong. But short of using only face-to-face meetings with people who carry three forms of identification, that's _always_ true of any online information source. The value comes, I think, from the "wisdom of the masses" (I didn't coin that phrase, I read it somewhere....). Like on Slashdot -- any one post could be crap. But with moderation and meta-moderation and karma, bad stuff _tends_ to disappear.