Seeds and Gardens: a Flower example.

Let me elaborate the concept of seeds as a "rating" of content with the gardens and flowers imagery in mind.

Example. A pod/group is started by someone somewhere on Gaia, with a simple message, e.g. about relationships. It explores family life. There is a hub on Gaia.com devoted to relationships, represented by (for e.g.) a red colour/flower, like a rose. Someone visits the pod and contributes, while also quickly giving the author a red (rose) seed. Someone else visits, sees the potential, quickly throws the commenter a normal seed and leaves. After a few days, a few more posts appear, the topic is developed. The author gives red seeds to some interesting contributions, the contributors give red/normal seeds to the initial post and comments, etc.

On the pod author's garden circle, which grows greener, a red petal appears in the background: it shows that the user has authored some interesting content about relationships. On his (or her, please ladies excuse my continuous masculine language) "garden page" the graphics shows he has many seeds planted (large garden), and that some proportion of his garden (content) is about relationships. There is a pink/red link to the pod he created, either becoming bigger as it is given more seeds (cloud engine), or just showing in numbers how much roses and other seeds it was given.

Results. The author can thus see himself which of his content people appreciate more, possibly being inspired and concentrating his useful contributions on that area. His friends who really like this user (not because of any glows, but because they got to really know him) are now able to visit his garden and, thanks to vivid imagery and a neat combination of links, go on directly to read and enjoy the best of his content. The new (and old) users are now able to search for "rosy content" on Gaia and find, quickly and easily, both the user and his greatest, most relevant to their search, content. On the "relationship hub" on Gaia.com, the pod quickly moves up the list and gets the spotlight, since all "roses" are in any pod are added together to determine its "red rank". On the community page this topic also becomes popular, since seeds (all types), comments and views are added together to determine "hotness". In the possible event of an article on relationships in a (future) Gaia magazine or a seminar on relationships, this user is specifically invited to contribute, along with other users with "rosy" gardens.

Moreover. No ego boost as the user is not being praised or informed that he is more trusted and respected. Giving flowers (like applause) and giving personal gold medals is different things. So instead, such seeds work as inspiration and useful feedback (since now author sees why he got seeds, yet not from whom). Users may be inspired to give seeds and write interesting, quality posts if this leads to actual aesthetical pleasure of "tending" one's garden, filling it with various different colours, making it look and feel like a little home online, warm and welcoming. Instead of "popular users" somehow having greater power or more important votes, I suggest that users with greater gardens... Simply get more seeds to spend. It is logical: greener gardens, more seeds available to sow. Thus users with large gardens will be able to give two/three seeds at a time, and get their "seed bank" (rename to seed pouch!) replenished by two or more seeds per post. I also suggest that for every three seeds sown, one is added to the seeds pouch, so that people keen on giving seeds don't run out of them so fast. Also, the fact that, to make one's garden and garden circle look nicer one will need to contribute quality content on a wide range of topics, it could be a good exercise and a mild incentive for people to express themselves more, for communities but mainly for their own sake.

Let me suggest how the garden circle could look like, graphically. See below: the circle is green, except for admins for whom it's Gaia-purple. Yes, I suggest that admins should have gardens too, if at least to let us show you how much we appreciate you.

1. 1. Newcomer, no seeds received. Number of posts irrelevant.
2. 2. Newbie, 15 seeds, 7 blue, 3 purple. For flower "glows", glow1 is 3-9
3. 3. 50 seeds, 15 blue, 3 red. 5 purple. Flower glow2 is 10-50
4. 4. 100 seeds, 32 blue, 24 red, 6 purple, 4 violet, 2 yellow (not enough).
5. 5. 125 seeds, 37 blue, 39 red, 9 purple, 5 violet, 5 yellow.
6. 6. 500 seeds (wow!), 79 blue, 112 red, 27 purple, 9 violet, 37 yellow, 31 orange. The largest colour glow, glow3, I suggest is anything above 50.
7. 7. Admin, really into the violet topic. 75 seeds, 52 violet, 12 red, 4 orange.
8. 8. Same as 3, but also a group moderator, distinguished by a purple leaf.

garden circles1

garden page1

Gaia Name1