Let me start off by introducing myself to all the blog readers. My name is Kyle (username: puckett86), and I’m currently the Just For Fun category editor. This category is loaded with a wide variety of novel and addictive quizzes, but also happens to be home to quite a few quizzes that should have been contributed as private. In this post, I’ll discuss all the ins and outs of why a quiz should (or shouldn’t) be made private.
What is a private quiz?
What many Sporclers might not know about quiz creation is that there is an option to make quizzes not appear in User Contributed section nor Search results, but still playable by you and anyone you send a link of the quiz to. Private quizzes are a perfect opportunity for you to challenge your friends on things about you or to quiz your classmates on the upcoming test, but unfortunately the feature is often misused (or not used at all), which makes it very difficult for everyone to sort through the many quizzes that are contributed each day.
Ask yourself these questions before you contribute a quiz
- Does your quiz mention peoples’ names that most Sporclers wouldn’t know, such as friends, teachers, co-workers, or family (Exceptions can be made if you happen to be a member of the Baldwin family)?
- Is it a list of favorites, like your favorite color, sport, food, band, etc?
- Does is contain personal information like ages, genders, etc?
- Does it contain inside jokes?
- Does it contain images that most Sporclers wouldn’t recognize, like friends or personal items?
- Is it something that you wouldn’t want the general public to see? (Remember that thousands of people visit Sporcle each day!)
Although the list is not limited to these questions, if you answer “Yes” to any of them, then your quiz should probably be private.
How to make a quiz private
On the final tab of quiz creation, Finish Up, there is a small checkbox that says Make Game Public. By default, the box is checked. Unchecking the box will make your quiz private. Note that after you choose whether your quiz is public or private and then contribute it, that option cannot be changed by anyone but the Sporcle Admins. If you accidentally made a quiz public that should be private, or vice-versa, shoot a message over to Sporcle, and they’ll do their best to help you out.
Things to always keep in mind
As a warning, personal quizzes that are not marked as private might be marked private by Sporcle. In addition, some personal quizzes, such as those that defame people or use profane language, might be against Sporcle terms and thus could be removed – even quizzes that you mark as private are subject to removal if they violate terms. This behavior is monitored and could cause your user account to be blocked, so use good judgment when you contribute any quiz, public or private.
Get to work!
To summarize, always remember that making your quizzes private is an option, but if you have a good public quiz to contribute, go ahead and click Contribute Game because we all want to play it! And if you’re thinking about contributing in Just for Fun, remember that it’s a perfect place to contribute quizzes that are… well… just for fun. Where else can you name the U.S. Presidents in under one minute (or at least try), delicious sugary Cereals in Milk (warning: don’t take when hungry) or what Rick Astley wouldn’t do to you?
Thanks for reading, and if you have any questions, feel free to e-mail me at puckett86@yahoo.com.