Offer badges for new users who are immediately productive

Question

This is an incentive for new users to put some thought and effort into learning how the site works and how to be productive, before posting their first question.

There should be three badges for this, and a page describing the badges and how to get them should be prominently featured when a new user logs in for the first time. All of this is negotiable, obviously, but here are my off-the-cuff suggestions for the requirements:

The Novice Badge (Bronze)

• User is registered
• User post two questions with no closed posts and no deletions, and receives at least one answer to one of the questions.

The Apprentice Badge (Silver)

In addition to the Bronze Requirements:

• User posts three answers with no post deletions.
• User achieves 50 rep and posts their first comment with no flags.

The Professional badge (Gold)

In addition to the Silver Requirements:

• User achieves 100 rep with answers, with no post deletions.
• User raises accept rate above zero.
• User votes up three posts.

Badges should be retroactive.

Answer 1

I think this idea has a fundamental flaw: new users who start participating by asking questions don't care about badges. They care only to have their questions answered. Badges only come later, once they start playing the game. If they ever do (not everyone does).

How do i parse html in java script in my android with regular expression plzsendtehcodez its urgent....... Whats a badges???

Answer 2

I think this complements Select from list of reasons when performing downvotes. The idea is encouraging new users to become productive without remarks that might seems snarky to a new user saying "Go read this" or seeing feedback that effectively says "you are asking bad questions".

I tend to browse meta every once in a while and I am shocked to see the number of people who ask "why was this question deleted" or "why can I no longer ask questions". We can fix that by encouraging people to read the FAQ and some of the important posts here on meta, but if you give new users easy milestones to say "you are doing a good job", it might be helpful and make them want to become invested in the site.

So easy milestones and incentives should be encouraged. Not sure I like the Gold and Silver badge criteria as they seem too easy. Borrowing Robert Harvey's original names and basic idea, I suggest something similar but more like:

The Novice Badge (Bronze)

• User is registered
• User post two questions with no closed posts and no deletions, and receives at least one answer to one of the questions.
• User has a non-negative score on all questions asked (edited from original)

The Apprentice Badge (Silver)

In addition to the Bronze Requirements:

• User achieves 100 rep with questions and answers, with no post deletions.
• User raises accept rate above 25%. (above 0% seems too easy)
• User votes up ten posts.

The Professional badge (Gold)

In addition to the Silver Requirements:

• User achieves 1000 rep with questions, answers, and suggested edits, with minimal post deletions
• User asks and answers separate questions on meta
• User votes up 100 posts (edited from original)

I removed the "no post deletions" from the gold badge as I think you are going to have some self-deletions if you hang around long enough to get to the rep milestone (usually 2 people who post absolutely identical answers at close to the same time).