Administrative Message #123 - Free Mini Upgrades
Just a reminder to those who have the free mini upgrades, you have until February 29 to get your free ads submitted. Anything that comes in on March 1st will be deleted. I have already removed the free upgrades from the members who have used all of their free ads for the month.
This is also an English test.
Thanks,
Kelly

The free upgrades expire March 1st
The free upgrades expire February 29th
The sky is green and the grass is blue

So kelly when does the upgrade expire as you don't even really put it in your admin message..it says ads in by feb 29th but it doesn't say anything about when the actually upgrade expires.. So please explain and i hope you didn't delete any members who got it wrong as this is just not right..

I really do not think posting English tests in the open forum is a good idea

Anyway, I got that one too and had to think for a bit before deciding on the answer. I received one English test yesterday from another program and I spent about 10 minutes trying to figure out what the answer is. Finally I gave up because after spending about 10 minutes, I still could not figure it out. Cannot remember the exact contents of it though. Was a real brain twister. I guess it will pop up again the next time I try to check mails **sigh**

Edited to add: If I am not mistaken, there was already another admin message previously about the expiry of the free upgrade.

Why bring this here without even cointacting us thru the site or even our own forum? Thats not right either

I am not a member and i am not telling anyone to cheat but come on it is a little hard isn't it? Also i didn't mention the site name..
English tests should not be brain twisters especially when people do this to have an addiction..lol

edited to add the not part because the heat has got to me

I didn't say you did tell anyone but seems awfull funny your not a member bringing this here and dont even give us a chance to step back and look at it. I mean wow give me a chance to look at it before you bring it here to start something over everyone can make a booboo give a chance to look and say oh your right or no its ok Geez

I did remove it because it was confusing.

Ok, not sure what to say since you say you are not a member. But posting English tests in the open forum IMO beats the purpose of sending them. Even though you did not name the site, I got that one too. So it was not difficult to guess whose site it was.

I agree brain twisters are not really necessary to test someone's understanding, but well, I think it is best to contact the PO about it, which is what I am going to do if I don't manage to crack the real brain twister I got from another site (not one of Gene's).

I got the answer wrong, which means I failed the test

Thanks for removing it Gene

i got suspended by the owner, i was trying hard to figure out the right answer, so i chose what i thought was the correct answer thou i had doubts. And ended up being suspended
Sent a support ticket and got a second chance.... well nice..... but how about a solvable english test the next time around ?!
I am close to payout at that "unmentioned" site and nearly got a heart attack when i found my account supended as it took me 3 months+ to reach the earnings as this site is one of the slowest earners i came across in 5 years of PTR biz.
After i reach payout its byebye xxxxxxxx.

Hi,

This site is one of the ones I like to keep as it started in the days back then whith the crazy NPAs and I joined day 1, have the highest upgrade, saw at least 3 different owners, 3 different designs, my account was hacked into and someone tried to cash out adding their PP instead of mine in my profile, the account even totally vanished at one point .... so basically, I always had great help from the different owners and for me it is a bit a summarised version of the history of GPT with its bad and good 'souvenirs', so when I saw the english test I was a bit confused too but did really want to keep that account.

I replied the best I could but still was puzzled and so asked a friend what they should do and they told me they should use the contact button and explain the possible confusion, so that is what I did, I told them them that one could consider the expiration being Feb 29 at midnight or March 1 at 0.00.

This morning I found a reply in my mailbox saying that my account was ok and that they would look into the problem of this english test.

I think we all at times phrase something one way and think it is totally clear whereas others will understand it differently, I do like the fact that once they realised there was some confusion, they did the right thing and fixed the problem.

I however still don't know what was supposed to be the right answer
I said the 29th, Enchanted what did you say ?

1st March and I am sure it is wrong because another of Gene's sites sent an admin that the upgrades expire on the 29th of February

ROFLMAO, yup then it must be wrong

Yeah, I was suspended at two GAC sites because of this silly test.
However my accounts were reinstated as soon as my contact message was read, which was very soon.

Thanks, Gene!

BTW (I'm writing this because that admin msg was deleted - as per previous posts), they can't expire on 29th, because they're still active then - it says that you can send you ads until 29th which means on the 29th as well, which means that the upgrades expire on 1st of March which was the wrong answer [if they were to expire on the 29th then you couldn't send your ads in on the 29th]

Yes, I talked about it also because the test was discontinued but then, if we want to have fiun and play on semantics, could we consider that March 1, the upgrades don't expire, but have expired already .... ?

ex·pire (k-spr)
v. ex·pired, ex·pir·ing, ex·pires
v.intr.
1. To come to an end; terminate: My membership in the club has expired.
2. To breathe one's last breath; die: The patient expired early this morning.
3. To exhale; breathe out.
v.tr.
1. To breathe (something) out.
2. Archaic To give (something) off.

I think we could go in circle here and those who were not confused by the test should be suspended (just kidding he !)

As English is my mother tongue, I'd like to think that I've got a pretty good grasp of the English language and I have to add, that there have been quite a few english tests lately that have bordered on tricky even for me. I think that when a program owner sees longtime members of known english countries where the vast majority are replying incorrectly, a little common sense should be used and the poll results considered prior to removing any members.

I'm sorry for the horrible English test I sent out I didn't mean for it to be confusing. I should have put Feb 29 and then 2 crazy answers instead of 2 dates and 1 crazy answer. I personally hate English tests and would have preferred to have just sent an admin message letting the members know they had until the 29th to get their ads in.

Not a member of the site, however in regards to all sites who send out english tests..........

First and foremost the owner themselves should be english literate.

Secondly, unless program owners are going to take into account all the nuances within the english language that even exists between the english speaking generations of those who have english as a first language, then the tests should not be given.

Even between Americans and British people who all speak "English" there is a distinct difference between words used and their meanings. What comes across to some as slang, is nothing more than one areas form of conversation.

Simply put, the only english test fair would be to ask members to check/tic a specific answer.

I still find the english tests unfair to not only those who speak english as a second language but to those english speaking members who may have a problem with dyslexia, interpretation of things read etc. (btw, read in this instance is pronounced red but in other instances it would be pronounced reed and both are still spelled read sounding different while giving the meaning if not familiar of red as in color and reed as in an instrument mouth part)

just out of curiousity, for those of you who are members at ME, what grade do I get

I try to make the english tests so that anyone with "just" enough english, or the ability to use a dictionary, can pass and also try to make it as simple as possible for those who are confused by words but it's been a real long, long time since my Dick, Jane & Spot days and writing a "simple" english test isn't really that simple

astrange, I personally don't have a problem with the english tests at ME and find them reasonable.

Non-scientific evidence seems to show that the propensity to send brain-twisting English tests is directly proportional to site debt.

thanks for the laugh!

I've a sneaky suspicion your evidence is persuasive.

Lately I think my native language is typo~nese maybe I should not make any tests for a bit



Anyways.... I try to leave lots of room for interpretation.... very often more than one answer is actually correct, however there is ALWAYS one that is very incorrect and it is those that I mark as wrong, the others I just ignore.

If some answers are going to be ignored and only one will be considered absolutely wrong, what is the point? Why not make it simple enough so that it will be easy for you to determine if your members can read and understand the English language? Why not have less answers to choose from?

POs do not need to make the English test so confusing that one needs a dictionary to figure it out or anything like that. They should be simple enough for everyone to understand and leave nothing open to interpretation.

For example:

John has 2 apples.

How many apples does John have?

a. 2
b. 50

See what I mean? There is no room for interpretation in that question. One answer is clearly right, the other is clearly wrong.

English tests should not be in riddles, should not have alternate answers, and should be clear and concise. If a PO allows for a marginal error, they are defeating the purpose of the test. Which should be "Can all my members read and understand English?"

I understand the need for English tests and they are somewhat helpful. But if they are confusing to the point of needing a dictionary or so difficult where the PO has to leave room for errors, then the PO has defeated the purpose and shouldn't even bother sending them out.

just having a couple of answers doesn't work because those who do not understand will guess. 95% of the "wrong" answers I get are choice #1. others will pick the very last choice hoping it's the right one and a rare few will be brave and pick something in the middle.

it's also, imo, illogical to think that every non native english speaker will know all the simple words that we, as english speakers, do. for those who really are trying to learn english I would guess they have a dictionary/translator handy to translate english words into their native language.

English tests should, like all other cheat detection methods, be only one part of looking for a pattern of behavior. Failing one test, clicking one bad link, hitting one bad turring # should not lead directly to suspention. I clicked a cheat link once just before one of my kids ask me something. I was horrified to turn back to the screen and see the timer on the cheat link window just hitting zero. When I contacted the PO about it she repied that she had already assumed it had been some sort of error because I had been such a good member for so long. My lost points were even restored to my account. Using a one time pass or fail, especially tricky ones, is IMO a sign of a PO trying to decrease member base or a new PO that doesn't know any better yet.

BTW, what do all think of this one? This is from a long time ago, so no one needs to comment on posting english tests on a public forum. I'm not bringing it up to complain about ancient histiory. I'm just interested in opinions on this variety of test.

What color are apples?
A yellow
B red
C black
D green

When I contacted the PO about being unsure of the right answer I was was told she was just looking for poeple that checked black. Well, OK, but what about all the honest members that had to waste twenty minutes considering their answer before picking red and hoping for the best?

imo that would be a bad english test, I think it's better to have only 1 correct answer. personally I would be willing to at least hear a member's reasoning as to why they incorrectly picked an answer, but for the majority of members there should be only 1 clear choice.

a much better question for that test would have been "What color do apples NOT normally come in?"

People who don't actually understand and read English are going to guess no matter how many choices there are. By having only one correct answer and only one incorrect there is no room for interpretation.

An English test does not need to be so hard where someone needs a doctorate in English to get the right answer. Obviously, if a person can figure out how to sign up for a site and enter their information and click on a link and do all the other things they need to do in order to get their payment, they have at the very least some kind of comprehension on the English language.

The trick questions, questions with multiple answers, and riddles are not the way to go because it leaves too much room for errors.

That has happened with me as well, where I've actually had to google to find the answer to the test and even then I wasn't 100% sure.

In my opinion, all the posters here who use "english" instead of "English", should fail the English test . At least, my professors of English would give them the worst mark.
Once, in my gymnasium, there were two brothers, from America. My gymnasium was called "The English gymnasium", all our professors were from Scotland. Once, we had an English test. One of the American brothers got "0" zero, and when he started complaining, the professor told him that here, in our country, if pupils want to get "1" (insufficient, the lowest mark", they need to know at least something. That James from North Carolina was the first one to get "0".

I have noticed that some webmasters whose English is terrible, ask from their members to solve English tests. I usually laugh...as I remember their terrible English...

In my opinion, correct English tests should be written by people, who have been educated for teaching English, and who have some knowledge of psychology, logics and philosophy. And, whose admin mails are written in the correct English language.

Just my opinion.. Because PTR is not a polygon for testing English. So often I wish to correct the mistakes on Home pages, as they are normally the ones which future members will read. What in case when the members whose English is much better than the program owners' English? Think...

Yes, I agree that this is a much better test question since there is only one obvious answer for it.

English tests should be easy to understand and should have only one correct answer.I remember one from 4 years ago that was easy for me some people have never been around animals....

Does a cat

1. Bark
2. Chirp
3. Meow
4. oink

I don't know this even in my own language, so once when sleeping at my sister's place, who had a cat which couldn't sleep and went around the place the whole night, I used our word to make the cat go away. But, my sister heard me, saying: hey, it's a cat, not a chicken . Now, nobody could say I don't know my language, am almost perfect in it, but have no idea how to make cats, dogs, hens etc. go away.

I don't think the animal sounds test is a good one. Ann, I think that - as a native speaker of English - you may be overestimating the obviousness of these sounds. Your "some people have never been around animals" sounds a bit condescending and I don't think there was a need for that. What is obvious to every child who grew up knowing that cats "meow" and pigs "oink" may not be so obvious to a person who did not have that childhood experience, even if their command of English is good otherwise and their childhood was full of animal encounters .

It wasn't until I studied English at university that I actually found out pigs "oinked" in English. What they do in Polish is "kwi kwi", which is substantially different. At that point, I certainly knew English well enough to be able to particiapte in ptr, had I known it existed. It's just not a subject that gets brought up in every day conversations.

QUOTE

POs do not need to make the English test so confusing that one needs a dictionary to figure it out or anything like that. They should be simple enough for everyone to understand and leave nothing open to interpretation.

For example:

John has 2 apples.

How many apples does John have?

a. 2
b. 50

I think this one, on the other hand, is an example of a pretty effective test, especially if the number of possible answers is increased to 3 or 4. Substituting the number with the word once (e.g. "John has two apples", but then "2" in the answer) would make it even better IMO.

I really liked the funny/silly tests when they first showed up. By now, though, I think the PO's keep repeating the same ideas and all these "purple cats with yellow tails" are just a tad too repetitive to be funny any more.

I also remember one test at Tesa's some months ago, where one of the answers (obviously wrong, as there was only one right answer) was "Do not eat yellow snow". My very first association was with snow that some dogs have peed on and I'm still not sure why it would have been wrong to advise/caution anyone not to eat that.

Hehehehe Triskell. Do not eat the yellow snow is the answer to any multi choice question.
There is a good one on lococlix.
"How many fingers do you have on your hand?"
Yes a tricky...make you sweat question ...because two of the answers to the question are 4 and 5.
Dont sweat it though...locolady gives ya a couple tries at it.
locotime

Not so sure about this one for an English test, loco. That's more of a riddle type question. (And what if someone has lost a finger on their hand? They would put the number of fingers they actually had and get it wrong.)

IMO, an English test should be simple and straight forward. Another example might be:

John has a red ball.

What color is John's ball?

a. Blue
b. Green
c. Yellow
d. Red

There is more than two choices and 3 answers are absolutely wrong. There is nothing tricky about it.

Nothing tricky about it, you get three choices. You only will see at the most two wrong answers before you get the right answer.
A bot will get it wrong hundreds of times. Bye bye bot.
Just a little fun.
locotime

To all newbies -

You need to pay FULL attention when doing this kind of English test.

The correct answer is b.

[Meanwhile the original 2 have made 48 small apples. And 48+2 = 50, if your remember correctly what you were taught in the school.]

Cheers,
Papy

Hehehehehe papnille. I like that one.
I guessed half of that amount but the answer was not there.
locotime

I think you have bunnies and apples confused Papy

I suggest when you create questions like this that have numbers in them, to truly screw up the bots and/or make sure the member can read English, use the number AND the word version of the number.

Example:

John has two apples.

How many apples does John have:
a. 2
b. 50

Notice the word "two" in the question and the number "2" as the answer.

Yeah, Triskell mentioned that in an earlier post. And I didn't even think about the bots when I initially gave the example. But I agree that it's a good idea to switch it up like that.

Actually, when I gave both examples, I was only thinking about determining if a member could read and understand English. Trying to find bots is a whole different realm for me. And I wouldn't have the first clue as to how to determine that. LOL