Review Criteria

These guidelines were originally posted here in December 2010, but the page you’re on now is the one we’ll continue to keep current as we add to and evolve our review criteria.

I know I’m not the only one who has struggled with the decision to include affiliate links in my reviews. I want to support Ideaschema in every way I can, but I know that affiliate links often confuse a reader’s decision to engage — and I don’t want anyone reading this site to feel like it’s about buying a product. A large part of my goal is in removing impediments to your personal, social, and entrepreneurial development. For that reason, affiliate links have typically been an afterthought.

I care quite a bit about how effective we’re being in our pursuit to help rather than hinder, so if you have feedback, absolutely drop me a note — I want to hear from you.

Here is our current policy regarding project reviews:

1. Ideaschema can’t logically originate all possible projects that would be useful to its audience. I want you to have as much information as I can give you about the tools you can use to build your positive-impact empire. If something meets my criteria, I’ll share it.

2. What are my criteria, you ask?

• Did I find it personally or professionally useful in a way that made me excited to use it (and excited to refer back to it later)?
• Was it created by an individual or institution with integrity (in my opinion, and in the opinion of trusted colleagues)?
• Does it likely serve a greater goal than just providing income to the author? Support a worthy social cause, teach something I consider essential to my audience, or support the work of a hypercatalyst who is doing good in the world?
• Is it a product beneficial enough to our people to be something we would or could have offered at Ideaschema, if we’d had the idea or time or skill to create it originally?
• Does it excite my sense of purpose, and is it needed by a significant portion of our audience?
• Can I provide enough information about this project to allow my reader to make a really informed decision about whether it will be useful to them?
• And most importantly: Is it a product or initiative that we support enthusiastically regardless of any kind of affiliate arrangement?

3. Some info-points are more important than others. For instance, how the project is put together is relevant — if it’s not put together well, you won’t be able to benefit from it. If the project in question involves a price, the price should be matched well to the content and its likely benefit to the purchaser. Some projects sacrifice aesthetic design in favor of clear, well-organized information — which I’m okay with, despite being a bit of a design nerd. Some projects sacrifice conceptual design for wealth of content, which I’m less okay with, because I want these projects to be tools you can use. Occasionally, the wealth of content is so worth it, I’ll be excited about it anyway — but I’ll give you all my thoughts on the issue, so you can be informed, too.

4. My involvement in a project has little bearing on whether I’ll review it. I do my best to make good decisions about what projects I get personally involved in, of course, because I want to be proud of that involvement. (Duh.) Sometimes the results don’t meet my standards for review, though, and when that happens, I simply won’t review the project in question. Yeah, those incidents bug me a little. But it’s not worth it. I’d rather have a solid standard, and review less projects (and make way less affiliate dough), than necessarily pimp out every single thing I had my name in — because I want to be able to meet my own gaze in the mirror every morning, and be worthy of earning your trust.

5. Many of the projects I write about are created by people I have some kind of relationship with. This is just the way it goes; I am most aware of goings-on in my particular circles, and I am always going to be a little more familiar with projects initiated by colleagues, friends, clients and readers. Enthusiastic gushing isn’t the issue, exactly, because the projects I want to write about in the first place tend to be the ones that cause me to gush enthusiastically. The part that matters is what I already said once: My integrity and your trust are both really important to me. I certainly do not write reviews to curry social favor (gag) and I do my best to maintain a respectable level of objectivity.

6. Ideaschema gains ground when you purchase something using one of our links. I am maintaining the Spirit of the Affiliate Afterthought in that I refuse to write about a project just because it has an affiliate program (and have left a lot of potential affiliate income on the table because of that). When we do use an affiliate link, it’s an opportunity for us to continue to support our mission — and if our content helps you out and improves your lot, using our links is a great way to tell us so. Every little bit helps us keep doing what we’re doing.

If you have thoughts about this schema, we’d love to hear about it. Click here to drop me an email. And if you found this page because you were reading a review in the first place, all you need to do is hit the “back” button on your browser to head on back and finish what you were reading. :}