Introduction (FAQ)
What is ThotMarket?
ThotMarket.com is a social bookmarking website that provides links to interesting and useful content on the web. The links featured on ThotMarket have all been submitted by our users much like many other websites like Digg.com and Reddit.com. ThotMarket is a little different than those sites, however, in the way that these links are ranked. On this site, users buy and sell shares in these links very much like how investors trade shares of companies on the regular stock market. Links on the site are ranked by their market capitalization which is a measure of how money people have invested in it.
Wait a minute. Are people actually investing real money in this market?
No. ThotMarket is a virtual stock market, meaning that no actual money is involved. Users are actually just trading credits within the system.
Why would someone want to trade credits in a virtual stock market?
While the credits exchanged within the ThotMarket system have no monetary value, they do have value on the website. Users have to spend credits in order to post links on the site, create comments and send messages to other users. The more credit you amass in your ThotMarket account, the more influence you have over what the ThotMarket community is paying attention to. Here's how it works…
How does it work?
Visitors to ThotMarket.com are welcome to browse the lists of links to find interesting stuff on the web. If a visitor sees something online and wants to share it with others, they can add it to the system. First they have to create a free account. New users are awarded a bank balance to get them started. They can use the credit in their bank account to post a new link to the site. Like a company making an initial public offering (IPO), this link (which we call a 'thot') will be offered at a price set by the user. The user must ‘spend' this credit to make the offer to the market. Once the new thot is offered, other visitors can view and click on the link. Other users can now buy shares of this thot at whatever the trading price is at that time. All shareholders of a stock are required to set a selling price for thier shares. That is to say, at any given time, someone could come along an buy your shares as long as they pay you the amount that you desire. The posted trading price (the one on the tickers) will always reflect the lowest price offered by one of the shareholders. When you purchase shares of a stock, the market will automatically attempt to purchase as many shares from the lowest priced seller. If you buy all of that seller's shares, and there is still money left in your transaction, the system will attempt to purchase from the next highest selller. This process will continue until your transaction runs out of money to afford shares.
The process just described will drive the posted selling price of that thot up as you eliminated the previous low seller, By default the shares you purchase will be set to a selling price slightly higher than the price you payed for them, but you are free to change this selling price at any time. You can make your selling price as high or low as you wish. You will probably want to set your selling price at an amount that you believe buyers will accept, and will turn you a nice profit. Of course, if you wan to just hold on to your shares, you can set the selling price arbitrarily high if you wish. Keep in mind, however, that unsold shares wont make you any money, unless the stock pays out a dividend (which might happen from time to time). Because you can't unload shares until a willing buyer agrees to purchase them from you, you may have to consider setting your selling price lower to attract suitors.
There are other things you can spend your thollars on, however. You can post comments on thots, or send any other user a personal message. To send a personal message, you need to pay the recipient the amount they have posted for such action. If you want to post a comment, you ge to set the price, but keep in mind that comments are ordered by their individual values, so the more you invest n your comment, the higher up it will appear. Any money spent on comments is considered revenue of the thot to which it is associated. When enough revenue is collected, a thot will distribute the revenue back to its shareholders in the the form of a dividend payment. Dividends are distributed once a day are are divided evenly among shares, so the more of a thot that you own, the bigger your dividend payment will be.
There is a bit more to it than that. If you want to know more, you can review the Glossary, or better yet, dive right in and start an account.
If we're just exchanging ‘credits' on this website, why do you refer to them as dollars and use dollar signs ($) all over the site?
We use these terms on the site to make it easier for people to understand. The site uses the regular stock market as an analogy because people already understand the basic mechanism of it. Likewise, people immediately recognize the principles behind dollars and cents. The use of this language does in no way imply that actual money is being exchanged on the site. This is all spelled out in our Terms of Service, which you must agree to when you create an account.
Who can participate in ThotMarket?
Anyone that is human.
Can I offer a link to a site with which I have no affiliation?
Yes, absolutely. While some users may want to use ThotMarket to try to promote their own website, blog or podcast, the vast majority of thots are provided by individuals that just stumbled across something interesting on the web and want to share it with others.
What's to stop me from offering thots for all the major websites, like Google.com?
Nothing. Please offer whatever you think the market will respond to.
What's to stop me from just shamelessly promoting my own website?
Nothing. If your website offers compelling content and you think that the market will respond well to it, we hope you will promote it.
Does this cost me money?
No. No actual money is exchanged in this market. It is all virtual and only credit is traded in exchange for influence over what the community pays attention to.
Can I make money?
Yes, there are plenty of ways to make money. We suggest finding a job that you enjoy, find fulfilling, and makes the world a better place. You wont, however, make any money with ThotMarket, as we have explained earlier, this is just a virtual stock market.
Why is it called ThotMarket, shouldn't it be called ThoughtMarket?
ThotMarket is part of the web2.0 revolution, meaning that the site reflects the thoughts and interests of its community. It really reflects it, see how shiny our logo is, it's almost a mirror it's so shiny. As a card carrying member of revolution2.0, ThotMarket embraces all of the principles inherit within renaisance2.0 including: rounded corners, soft gradients, appending ‘2.0' to everything, the aforementioned shiny logos, as well as URLs that are clever plays on common words. We thot ‘thought' was just too 1.0-ey.
How is credit earned in ThotMarket?
There are five ways to earn credit in the ThotMarket system. First of all, you are provided a starting BALANCE when your account is first created. You can earn PROFIT by selling shares of a thot for a higher trading value than when you bought them. You can earn DIVIDENDS for each share of a thot that you own. DIVIDENDS are distributed as visitors click on the thot's link. You can also raise money by having others pay to send you personal messages.
What can we link to on ThotMarket?
You can link to pretty much anything that has a unique URL. That includes entire websites, individual blog postings, podcasts, RSS feeds, individual images, etc.
Can I edit a thot once I've offered it to the market?
You can edit parts of the thot if you are the controlling shareholder. At IPO this will be whoever offered the thot. This may change, however, if another investor acquires a majority stake (i.e. more shares than anyone else.) This person can edit the title and description.
But, what if a link changes, or goes bad?
You can't edit the URL associated with one of your thots once it is offered to the market. If the link subsequently goes bad, then the value to your shareholders will obviously decrease. If you are the shareholder of such a thot, we recommend that you dump your shares as quickly as possible before the thot is delisted.
Are thots ever removed from the market?
Yes, there are two ways. Thots are delisted when share value drops to junk status. Junk status is defined as having few shareholders and a market cap that is equal or less than what it was at the time of ipo. This only applies to thots that have been on the market at least one week. Thots can also be removed from the market manually by the webmaster in accordance with the site's Terms of Service. This could happen to any thot for any reason at any time. If a thot is removed in the manner, all shareholders will lose their investment in that thot.
How is the main list ranked?
Thots on the main list are ranked in such a way that those that are valued by investors are pushed to the head of the list. Factors in the calculation include: the Market Capitalization (or the sum total of money invested in the thot), the number of shareholders, and the time that the thot has been on the market. The time factor is considered to allow newer thots to compete with more established ones for placement. In general, the longer a thot has been on the market, marketcap plays a greater role n supporting its rank.
How are Thot Dividends calculated?
Thot dividends are funded entirely by the money spent by users to post comments on a given thot. If the total amount invested in comments exceeds a trigger threshold, a dividend will be sent to the shareholders at the end of the trading day. Unpaid comment income for thot rollsover to the next trading day.
No one is buying my thots. What can I do?
You can try to entice investors by lowering your selling price. You can try to entice investors buy offering dividends. You can trigger a dividend by posting comments on your thot. You can try to draw attention to your thot by advertising it using the daily Ad auction. Or, you can try to create attention offsite, by promoting your thot on other sites. There is embed code for each thot that will allow you to place a live ticker graphic on your website (or to discussion forums you post to). The embed code is available on the thot ‘s detail page. These are most effective when targeted toward groups that have a common interest in whatever your thot is about.
I ran out of money. Am I stuck?
No. Hopefully one of your investments will start to pay something so you can get back on your feet. Otherwise, you will eventually receive a modest hardship grant from the site administrator. These grants are sent out irregularly, and are funded entirely by the proceeds produced by the daily Ad Auction.
Does any activity happen with my account when I'm offline?
Yes. At any time, other investors might buy shares from you if they meet the selling price that you establish for your holdings. Your bank account will be credited in your absence. While you are offline, any advanced order may be executed if the triggers you set for them occur. You can receive dividends or personal messages from other users. If you are offline for more than a week, the system will begin to erode your selling prices. Each day that you don't log in to the system after a week of inactivity, your selling prices will deacrease by 2%/day. This is meant to allow holdings of users who have left the site to return to the public market eventually.
Can I just price my thot high enough to make it #1 on the list?
Yes, if you have, and want to spend, the credit to do this, go ahead.