khosq.com

Digg and most such sharing services are mostly for US-related news. In 5 years since its launch, an Armenian-related story has never been on the front page of digg, and, frankly, doesn't stand the chance. Khosq focuses (though not exclusively) on Armenian-related Web - it's a place where Armenians from all over the world can share and discover most recommended content from the web that relates and matters to us both as humans with diverse interests and as Armenians.

In addition, you can't publish your own articles on Digg or StumbleUpon or Del.isio.us, but only post a link with a small description no more than 350 charachters. On khosq you can publish your own original articles even with attachments. Khosq is very different from Digg!!!

What's more is that Digg has often been criticized for it's populism, sensationalism and group-think mentality, as well as the undemocratic nature of the algorithm that governs the promotion procedure on Digg. All this is different on Khosq! What matters most to us is NOT the quantity of created user accounts, but the emphasis on our Community, which is reflected in the nature and quality of content on khosq.

KARMA is one of the most important concepts on Khosq.  Karma is a quantified representation of each user's "reputation" and credibility as a member of khosq. A person receives Karma points in the following fashion:

+1 karma point is added to you each time you Vote for other people's articles or comments.

+1 karma point for every thumb-up that other people gives you on one of your comments, 

+2 points every time you submit a new article.

+3 karma points are awarded to you each time someone votes up on your article.

So, for example, if you submit a new article you'll get +2 points, but if 6 people vote up on that article you'll get additional (6x3) +18 points. 
Karma helps to prioritise quality over quantity.  And it encourages people to Vote and submit new articles regularly. When a person's karma reaches a certain threshold he/she can gain access to more privileges and features.

These karma numbers also work in reverse for the "Down" votes. A person may submit junk and get +2 point, but if 4 people vote it down then he/she will loose -12 points.  Similarly, once a person's karma drops below certain threshold that account gets automatically blocked and deleted together with all the content that was submitted by that person.

The simple answer is be creative. There are few ways to get your article to the front page. Here are some of them:

1) Write a good article! This is the simplest and most reliable way. Articles on khosq are judged on the basis of how Important (as well as Interesting) they are. Each content on khosq is judged on its own!!! Someone may post a blog entry from a young and obscure blog, right next to an article written by an established journalist working for a major news-agency, and yet, if that blog entry has something important to say, khosq readers will notice it and vote it up.

2) Make Friends! The more friends you have on khosq the more likely is that each one of your friends will notice your article when they click "My Friends' Articles".

3) Invite more friends to khosq.com and ask them to read your articles and vote on them. Humans are not automated machines ;) Sometimes you need to ask them a little extra...

4) Post a link to your articles column on your blog or website. Your own column is located at http://khosq.com/articles/YOUR_NAME

5) Mention your khosq article on an external website (e.g your blog or comments of other people's blogs and news-sites). No need to ask people to vote for it explicitly, but it will draw more attention to your article and therefore more votes. (This method is actually quite effective).

6) Create a new Group and start building your own community around a specific topic of discussion, Marz or your local Diasporic community, political campaign, organization or business firm. And when you post new articles tick the audience checkbox for that group. Doing that will also copy the article to that group's column, and attract more attention to your article from people who are more interested in that topic.

Go to his/her profile page and click "Report". You must also give a good reason why you want this person blocked or banned.
Just because you disagree with his/her views is not a good enough reason. If that is the case, then just vote "Down" against his/her article or comment.

All you need to do is submit the URL address of that video. Khosq system will automatically recognize it and embed it for you. We currently support videos from YouTube, GoogleVideos, MetaCafe, Revver, iFilm, Spike, Veoh, Hulu and YahooVideo.

We provide various Tools to help Armenian webmasters and bloggers easily integrate khosq buttons, badges and widgets inside their websites or blogs.

The author of that particular article has the right to delete the comments that he/she doesn't like. It's their choice!
Also, remember that people can vote on comments too. If your comment received to many Thumb-down votes and reached a score below viewing threshold, then it won't be displayed.
In addition, through there is no direct moderation, if a comment contains spam, hate-speech, racism etc, the architects of the site may intervene and delete it. But on most such occasions khosq's Community would've already voted that comment down below viewing threshold.

Yes, but be careful - khosq users don't like anything that sounds like advertisement or spam. Your announcement must be important enough to receive positive votes from many of khosq's users. If you receive too many "Down" votes your karma level may drop to a point where you will be banned and your account with all your posts will be deleted.

There are several ways to do this:
1) go to your Inbox and go to the "Compose" tab or click link that says "Write new message". Once you're there, where it says "To" start typing the name of that user and the database will fetch the name from the first letters that you type.
2) Another way to send a message to someone is simply to go to his/her profile page and click "Send private message".
3) In addition, below the full view of every article there is link that says "Write to author".
Note: you can't send a private message to a particular member if he/she has chosen to disable his/her private messages Inbox. Similarly, you can't send a message if he/she has blocked you.

Sure! Just send us a message.