As of now the integration of new VideoSift members into our community is lacking focus. The current focus is too much on old members. We should be more welcoming to new members and help them to keep this a mature community.

Hereby a list of practices and new features that could improve the current unbalanced situation:

*Make it possible to select to see just posts by non-starred members, bronze/silver/gold members in the unsifted queue (cf. "display new submitter videos only" in the unsifted video listing order).
This increases exposure to new members and experienced members can monitor new members.

*Create a link to the Top Users of the Past Week (e.g. http://www.videosift.com/weeklytopusers), just like the top users link. This means not just showing the Top 15 Users of the Past Week but the particular amount of votes of all members. This way new upcoming members can be spotted and motivated early on..

*Make a non-binding Sift etiquette. This could include guidelines like: experienced members should welcome new users in the comments of their first post(s) or on their profile; don't overpromote your own sifts; try to find the original video (one without a link advertising a person/organization that was not involved in the creation of the video); don't use Digg-like titles for your sifts; tag appropriately; allocate your post to as many appropriate channels as possible etc.

*Improve the FAQs by splitting it into FAQs and (binding) Rules (instead of and beyond "posting guidelines": this sounds too non-committal): this leads to more understanding/courtesy, less selflinking&snuff/porn posting, etc.

*et cetera.
What do you think of these ideas/what other ideas do you have?