Frequently Asked Questions
Finding Solutions:
How do I find Creative Solutions?
What if I find multiple Creative Solutions that are similar?
Uploading Solutions:
How do I share Creative Solutions?
What makes a Creative Solution?
Where do I get the information for a Creative Solution?
What if I only know a little bit about a Creative Solution?
What if I don’t know the Effects of a Creative Solution?
How do I calculate the yearly savings of a Creative Solution?
How do I track a Creative Solution?
How do I edit a Creative Solution?
What if I find something wrong in a Creative Solution?
How do I include Videos and Pictures in a Creative Solution?
What if I have a question about a specific Creative Solution?
How to Become an Expert:
Expert comments guide Creative Solutions. Individuals who have proven themselves to be experts in the world of sustainability are invited to be designated experts.
What are the privileges of being an expert?
User Profile:
How do I use Facebook Connect?
How do I change my picture or avatar?
Community:
How do I share Creative Citizen with friends?
How do I become a Top Citizen?
What is the Recent Activity Feed on the Main Page?
Featured and Sponsored Solutions:
How does a Creative Solution become a Featured Solution?
How does a Creative Solution become a Sponsored Solution?
How does Creative Citizen prevent against Greenwashing?
General:
How can you communicate with the Creative Citizen team?
What is Creative Citizen?
Creative Citizen® is the place for solutions, where people can easily find ways to save money, live green and be well. As a wiki service, Creative Citizen is powered by the community, where the world's solutions can be created, edited and shared. Creative Solutions exist within every single habit or action in our lives. From turning the water off while we brush our teeth to installing solar panels, taking one step at a time is the sensible path forward.
We at Creative Citizen seek to catalyze a community to save billions of gallons of water, gigawatts of energy, millions of tons of waste and as much carbon dioxide as humanly possible. At the same time, we will save people millions of dollars of wasteful spending.
What is Creative Solution?
Anything you can do to save money and resources. Habit, product, service or some combination of those that end up reducing environmental or waste. Each Creative Solution tracks the amount of money saved, carbon dioxide reduced, water preserved, waste prevented and electricity earned.
Creative Solutions are living beings, they are dynamic works-in-progress and always open to change. Creative Solutions are only as good as the information available in the world and the community working together to make sense of it all.
View a short how-to video, get the fast facts by reading highlights, watching a video or speaking with other creative citizens. If you find something wrong or missing, just press edit and make the changes yourself. If you've tried the solution and like it...or don't...leave a comment or criticism, then partake in a discussion. We must work together to pool our best practices. Creative Citizen is the venue and the tools; the people are the party.
How do I find Creative Solutions?
There are several ways you can find solutions. First and foremost, you can insert any keyword in our search bar. Put in such terms as home, kitchen, water, or car to find solutions that relate to those. You can also be more specific and find more efficient ways of composting or using a certain product. Creative Citizen is also a great way to find reviews and savings about green products or services. If there is a product that you want to know about, try searching for it.
You can also find solutions that are most recent, most popular, save the most money, waste, water, emissions, or energy. You can also browse by the most popular tags.
What is a Tag Cloud?
The tag cloud shows the keywords for all of the solutions that are tagged by our community. The bigger the word, the more solutions are associated with that tag. Click around and see what you can find.
What if I find multiple Creative Solutions that are similar?
If you find Creative Solutions that are simliar, just try and pick the one that is less developed and flag it. Once flagged, the editors over at Creative Citizen will look at the solution and delete it if it is truly duplicated in content. As a contributor, you could also merge the lesser-developed Creative Solution into the more thorough Creative Solution by seeing what morsels of information, links, videos or pictures the lesser one did have that would of value to the primary Creative Solution. Another method to notify people of potential overlapping solutions (one's that may work together or may be different solutions for the same problem) is to copy the link of the potential duplicate and post it as a comment or in the body of the similar Creative Solution.
It's important to help us note duplicates so that we can compile the most powerful and accurate Creative Solutions possible.
How do I share Creative Solutions?
You must be a registered user to share a Creative Solution. You can either create a new account, or use your Facebook account to login. Once you're logged in just click on the share a creative solution button in the top right corner. Fill in the required fields and click submit. It's that simple. If you want your solutions to be found by the Internet community and rank high in search engines check out our SEO White Paper at http://blog.creativecitizen.com/resources/
What makes a Creative Solution?
A Creative Solution is anything that has a beneficial effect on the environment, life, or the world at large. It can be either a habit, product or service; anything you can do to be environmentally friendly.
Where do I get the information for a Creative Solution?
You can get the information for a Creative Solution from anywhere. It could be from an article or book you read, it could be something you heard on TV or the radio, or it could be something you came up all on your own. Just make sure to give credit to the source if you get the information from someone else. It's important to give credit where credit is due.
What if I only know a little bit about a Creative Solution?
That's ok, just input as much as you know. If it's just one sentence, it might be better as a comment on another solution. The power of the Creative Citizen community is that when we are all working together, no one person has to know everything.
What if I don’t know the Effects of a Creative Solution?
That's alright, you can leave it blank. You might want to reach out to active members of the community to fill in the blanks. Just leave a comment on their profile and ask for some help. Before you know it, an Expert Creative Citizen will have come to the solution and added some facts and figures from the latest studies and reports. Be sure to check back to Creative Solutions to watch and partake in their development.
How do I calculate the yearly savings of a Creative Solution?
You do your best. You may or may not be a scientist, so all I expect is that you report what you know and if you don't know something, put an approximation. The community will find more information as time goes on and will update the information to keep it as accurate as possible.
How do I track a Creative Solution?
Just click the "I'll do it" button.
How do I edit a Creative Solution?
Just click on the "Edit" button.
What if I find something wrong in a Creative Solution?
You have the ability to edit the solution. Just click on the Edit button.
If you aren't sure about the change that should be made, but you know that something is wrong in a Creative Solution, leave a comment on the solution and someone will come along who does have the info.
How do I include Videos and Pictures in a Creative Solution?
You can upload videos on the "Share a Solution" screen and include the YouTube URL of a video (not the embed code).
What if I have a question about a specific Creative Solution?
Leave a comment on that solution or on the profile of the person who shared that solution. Or ask any Expert Citizen. They will have a red Creative Citizen logo denoting their status as a true expert.
What are the privileges of being an expert?
First and foremost each and every one of your comments are showcased in our Expert comments area. You are helping the community distinguish what green really is. Second, being a designated expert you have the ability to edit any solution (even if it’s locked). This gives you more power as an individual to help us distinguish the most effective habits, products, and services that reduce environmental and financial waste. Third, experts can see all revisions of a solution, even if they were not the creator of that solution, and revert back to more accurate versions.
How do I become an expert?
There are a few ways to become an expert: Creative Citizen will invite known leaders in the green community and the community will be able to view their expertise through the information contained in the personal profiles. We are scouring the site looking for active individuals who have either uploaded great solutions, edited solutions with great depth, or made great comments on solutions. These people will be invited to become experts based on their contributions to the Creative Citizen community and their eco-credentials. You can also simply e-mail us at experts@creativecitizen.com. Tell us why you want to become an expert and show us how you are a leader in the world of sustainability.
Why should I register?
While we've made every single solution at Creative Citizen open to the world (read: no registration required), in order to edit or add solutions, you have to be a registered user. This protects us from SPAM-artists. Also, in order to keep track of all the Creative Solutions you've pledged to do or have added to the community, you also have to have your own profile. Registration also allows you to take part in the community by leaving comments on Creative Solutions or on specific Citizens' profile pages. If you don't feel like registering for the site and have a Facebook account, just click the Facebook connect button and it will handle everything from there (thanks be to Facebook!).
How do I register?
You can either click the Become a Creative Citizen link on the top right, or if you have a Facebook account click the Facebook Connect button.
How do I use Facebook Connect?
Just click the Facebook Connect button and enter in your information. Don't worry, we don't store any information exchanged with Facebook, it is just used to authenticate you. We guarantee the safety of all your personal information.
How do I "Show Off My Green?"
While we're hearing so much about green, very few are really walking the walk. When you adopt all your Creative Solutions, your profile stores them all in a cool little display that you can share with your friends. Hey dudes and dudettes, this is what I do to be green! Share your profile on other social networks like Facebook and Twitter, include your simple URL at the bottom of your emails or use it as a marketing tool for your green business.
What is Greenage?
Greenage is a personal gauge for how active you are in the Creative Citizen community. The more you contribute to the community, the more your Greenage grows. In the very near future, we will have many cool ways for you to redeem your Greenage points at green stores online and off and at green events. To submit your ideas about how best to redeem Greenage, please email us at info@creativecitizen.com.
What are my Personal Effects?
Your personal effects are how much you save yearly due to the Creative Solutions you have adopted. We felt that "going green" should be less about the good feeling you get and more about the real results. As you know, the effects of any Creative Solution are given by the community, so if some of the numbers are wrong, make an edit and include your sources in the body of the Creative Solution or as a comment. If you for some reason can't do a Creative Solution any more (you've already pledged with the "I'll Do It" button), then click the "Can't Do It" button and it will be dropped from your list. You may want to leave a comment on the Creative Solution describing why you couldn't do it any more as this will likely help others in the community who are struggling with the same problems.
How do I change my password?
Click to login, then click "Forgot Your Password". You will then receive an e-mail that allows you to reset your password.
How do I change my username?
At this time we you do not have the ability to change your username. But if there is a super serious reason why you have to change it, please email us at info@creativecitizen.com.
How do I change my picture or avatar?
While you are logged in, from your profile click the "Edit Profile" button. There you have the ability to upload a new picture or avatar. For best results make sure your picture is sized to be 80x80 and isn't over 300K in size.
How do I add friends?
When on another Citizen's profile page, click the "Add Friend" button. Make sure you are logged in.
How do I share Creative Citizen with friends?
Click any one of the social media links throughout the site. You can use Facebook, Twitter or 120 of the most popular Social Bookmarking and sharing services. Whatever service you use most, you can be sure is available on Creative Citizen. Sharing your favorite Creative Solutions or Creative Citizens with your friends is one of the most powerful steps you can take to spread the good word. Share early and often!
How do I become a Top Citizen?
Become active on Creative Citizen: start commenting on solutions, submit solutions, and adopt the ones you do. The more you contribute to the community, the more likely we are to feature you as a Top Citizen.
What is the Recent Activity Feed on the Main Page?
The Recent Activity displays the Creative Solutions that the Creative Citizens have recently pledged to adopt into their daily lives. This way you can see what people are doing in live time. In the very near future, Creative Solutions that have been edited or commented on will also flow through the live feed.
How does a Creative Solution become a Featured Solution?
The Creative Citizen team noticed how innovative, thorough or generally amazing a Creative Solution is...our team of editors is always keeping an eye out for the best of the best. If a Creative Solution sparks a large discussion or a bunch of comments, we'll feature it: it's obviously interesting to the Creative Citizen community, so we'll feature it.
How does a Creative Solution become a Sponsored Solution?
Companies contact Creative Citizen about sponsorship opportunities and then support a Creative Solution by sponsoring it. This makes sure that more people will find the solution and that it will spend time on the front page of Creative Citizen. If you would like to sponsor a solution please contact sponsors@creativecitizen.com. If a company sponsors a Creative Solution that you think is greenwashing, comment on that solution with your reasons and links to articles or reports so that we can call them out on their false claims and help them to improve their products, services or company in general.
How does Creative Citizen prevent against Greenwashing?
We have a dedicated community that sniffs out greenwashed items. If you see anything that isn't green, feel free to make a comment about it or even edit the solution with your reasons, articles, reports or anything that proves that the product or service is...bogus. The company will then be forced to respond to those claims, right there on the Creative Solution. This creates a dialogue that has never taken place before, between the company and the community at large. If a company makes a green claim, the Creative Citizen community will be there to assess its quality and call it as we see it.
How can you communicate with the Creative Citizen team?
Check out our About Us and Contact Us page.
