Make No Mistake, Getting Activities into Plus 3 is Front and Center

We have moved the data entry, the lifeblood, the way you make it count, to the front and center of the page and we are trying to make it smarter and faster. Let me tell you how.

We realized that we have some idea of what you do. And we also know that people often have routines or schedules that they follow. So we figured we can use that information for your benefit.

Start Typing = Smart Typing

If you have a history on Plus 3, once you start typing we look for the most common things you do that have those letters/words in them. We serve them up on a hot platter.

If you choose one of the past titles, then we automatically take a stab at the Sport, the Duration, and the Distance.

You can overwrite them, or simply press Enter and Done and be, well, Done.

Some of the Details Behind the Form

So what we do is some background processing every now and then that build a little profile of what you do. We can then use this to your advantage. If you enter the same things often, like "Gentle Yoga" for an hour, then type "G" and we will put up Gentle Yoga, and you can select it and we'll put in One Hour, and you can then press Enter and Done.

+ / - Day - If you press Enter and Add Another, we clone everything you just wrote and you can use the + / - day to move the date and then get in a bunch of Yoga session with just a few clicks.

Default Sport - we also note what Sport you do most often and that is how we sort the pull down menu for sports. So if you do a lot of Ultimate Frisbee, then it will be the defualt sport and you no longer have to scroll to the abosolute bottom of the list to get your fix in.

Steps - we are starting to count steps too, as we get ready to allow for pedometers. If you do a running or walking oriented sport, we'll put in 2,000 steps for a mile walk or 1,400 per mile running. If you know your steps per mile, you can overwrite. Soon we'll let you put in Steps if you know those and we'll put in the miles. The steps also show up on the Activity page.

Calories - if you go to the Activity page, you'll also see that we have added a SIMPLE calories count for each sport. This is step one, we'll improve this over time, too, giving you some control over the number based on your age/sex/height/weight.

Steps and Calories on the Activty Summary

How to upload

Uploading Activities from Garmin GPS devices is as simple as plugging the device into your computer and letting Plus 3 transfer the data right to the website. If you use a Garmin, we can actually validate routes, validate pace and distance, validate speeds and streets; all things that allow us to put more value on GPS tracked Activities. So, the bottom line is, a GPS Activity yields 2-times the value of a hand entered Activity. (Please see the Garmin compatibility section in the FAQs for a current list of compatible GPS devices.)

Plug your Garmin device into the USB port on your computer with the cable or Ant Stick provided with your device.
Click on the Home tab at the top of the page. Select Upload Activity:

If you haven't already installed the Garmin Communicator Plug-In, you will be prompted to install it. Otherwise, Plus 3 will find the connected Garmin devices. Select the device you want to upload from.

Plus 3 will find only the Activities on your Garmin that haven't already been uploaded to your account.

Choose an Activity that you want to upload and select the Sport, enter a Name, Description, and Tags*. Click on Upload Activity.

* Tags are a great way to describe and classify your Activity so later it can be found by searching or browsing. Tags can be any word or phrase chosen by the Activity owner. It's wise to choose words that other members might use for searches, like "5K", "Marathon", or "Century". You can even use names of places like "Rancho" or "Boston", or the type of Activity like "Ski" or "Running". Use the name of your bike "Nomad" or "Trek", or the shoes you were wearing "Ahnu" or "Nike".* Using words like "Race" or "Training" can be useful so that later you can search for these types of events. More than one tag can be used in an Activity, just remember to separate them with commas.

The Activity will take a short time to process and a message will display explaining that it is finished and how much was earned for your Cause.



When you return to your Home page or the Activities page, your Activity is in the list, which is sorted by Activity date.



The Kudos and Dollars that you earned for entering this GPS Activity will be added to your totals displayed on your home page. Also, if the Activity was marked Public, it will contribute towards the monthly points on your Leader Board.



If you have any questions or problems uploading to Plus 3 from your GPS device, please email Plus 3 Support.

How to use your Home Page

Upon logging into Plus 3 Network, you will be brought to your Home Page. The Home Page is organized and packed full of useful information and fun features, including Personal Stats, Latest Activities, Leader Boards, Messages from Plus 3, and more! Anytime you want to get back to your Home Page, click on the Home tab, which is the leftmost tab at the top of your screen.


Under the words Making it Count at the top of the page is a tally of how much money has been moved to worthwhile Causes from Plus 3 Sponsors based on Activities logged by all Plus 3 Memhers.
1) The leftmost section of the Summary Bar contains Profile Information. (You will find more information on changing your profile in section 8. of this How To page.)
2) The next section titled My Stats This Month shows the current month's totals of Kudos*, Dollars moved to your Cause, Hours of Activities logged, and Miles logged.
3) The next section titled My Stats This Year shows the current tally of Kudos*, Dollars, Hours, and Miles for the calendar year.
4) The My Messages section will display links to any Friend or Group Requests.
5) The My Goals section displays any Challenges that you're participating in and gives a summary of Challenge progress.

* When you log an Activity on The Plus 3 Network, either by simply filling out our form on your Home page "by hand" or by uploading with a GPS, we apply our Kudos to the Activity. By identifying it as a run, an hour in the gym, a walk, a game of soccer, or other -- we apply a reward Kudos value that matches that Activity (i.e. 21 Kudos per mile or 26 Kudos per hour, depending on the Activity.) Then based on what your Sponsor has pledged, we convert your Kudos to charitable dollars for your Cause.


The area below can be used to log your Activities (either hand-enter or upload from a GPS device) to Make it Count for your Cause. (For details on logging your Activities, refer to How To Hand Enter Activities or How to Upload from a Garmin in sections 1 & 2 of this HowTo page)


In the center of the Home Page is the Activity Feed, the summary of the 20 Latest Activities. Choices to filter to see a list of Mine, Mine+Friends, and Everyone's are available. Each Activity name is a link to the Activity itself, as is the Activity Owner, Cause/Sponsor and Comments. You can see at a glance the sport, the distance/time, and how much each Activity earned for the Cause. At the bottom is a button to view the next group of 20 Activities. Take a minute to click around on anything orange on the Activity Feed to get information about Activities, member profiles, Sponsor/Causes, comments, etc.


If you click on Mine , you will get a summary list of the last 20 Activities that you entered. You can see at a glance the sport, the distance, the date and time, which Activities you marked as private, if anyone has made comments, and how much each Activity earned for your Cause. Clicking on the Activity Title will allow you to edit the Activity.


On the Rightmost column of the Home Page you will see information about your Cause & Sponsor. Click on Visit My Clubhouse Page to be taken to your own Cause/Sponsor Clubhouse to see more information and updates about your Sponsor and Cause, as well as view other members who are Making it Count for the same Cause.


Below the Cause/Sponsor area is the News section. Check this area frequently for messages from Plus 3 on tips, events, news, and more!


Below the News area is is the Friends section. Several of your friends will be randomly selected and displayed in this area. If your friend has not uploaded a picture, they will appear as a gray faceless silhouette--you should urge them to upload a smiling face! Clicking on View All Friends will take you to the People tab where you can see all of your friends.


Below the Friends area is the Leader Board. The Leader Board shows a running total of Kudos earned for the top 20 people on the Board. See how you stack up in Kudos raised against your friends. You can toggle between viewing Everyone's Activities or Mine + Friends . If you don't like your position on the Leader Board, let Plus 3 motivate you to add a workout to your week. Who knows, you might bump yourself up a notch on the Leader Board! (Note: only Public Activities contribute to Leader Board Kudo totals. Kudos earned from Private Activities still raise $ for your Cause, but they won't show up on the Leader Board.



At the bottom of the page is the Plus 3 Footer. The Footer contains lots of fun and useful information with links to articles on the Plus 3 blog, links to the eStore, information on how to contact Support, and some FAQs. Check the Footer frequently for tidbits of Plus 3 information!



That's it! Use your Home Page fully and frequently!

Who Sees What

We have have these settings:

• Public (Green Label)
• Friends (Blue Label)
• Friends and Co-Workers - (Only for our Wellness Clients - Orange Label)
• Private (Red Label)

that you can apply to your Profile and to your Activities.

Here is how it looks on the Activity Feed:

Profile Compared to Activities

There are two places you can apply Privacy settings: your Profile and your Activities.

Below we'll go into detail on the settings and where you can apply them.

NOTE: The default, when you join Plus 3 is PUBLIC.

You can change those defaults on your Profile Page.

First a word about Kudos, Dollars and Privacy

All your Kudos are converted to money for your charity, both private and public.

In order to have a fun system to build a leader board, there has to be transparency and the ability for anybody to marvel at your achievements or call bull pucky on questionable posts (usually we find these to simply be mistakes).

So our general rule is that for leaderboards and challenges that are open to everyone, those Activities need to be set to PUBLIC.

Items set to Friends or Private or Co-Workers will not show up in your Kudos counters that are publicly viewed. They will show up in your personal dashboards that only you can see.

We have also changed the Kudos counter on the Dashboard to show which of your Kudos are Public of your total Kudos (Private, Friends Only, etc.) number.

Profile compared to Activities

Profile and Activies. They are different.

Profile Page

On your Profile page, you can write stuff about yourself and when people click on your name on Plus 3, they can see what you have written about yourself, a fundransing dashboard and a summary of your Public Activities. You can edit your Profile from the Edit My Profile link.

A Private Profile displays the words "This Member has chosen to keep their Profile Private" when a Member or Guest clicks on your name.

A Public / Friends level Profile will show a summary like this:

for Members and Guests, and if your are at the Friends level with a Members, they too will see that page.

In the Edit My Profile you can set this Profile view to:

• Public
• Friends
• Friends and Co-Workers - (only for our Wellness Clients)
• Private

Public - Anybody can see this. And it shows up on web search engines.

Friends - Only people you have mutually accepted as a Friend on Plus 3 can see your Profile page, and the Activity summary will show Public and Friends level privacy Activities.

Private - Only you can see your summary Profile page. It also will hide your name from a search in the People tab. This will keep you hidden, but also make it hard for people to find you to be your friend. They can still find you IF you set up an Activity and mark it Public. Your name will show up in the Activity feed and on a Search on the Activity tab.

You can edit your Profile from the Edit My Profile link.

Activities

You can have Private Profile but still have Public Activities. So you may not want people to see a quick summary of your total Public Activities, but you still want to be on the leader boards and take part in the Challenges and the greater fun of Plus 3.

You can set a GLOBAL DEFAULT for your Activites in the Edit My Profile link. You can then change any individual Activity as you log it to be one of the three settings.

Then, when you enter a new Activity, your default will show, but you can change it on any individual Activity to any of the layers.

Public - Anyone can see this. The kudos from this Acivity will show up on your public leader boards and in challenges.

Friends - Only people you have identified as a mutual Friend on Plus 3 can see this. The Kudos raise money for your Charity, but the Kudos DO NOT show up on the Leader Boards nor any public dispaly of your Kudos.

Friends and Co-Workers (only for our Wellness Clients) - All your co-workers and anyone you have identified as a mutual friend can see this. The Kudos raise money for your Charity and they DO show up on your Clubhouse (your company specific leaderboards), but the Kudos DO NOT show up on the Public Leader Boards nor on any overall public display of your Kudos.

Private - Only you can see this. The Kudos raise money for your Charity, but the Kudos DO NOT show up on the Leader Boards nor any public display of your Kudos.

As we mentioned at the top, this is step one towards more granularity in how you control who sees what. Int he future we'll be adding more biometric things (letting you track weight, etc.) that will bring on more reasons to have richer privacy, so look for things to continue to evovle.

Some Notes on Privacy Best Practices of our Members

We know that being on a social network involves a lot of public trust. We can't ever be everything to everyone, so here are a couple things our members have done when they want more priacy.

Use your first name and Last initial to indetify yourself. Edit in Edit My Profile.

Don't start/end your GPS right from your doorstep. You can leave a couple Kudos on the table, but it gives you some obfuscation on your start/end points.

iPhone Note: Privacy Settings Disabled

These changes we make this week will diable the iPhone setting for privacy until we can update our iPhone app to see these new settings. We are working on that now.

What's a Wellness Client?

Plus 3 is a mixture of commercial companies doing good for Charity and companies who want to motivate thier employees to be active by giving to charity. We believe that getting everyone to to be active in support of charity and themselves is the big goal. So the companies on our site who want to support their emplyees have the need to group all thier employees onto leader boards and challenges where the level of privacy circles around just those borders. And they still want their employees to be part of the overall good.