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How to disable badges?
Newby here. In the first 5 minutes I earned a 'badge' for about each mouse click, with a related red dot over the bell icon on top, wasting my time. Is there a way to disable this childish nudging? Assuming we're among IT professionals here, we don't need this, do we?
WillemYKW , I asked same question 8.5 years ago Is it a way to switch off pop-up badge received notifications? | Microsoft Community Hub . But after receiving my first few badges which I guess takes, depends on activity, about a month, I totally forgot about them. On practice after that it will be one badge per year, nothing critical.
I'm not sure if option to disable badges notification was in previous release as discussed How to stop receiving messages and emails for ranks and badges? | Microsoft Community Hub . Not in current one. But on practice the rule is - more activities less budges you have.
MCT of nearly 15 years here - Wish I could like your comment more than once. These "badges" are cheap and childish. They make something that previously had value (being an MCT) into a joke..."Ooo! Look, I've just earnt my 10 people in your class badge. Yay me!"
Even my 9 year old autistic daughter thinks these are childish and only used by kindergarten kids to reward them for getting to the toilet on time. Is that honestly how MS see us professionals these days? I'm not sure if I should feel insulted or just pity them the quality of staff they must be employing if they think these badges hold any value.- Allen
Community Manager
BrianG Thanks for posting, point of clarification here - MCT badges are different from Microsoft Tech Community Badges (MTC). You won't earn any badges from the Microsoft Tech Community for the number of class participants.
Our badges at the moment are set to encourage and increase participation in the Microsoft Tech Community by making folks contributions feel rewarded. Could we do a better job? 100 Percent but the badging system for the community is not capable enough today for us to, for example, give someone an Excel Expert badge based upon their engagement and solutions in the excel community.
That kind of granularity is coming, and we have some further exciting roadmap items to look at how we could surface MS Learn Certificates and Badges through the community profile.by making folks contributions feel rewarded
I feel rewarded by serious interaction with humans. Never by anything generated by algorithms or bots.
but the badging system for the community is not capable enough today for us
My suggestion: switch it off or make it an opt-in in setting for those that grew up with TikTok. I run a few forums based on Discourse. That platform has a badging option as well, although not as over-the-top as this one. But it is always the first thing I disable after installing.
- Allen
Welcome to the Microsoft Tech Community WillemYKW and thank you for posting.
The direct answer to your question is no, everyone gets badges for engagement. This topic on badging has come up a few times and to be honest its split evenly between folks who like it and want it and those who don't. The badges you earn significantly decrease the longer you spend in the community, many users get to a point where the only badge they earn is their yearly anniversary badge.
I think what I would say to you directly is we are currently evaluating how we could better leverage the badging system in the new Aurora UI and we will launch a new badging system later. In the mean-time I hope you will continue to participate in the community and perhaps even offer insights on any badges you might like to see via our community ideas board.
All the best
Allen
