by Karon Brandt

Created on: March 18, 2009   Last Updated: February 22, 2010

Helium has created a user-generated, fact-based article directory, which is earning a reputation for reliability and authenticity.

Helium is the sum of its staffers and writers. It pays a self-monitored community of writers who use Helium as an instant publication house to showcase their articles with their bylines. Helium fulfills the legal and business end of the partnership; the members write the articles for Helium's virtual "library."

Helium is highly motivated to encourage and reward its writers with incentives like stars and pay; writers are highly motivated to keep their platform "litter-free."

The writers are the raters, critics, and editors of all the material that flows through Helium. They flag improprieties, report plagiarized works so Helium can eliminate them, and they give feedback and encouragement to aspiring writers. Some members act as mentors to upcoming writers; others act as site stewards who oversee every article that is posted under their areas of expertise.

Helium is a writing community. Writers may be competitive within article titles, but professional, friendly Helium staffers and most writers have reached out to help a fellow Helium-ite at some time or other.

We have been "strongly encouraged" to post our photos and biographies on our "About me" pages. "Required" is a bit strongly worded, but how else could a "community" be formed without names, faces, and some kind of personal recognition? Within a community, we all try to identify our police officers, our teachers, ministers, crossing guards, councilpersons, etc.

When I read a magazine or newspaper article by Margaret Walker of Columbia, Ohio, and she claims to know all about her topic, would I read it if I strongly suspected she was "just another freelancer" who made up her bio to back up her story?

If Margaret wrote about Canada and then made a statement that she had never been outside the USA, would I find her "insight" credible? If she talked about raising a teenager as an unwed mother and then, in a follow-up article, declared she was actually a fireman, would I ever read another article by her/him again?

I understand why some people who write fiction decide to use pseudonyms that sound much more interesting or memorable than their given names. An assumed name can allow one much more freedom of expression; it protects one's identity.

We expect glamorous names for TV and movie personalities, but even they build up a reputation based on whatever names they use. We expect every

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