How is it possible for a "person" to earn a 5-digit point count in just one week on Y!A?

1) Check their BA%. With a high BA%, it is possible. Even LEGALLY, though that is a bit harder. During my 'prime', I averaged about 3000 - 5000 points per week. I have ONE account (and always have) but a fairly high BA%, which helped. During that time, I did spend about 4-5 hours per day on the site - because I HAD to be in front of a computer ALL day, but had absolutely NO work to do on the computer. YA beat computer games, because at least I could help folks with my answers. I don't have the time to contribute this way NOW, of course, but back then, I was in the top 10 weekly scorers most weeks.

2) Another option is the LEGAL use of 'partners' (NOT multiple accounts). While it may not seem fair to US, it is NOT AGAINST the rules for 2 or more people to SHARE a single account. That way, they can easily answer in shifts - and post a LOT more answers and earn a LOT more points. Still perfectly legal on this site.

3) Finally, we come to the ILLEGAL way of doing it. Multiple accounts. Everybody knows it happens; everybody hates that it happens; most folks report people they suspect are doing it. But it takes a LOT of reporting and a LOT of proving to get something done about it. A few years ago, there was a user that was #1 on the Global YA Leaderboard (NOT the person who is currently #1). They were from Brazil or Argentina or something and were obviously pointgaming. It took almost a full year of reporting by folks in a lot of different countries to get that account suspended - but it DID eventually happen.

I am glad that you learned a lesson from your last two attempts at asking. I appreciate the fact that you are not ranting.

To answer your question, I actually have two theories as to why this can happen:

1. The user is cheating. Plain and simple, users cheat. In many cases if a user wants massive points they can cheat in two ways. The first is of course creating multiple accounts and awarding themselves best answers. The second way is to only answer questions that have 0 answers, and this can be done by answering questions asked days ago. Usually that gives them a chance to vote for their answer because they know they will get best answer if they are the only user to answer it.

2. The user obviously has too much free time and all they do is answer all day and all night. I would think this is a rare occurrence. But users like Stephen K I think are a prime example of this. He's the only user on this site to have over a million points. I don't think he cheated, but I think he spent WAY too much time on this site. Most likely hours and hours on end. I say this to say, some users literally have nothing else to do so they spend their time here and it adds up in time and points.

Those are just two theories which I think are true for some. I was never that curious I just assumed the users in question either cheated or lacked anything else to do. If they want to do either I don't care, because this site isn't that serious. It is just something I do for fun.

I have also wondered how a person can get in excess of 20, 000 points in a week, and be tops in math and high in home work. someone else asked a similar question the other day, and it was probably asked in other categories that I do not visit.

http://answers.yahoo.com/question/index;_ylt=AgUOc...

the only answer I can think of is someone without a life.

I am retired with nothing to do, and I do not get 20,000 points in a week

even the world leader only averages 5200 per week

and number 2 on the world weekly only got 11,288 last week

really makes one wonder