FAQ

We have listed answers to some frequently asked questions here. Click the question to view the answer.

Membership

Benefits

Profile and Password

Search

Activity

Articles

Photos

Following and Followers

Groups

Messages

Business Use

Community

General

Feedback

Answers

Membership

How do I join Kiribu?

It is free to become a member of Kiribu and benefit from all the features on the site. It is easy to join, we ask for the minimum of information to set up an account. Click here to sign up, and click here to view the Sign Up help page.

Why do I need a business account?

It is completely free to sign up to Kiribu if you are a business. Business accounts are the same as regular member accounts, but with some extra features specially added for Business users, such as the option to add more information about your business including maps, a link to your website, booking links and more. Read more about the account differences here.

Can I have a personal account and a business account?

Yes, but you must use a different email address for each account. Please don’t artificially publicize your business from your personal account. If we feel that you are abusing your accounts we will close them down.

Benefits

How do I win prizes on Kiribu?

Kiribu aims to get as many travel businesses signed up as possible, and we can’t do that without your help. As a thank you to members who have successfully invited businesses to join Kiribu, you will automatically be entered in to a prize draw if you have signed up a business. Every 500 entries will start a new draw. However, please only invite businesses if you have spoken to the manager. Don’t send random invitations by email. If you are reported sending spam your account will be shut down. For more information click here.

How do I make money with Kiribu?

Kiribu aims to get as many travel businesses signed up as possible, and we can’t do that without your help. As a thank you to members who have successfully invited businesses to join Kiribu, we will automatically pay out commission on any payments made to Kiribu by those businesses. Businesses can pay to have their profile appear at the top of the search results. However, please only invite businesses if you have spoken to the manager. Don’t send random invitations by email. If you are reported sending spam your account will be shut down. For more information click here.

Profile and Password

I can’t remember my password

With almost everything password protected it is hardly surprising that passwords are occasionally forgotten. It is not a problem though. Click ‘Sign In’ on the top right of the page and then click ‘Lost password?’. Just follow the instructions from there, and you’ll quickly be able to log in again.

I can’t remember my username

Usernames, passwords, pin numbers, the list is endless and it is easy to forget them. It is not a problem though. Click ‘Sign In’ on the top right of the page and then click ‘Lost password?’. Just follow the instructions from there, and you’ll quickly be able to log in again.

Can I change my password?

Of course. Many security experts recommend you change your password frequently, but it is entirely up to you.

  • From your homepage click on ‘Profile’ at the right end of the menu bar.
  • Select ‘Email & Password’ and follow the instructions.
  • Click ‘Save Changes’ to finish.

How can I stop receiving emails from Kiribu?

By default you will receive an email whenever there are updates to your Kiribu account. Sometimes this is useful, but you may find this annoying! To change your email settings just do the following:

  • From your homepage click on ‘Profile’ at the right end of the menu bar.
  • Select ‘Notices’.
  • Scan down the list and select if you want to receive an email for each event (Yes) or not (No).
  • Click ‘Save Changes’ to finish.

How can I update my profile?

Your profile page is where you can tell other users about yourself or your business. Business members can add more information which will tell customers about the services they offer.

  • From your homepage click on ‘Profile’ at the right end of the menu bar.
  • Select ‘Edit Profile’.
  • Scan down the list and add whatever information you wish. NOTE: you can restrict what people can see.
  • Click ‘Save Changes’ to finish.

See more the Profile help page here.

Can I find a map to a business?

If a business user has added directions to their account you can find them as follows.

  • Go to the business user’s home page
  • Select ‘Profile’ from the menu bar
  • Now select ‘Location’. This will show information about where they are. If it is blank, why not send them a message telling them they can add this information?

I would like to close my Kiribu account

Why would you want to do that! Kiribu is amazing! Of course, maybe you just don’t use it… We are of course sad to see you go. To close your account follow these steps:

  • From your homepage click on ‘Profile’ at the right end of the menu bar.
  • Select ‘Delete Account’.
  • Read the warning and tick the box to confirm.
  • Click ‘Delete My Account’ to close your account.

Be aware that all your content will be lost once you do this.

Search

How do I search for stuff?

Easy! You can search the site for anything using the search box below the logo at the top of the page. Search for businesses, articles, photos, locations, countries, members, groups, anything! Just type in what you are looking for and click ‘Search’.

The search results are grouped by type, including Articles, Members, Groups, etc. However select ‘Advanced Search Options’ to filter out unwanted results.

For more information about the Search feature click here.

Activity

What is Activity?

Activity lists all the stuff that you and all your connections have been up to. Every time you are active on Kiribu your activity stream is updated. For example if you Follow a new member or add a new Article. You can also update your status to tell your Followers what you are doing right now! For more information about Activity, click here.

Where can I see my Activity?

  • From your homepage click on ‘Activity’ at the left end of the menu bar.
  • Select ‘Personal’ to list all your activity.

Where can I see my friend’s Activity?

  • From your homepage click on ‘Activity’ at the left end of the menu bar.
  • Select ‘Following Only’ to list all the activity by members you are following.

Articles

How do I add an article?

This is easy! From your home page click the green ‘K’ with the pencil ‘Quick-Click’ button in the sidebar to go straight to the ‘Compose Article’ page. For full instructions on creating articles, click here.

Can I check my spelling?

If you’re article is in English, you can. We intend to support other languages in the future. Click the spelling icon on the Editor Tool bar to do a full grammar and spelling check. Left-clicking each highlighted word will tell you the problem and give suggested corrections.

How do I add a picture to my article?

When you compose an article on Kiribu you can insert images within it. At the right end of the editor tool bar is an ‘Upload & Add an Image’ button. Click this to insert images to your article. For full instructions on how to do this, check out our help section here.

How do I change the thumbnail image?

Only thumbnails of each image are displayed in the article. Kiribu tries its best to show the important part of the image, but sometimes it gets it wrong. You can control exactly what is displayed from the ‘Upload & Add an Image’ window. This is described in the Adding Images part under this help section.

Can I change the title image for my article?

When you insert pictures in to your article, one of them is chosen as the title image, and is used wherever the article is listed. You can easily change this from the ‘Upload & Add an Image’ window. Click here for complete instructions on how to do this.

Photos

How do I upload photos to Kiribu?

You can easily upload photos from your home page by clicking the green ‘K’ with the camera ‘Quick-Click’ button, which will take you straight to the ‘Add Photos’ page. For complete instructions on adding photos and creating albums, click here.

Can I upload full size images?

You can, but it is probably not the best idea. Currently the Kiribu photo uploader will upload the full image before processing it, so if you upload a 4Mb image (i.e. an image from a 10 megapixel camera) it will take quite a long time. After upload, Kiribu immediately scales your image down and discards the larger image. So, you would be better to resize your images before you upload them. We recommend to reduce the longest edge to around 800 pixels and save it as a JPEG file (which will be about 100x smaller). Click here for some different programmes you can use to resize your image.

How do I change the thumbnail image?

Only thumbnails of each image are displayed in the album. Kiribu tries its best to show the important part of the image, but sometimes it gets it wrong. You can control exactly what is displayed from the image uploader section. This is described in the Adding Images part under this help section.

Can I change the title photo for my album?

When you upload pictures to your album, one of them is chosen as the title image, and is used wherever the article is listed. You can easily change this by editing your album after uploading the images. Click here for complete instructions on how to change the order of your images.

After I upload a photo, I can’t see any information about it.

If there are internet connectivity problems or the image is too big the photo uploader sometimes fails to display the information properly. The best thing to do is to reduce the size of your image to a maximum length of 720 pixels and try uploading again.

Following and Followers

Either enter your contact’s name in the main search bar below the logo at the top of the page and click ‘Search’, or use the ‘Find people…’ box in the sidebar. Click here for more information.

How do I follow someone?

From the search results page, you can click the green ‘K’ with a ball and chain ‘Quick-Click’ button next to their name to follow them. Or, if you are on their homepage, you will find that button below their username in the sidebar. For more information about following, click here.

How do I block someone from following me?

You may chose to block any user from following you. They will be unable to follow you again once you have blocked them.

  • From your home page select ‘Follow’ on the primary menu bar
  • Select ‘Followers’ from the secondary menu
  • Click ‘Block Member’ and click ‘OK’ in the confirmation window

For more information about following, click here.

Can I block business followers?

At the moment you can only block each business individually after they follow you. We are considering a privacy option to block all business followers in the future.

How do I invite a friend to join Kiribu?

Please do invite your friends to join the Kiribu community.

  • From your home page select ‘Follow’ on the primary menu bar
  • Select ‘Invite New Members’ from the secondary menu
  • Enter the email addresses of your friends, you can add up to 5 at a time
  • Customize the Subject and Message if you wish
  • Select ‘Send Invites’

For more information about sending invites, click here.

Groups

Can I create a group?

Any member can create a group about anything, so long as it doesn’t break our Community Guidelines. You must be logged in to create a group, and you can invite Kiribu members to join. To create a group, either

  • Visit http://kiribu.com/groups/ and click Create a Group or
  • Select Groups from the primary menu bar on your home page and click Create a Group

Then follow the instructions. Click here for more information about creating Groups.

You can search Kiribu for anything via the main search bar. This will return all results including Group results, and you can filter the results to only show Group results. Further information about the search feature can be found here.

A second way to search information in Groups is to enter your search query in the Groups section of the sidebar. This will only search Groups for your query. Find detailed information here.

How do I join a group?

The easiest way to join a Group is to visit the Group home page and click ‘Join Group’ in the header. You can also search for Groups using the sidebar Groups search box and clicking ‘Join Group’ in the results listings. For more information click here.

How do I add my articles and albums to a group?

Can I leave a group?

Of course. From the Group homepage you can click ‘Leave Group’. However, you cannot leave a group if you are the only Administrator. You must promote another member to Admin before leaving the group. Click here for further info.

Can I delete a group?

Only the Administrator can delete a group, and once the group is deleted all the information associated with it will be lost. You can promote another member to Administrator so that you can leave the group. Click here for full details.

Messages

How do I know if I have a message?

You can view the number of new messages from your home page. If there is a number next to ‘Messages’ on the primary menu bar, that indicates the number of new messages you have received. Click here to find out more about accessing your inbox.

How can I send a message?

From your home page click ‘Messages’. This will take you to your inbox. Click ‘Compose’ to create a new message. If you are on another member’s home page you can select the Quick-Click send message button on the sidebar to message that user directly.

Business Use

Can I link to my own website?

Absolutely! One of the most frustrating things on the internet is that it can be difficult to find a business’ own website as most booking and information sites don’t share this information. Kiribu is all about making it as easy as possible for users to find all the information they need.

  • From your homepage click on ‘Profile’ at the right end of the menu bar
  • Select ‘Edit Profile’ and scroll down to ‘Website’. Enter your business website here.
  • Scroll to the bottom and click ‘Save Changes’
  • When a user clicks on ‘Profile’, they will see the link to your website here.

Where can I add directions to my business?

As a business member you can add a map, address and directions to help customers find your business.

  • From your homepage click on ‘Profile’ at the right end of the menu bar
  • Select ‘Edit Profile’ and scroll down to ‘Location’. Enter your business address here.
  • Scroll to the bottom and click ‘Save Changes’
  • Select ‘Location’ on the menu bar
  • Follow the instructions to find the co-ordinates of your business using google and enter them here
  • Add any information to help your customers find you in the directions box. This can include train or bus timetables, taxi fares, nearest airport, etc.
  • Scroll to the bottom and click ‘Save Changes’
  • When a user clicks ‘Location’ in your Profile menu, they will see maps and directions to your business.

Community

How do I rate an article or album?

You can only rate articles and albums by other members. Click here to find out how to rate an article and here to rate an album. If you are planning to give a low rating, please try to contact the author first to share your thoughts, or add a comment. They may be trying their best to write a good article and some feedback may help them improve it. For further information about the rating system click here.

How do I rate a business?

When you visit a business user’s homepage you will see the rating bar at the top of the sidebar, underneath the logo. Use the mouse pointer to select your rating, from 1 (lowest) to 5 (highest). If you are planning to give a low rating, please try to contact the business first to share your feelings. They may be able to apologise or offer an explanation. In most cases businesses are trying to do their best for their customers, but everyone can make a mistake. For further information about the rating system click here.

Can I comment on an article?

Yes, you can place comments. All articles, albums and photos have a comment box at the bottom, and so long as you are logged in you can contribute a comment. Please remember that there is a human behind each username and be considerate! Refer to our Community Guidelines for more information.

Can I prevent comments on my articles and albums?

Not at the moment. We will be introducing this feature shortly.

Can I prevent ratings on my articles and albums?

Not at the moment. We will be introducing this feature shortly.

Feedback

What is an Avatar?

An Avatar is the digital representation of you online. It could be an image or a name. Generally it represents the image associated with your account, so it could be a profile photo of you. On Kiribu your Avatar image is used to identify you across the website.

Can I connect with Twitter or Facebook?

You can set up your account to automatically post your Kiribu updates to Twitter and Facebook. It takes just 5 minutes to set up using TwitterFeed and RSS. Click here for detailed instructions. However, we don’t currently support sign-up using Twitter or Facebook accounts. Adding this feature is on our roadmap for 2011.

Feedback

I can’t find what I am looking for, what do I do?

We have tried to make the help documentation as complete as possible, but if you cannot find what you are looking for, then the best place to add your questions is in the Help group. Kiribu staff are always checking this group, and we will answer what we can.

I have some suggestions for improvements to Kiribu

Fantastic. We have quite a list of new features and improvements that we will be adding to Kiribu as they are ready, but please do send us your ideas and feedback as you may have thought of something we haven’t. Click here to send feedback.

‘Upload & Add an Image’ window