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Comment by AmberShah | Hacker News Reader

That's a good question.

Code Anthem is different because...

1) Programmers are ranked based on how they do relative to everyone else, not pass/fail on some random, meaningless level. (like certifications)

2) The only thing that is rewarded is your skill at problem solving with code (ie. not coming back to the site every day). (like SO, RentaCoder)

3) By providing a profile page and badges, programmers can take control of their own career by proactively demonstrating their skill level.

4) Employers can contact job seekers based on their skill level, which is a recruitment process for programmers that -finally- makes sense.

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The online judges I'm talking about are like UVa. http://uva.onlinejudge.org/ People usually use it for ACM-ICPC training. Every Oj I know of can fulfill 1 and 2.

For 3, the innovation is the badge system.

No.4 is nice, it closes the gap between OJ users and employers. That's something OJ's lack.

Topcoder does all of what you told, except a badge system. That's just a small difference. You need something better to compete with Topcoder.

Maybe your platform support more languages? One can't hope to hire lisp programmers from looking though Topcoder's competitions records.

I hope this site become successful. I really don't like Topcoder's interface. xD

The largest difference between Code Anthem and TopCoder is that Code Anthem ranks you between 0-10 compared to other programmers, whereas TopCoder is a never-ending point system that rewards average programmers for spending more time on the site.

While certainly TopCoder is used by a fair number of people, I've never met a professional programmer "in the wild" that used it. The dollar prizes are actually a disincentive to well-paid programmers who can make that money guaranteed doing consulting, rather than throw their name in the hat in a contest.

Could you compare and contrast yourself with TopCoder? Or should I just wait and see?

The biggest difference is #2. Look at the high scorers on TopCoder. They have a ridiculous number of points, but are they really the best programmers? No, they are decent programmers who spend a great deal of time on the site. As a very good programmer who does not want to waste away their life on the site, you have no hope of coming close to them. Stack Overflow reputation is similar.

With Code Anthem you are scored in a language in between 20 minutes to an hour, depending on your own speed. After that you are ranked compared to all other people and there's no way to trade time for points.

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