Membership Beta Is Ready And We Need Your Feedback!

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Has someone asked you to be their beta reader? If so congratulations — it’s a huge honor to be the first to read someone’s creative work. Of course, with that role comes a great deal of responsibility. The author is entrusting you to provide honest feedback, and to make that feedback as helpful and easy to understand as possible.

That’s why we’re inviting you to join the EA Desktop app beta: to test-drive our work, explore what’s new, and help us plan for the future. If you’re an Origin™ player, your friends list and progress on eligible games will carry over. And rest assured that you can still access all of your content on Origin, so you can pick where you play. Just be sure to segment them within your beta test so they don’t taint the feedback from your core beta testers. If you’re looking for ways to recruit volunteer beta testers, take a look at our previous post on sources for recruiting beta testers. Also check out our tester community, Betabound. With 90,000 members, we’re certain we can.

An in-app user feedback SDK automates some of the most tedious and annoying parts of beta testing so that you and your team can focus on fixing errors, refining the app, and iterating faster. If you’re in a race with competitors to be the first to market, you can speed up the testing period and release quicker with automated bug reports.

Ready

I was a beta reader for one of my college friends this weekend, and thought it could be useful to provide some tips on how to be a great beta reader.

1. Understand the author’s goals of this round of feedback

Sometimes authors send beta readers pretty polished manuscripts in which they’re looking for feedback on lingering plot holes, typos, or grammatical errors. Other times authors send beta readers a first or second draft and want feedback on plot or character inconsistencies, redundant scenes, or overarching theme problems.

It’s important to understand what kind of feedback the author is looking for so you don’t waste her time — or yours. It doesn’t make sense for you to keep a running list of every typo in the book if the author is going to have to rewrite entire scenes or chapters anyway.

2. Let the author know if you’re not in her target audience

The book I read over the weekend was paranormal with multiple mythological species, and that’s just not my thing. I like to think I have a pretty good eye for character development flaws and plot holes, so I was still eager to be a beta reader. But since feedback is always so subjective, and in my case I’m already biased against the genre, I wanted the author to understand where I was coming from to begin with.

3. Keep a notebook next to you at all times

The least helpful beta reader is one who reads (or skims) an entire novel, cover to cover, says, “That was good,” and gives some vague anecdotal feedback.

When I beta read, I take pages and pages of notes in a spiral notebook. If you’re not willing to do this, don’t agree to be someone’s beta reader. If something doesn’t make sense, or if I have a question, I jot it down immediately, along with the page number so the author can easily refer to what I’m talking about. I also note observations or thoughts that run through my head, like “Where’s Bob? Haven’t seen him in a while.” or “I found myself skimming the last few pages — there’s too much info dump here.”

4. Provide macro and micro feedback

Macro feedback: overarching problems that affect the entire novel. For example, a character doesn’t have a consistent voice either throughout the novel or between their dialogue and internal monologues.

Micro feedback: sentences or minor plot points that could be improved. For example, a European says, “crapola” or “eat my shorts,” and you think to yourself, “a native European would never say that.”

In your notes or conversation with your author, start with the macro feedback and work your way down to the micro feedback. Reference page numbers wherever possible.

5. Try to understand character’s motivations

Once you finish the book, take a while to mull it over. Sometimes there are things that stick out that aren’t on the page. How did the characters meet before the story began? Why would this character act the way she did? Did it make sense for the bad guy to want vengeance in the first place? If something doesn’t makes sense to you, write it down. If the author can then explain to you why a character acted a certain way, encourage her to work that background or explanation into the story.

6. Make sure the main character changes

Once important lesson I’ve learned, both as an author and a reader, is that the best books have protagonists that change throughout the story. There must be an inciting incident at the beginning that throws the protagonist for a loop, and they need to spend the book figuring out how to resolve their situation. And throughout, they need to grow in some way, to change, to become a more complete person by the end. So take a closer look at the author’s main character. Can you pinpoint how the character evolved throughout the book? If not, it’s important to let the author know. If you’re afraid you missed something — don’t be. If you didn’t catch it, it’s likely an agent/editor/reader wouldn’t see the character’s evolution either.

7. Point out what the author did well

Nobody likes receiving an editorial letter or notes entirely full of criticism. Boost the author’s self-esteem by pointing out the things you liked about the story. Ideally, open up with the positive feedback. They’ll likely read your notes or get on a call with you filled with trepidation, and saying good things first will put them at ease.

8. Be brutally honest

At the same time, you’re not doing your author any favors by hiding negative criticism. You are involved in this process to make sure YOU catch flaws with the novel — not the agents/editors. Authors usually don’t get second chances with agents, editors, or if self-publishing, the end reader. It’s on you to make sure the author knows what to fix prior to sending their manuscript to a less forgiving audience. When I sent my manuscript off to my beta readers, I asked them to be honest and not hold anything back. I’d MUCH rather hear negative criticism from them than from an Amazon reviewer.

Did I miss anything big? What would you add to the list? Let me know in the comments below!

Want to share this post? Here are a couple ready-made tweets:

Click to tweet: How to Be a Great Beta Reader and Give Helpful Feedback – http://bit.ly/1neepFX by @DianaUrban

Click to tweet: Being chosen as a beta reader is an honor, but it comes with much responsibility. Learn how to be a great beta reader: http://bit.ly/1neepFX

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What is flighting?

Flighting is the process of running Windows 10 Insider Preview Builds on your device. When you run these early versions of Windows and give us feedback, you can help us shape the future of Windows. Once you've registered for the program, you can run Insider Preview builds on as many devices as you want, each in the channel of your choice.

What are channels?

We release Insider Preview builds to you through channels, which are each designed to bring you a different experience based on the quality of Windows you need for your life and your device. When choosing a channel, you should keep in mind:

Membership Beta Is Ready And We Need Your Feedback For A

  1. How stable you need your device to be
  2. What level of issues you can handle on your device
  3. How early in development you'd like to see features and changes
  4. Whether or not you need Microsoft support

As we continue to evolve the way we’re building and releasing Windows in the future, we may introduce new channels to bring you new experiences.

Dev Channel

The Dev Channel is for highly technical users who love to be the first to see the latest features and updates for all things Windows. It will get builds that are earliest in a development cycle with the latest work-in-progress code from our engineers. These aren't always stable builds, and sometimes you will see issues that block key activities or require workarounds while flighting in this channel.

These builds aren't matched to a specific release, which means these may simply be the latest work-in-progress code from our engineers. New features and OS improvements in this channel will show up in future Windows 10 releases when they're ready, and we may deliver them as full OS build updates or servicing releases. Your feedback here will help our engineers with major fixes and changes to the latest code.

Beta Channel

The Beta Channel is for early adopters and IT professionals who want to see what's next or validate the latest Windows updates and features, but still need reliable updates that are validated by Microsoft.

As a part of the Beta Channel, you'll be seeing builds tied to a specific upcoming release, like 20H1 or 20H2. Your feedback will be especially important here, since it will help our engineers make sure that key issues are fixed before major releases.

Release Preview Channel

In the Release Preview Channel, Insiders and IT professionals get the upcoming version of Windows before it's released to the world, with advanced quality updates and certain key features. These builds are also supported by Microsoft if you're in the Windows Insider Program for Business.

Our move from rings to channels

For Windows Insiders who were already flighting, you were automatically moved to the new channel that corresponded to your old ring. The Fast ring moved to the Dev Channel, the Slow ring moved to the Beta Channel, and the Release Preview ring move to the Release Preview Channel.

IT administrators can still manage builds from the Beta Channel and Release Preview Channel using the same tools you'd used to manage your policies before or through Azure Marketplace virtual machines.

If you want to try out a new experience, go to Settings > Update & Security > Windows Insider Program to change your channel.

Membership Beta Is Ready And We Need Your Feedback Survey

Membership Beta Is Ready And We Need Your Feedback!

Switching between channels

If you've installed an Insider Preview build in the Beta Channel or Release Preview Channel, switching between channels is easy. But if you've installed a build in the Dev Channel, because it's not tied to a specific release, you'll have to do a clean install of Windows and reset your Windows Insider settings on that device to switch.

Switching from the Beta Channel or Release Preview Channel

  1. Go to Settings > Update & Security > Windows Insider Program.
  2. Under Pick your Insider settings, select your current channel to open all the channel options.
  3. Choose the radio button beside the channel you'd like to switch to. Your Settings will update to your new channel.
  4. The next time you receive an update, it will be for your new channel.

Switching from the Dev Channel

  1. Once you've reinstalled Windows, go to Settings > Update & Security > Windows Insider Program to set up your device again, making sure you select the channel you'd like to move to. Learn more about setting up your device.

Understanding updates

After you've set up your device and installed your first Insider Preview build, you'll start getting updates based on the channel experience you picked. With each new update, you'll see a new build number, and that number can help you understand what you'll see in the build.

Major builds

Major builds can include new features, updates, bug fixes, application changes, and more. You'll know you received a major build when the build number increased by one or more from your previous build. You will see major builds in the Dev Channel, Beta Channel, and Release Preview Channel.

Minor builds

Also known as servicing or cumulative updates, minor builds give you small bug fixes, updates, or changes that work with a major build that's already been released. You'll know you received a minor build when the build number increases by decimal points. While there's no set rules about when you'll see minor builds, usually they'll be rare in the Dev Channel, attached to major builds in the Beta Channel, and released between select major builds in the Release Preview Channel.

Membership Beta Is Ready And We Need Your Feedback Test

Note

Membership Beta Is Ready And We Need Your Feedback Homeostasis

If you're having issues receiving Insider Preview builds, would like to stop receiving preview builds, or would like to leave the program, learn more in our troubleshooting section.