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Vote on the Reputation System


Ran
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Reputation System  

226 members have voted

  1. 1. Do you find the reputation system adds something of value to the board?

    • Yes
      49
    • No
      113
    • Maybe, if you change it a bit...
      42
    • Do not care either way.
      22
  2. 2. If you voted Yes, please indicate how strongly you feel about it. 1 is not strongly, 5 is very strongly.

    • 1
      13
    • 2
      13
    • 3
      26
    • 4
      16
    • 5
      17
    • 0 (Voted No)
      141
  3. 3. If you voted No, please indicate how strongly you feel about it. 1 is not strongly, 5 is very strongly.

    • 1
      21
    • 2
      15
    • 3
      37
    • 4
      23
    • 5
      30
    • 0 (Voted Yes)
      100
  4. 4. If you voted for changing it, which changes would you like to see to make the system more useful on the forum? You may select multiple options.

    • Positive voting only.
      23
    • Removal of the feature from General Chatter.
      23
    • Public voting history (i.e. everyone would see the most recent votes, and who initiated them; no more anonymity)
      54
    • Change how many points are available each day (for example, more positive and negative votes, or more positive and the same or fewer negative votes).
      31
    • Did not vote for changing
      140
  5. 5. Respond to this statement: Ran is awesome.

    • Yes.
      50
    • No.
      3
    • Maybe.
      21
    • Awesome? No. More like evil incarnate.
      28
    • My hovercraft is full of eels.
      78
    • Yeah, but I am awesomer.
      31
    • No, but I am still awesome so it's all good.
      15


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Protected naming conventions are no game, I assure you. For instance, the Vidalia onion ...

:rofl:

Post of the day. I laughed harder again when I saw someone had negatived the post. :lol::lol::lol:

I have an idea.

I had a simpler idea

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The fact that Ran has -180 reputation points says a lot about how seriously people are taking the whole system. Seeing how Ran is on the list of two boarders who get thanked by their real name in the acknowledgements section of A Feast for Crows and all. Some people probably use that as an argument to trash it, but that's my reason for keeping it. It's whimsical, silly meta that's ultimately harmless and occasionally rather amusing. The same kind of thing that people have come up with on their own over the years of this forum. I don't really look at it any differently than "profile view wars" or any other number of silly things that have been posted on the board over the years that were inspired by chat board antics or some RL gathering or whatever else. The difference being here, I suppose, that the rating system was just dumped into our laps rather than growing out of an inside joke between some boarders and some people aren't quite sure what to make of it.

Embrace the fact that it doesn't matter. Be at peace with the knowledge that if you post stating your desire to accumulate a positive reputation, you will get negative reputation points. Accept that if you post stating your wish to join Ran in Evil Incarnate land, you will get positive reputation points. Understand that making a post asking why you got negative reputation points is akin to asking to receive further negative reputation points. Maybe you have some negative reputation stalker, who smolders with generic rage and follows you from thread to thread giving you negative reputation points. You may even have a clique of negative reputation stalkers: take heart in the fact that some group of people have nothing better to do with their lives than nerd rage at you by putting -1 on every post of yours they can find. I, for one, would feel better about my own life if this was the case. Maybe you let your temper get the best of you for one post and you said something abrasive and people didn't like it. Maybe you meant to be abrasive and you can thus revel in your moment as an iconoclast. Maybe somebody meant to hit positive and they hit negative instead. Most likely it's completely disconnected from any reality that we human beings are capable of comprehending. It's also possible that nobody likes you, so maybe you should just take the hint and go away.

That said, there are going to be those rare times where there is some rational basis for a person, or a group of people, to offer either positive or negative votes. I think when an individual comes into a thread and nags about a grammatical pet peeve, then calls the OP and anyone else who uses this improper grammatical structure ignorant (which, as it happens, includes myself and everyone I know), then it shouldn't be a shock when some negative reaction to that commentary is expressed via the rating system, nor should it be especially surprising when the disbelief over the proliferation of those negative ratings becomes the subject of a new thread and some people choose to continue to express their disapproval of the entire situation. This is probably better than a flame war that derails the thread or gets the thread closed, or both. I would also argue that it's better than if the comment is completely ignored and receives no response whatsoever, but this is certainly a point where reasonable people can disagree, so I sure won't shed any tears if it goes away entirely either. The board's gone along fine without it before: that's fair. Hey, it was worth a try.

I do like the idea of removing the aggregate reputation of all posts by a particular boarder. That's a great suggestion. I would hope that would make it a lot more palatable for people, if there is no "permanent record". Then the new feature can realize its true destiny, which is probably to receive 98% of its use in Forum Games.

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I voted "don't care", but my official opinion is "Don't care. I'm down for whatever makes people stop worrying about it so much." It kind of reminds me of when I was 6 and my sister was 8 and my mom bought us a new toy to share. We couldn't agree on how to play with it, so after a couple of days, mom took that toy away from us. Forever. :crying:

However this turns out, it has been fascinating to observe the different reactions to the new system. I'm looking forward to the time in the not-so-distant future when we can all look back on the Post Rating Era and laugh at how silly all the drama was. :grouphug:

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I'm honestly perplexed and totally amused that people are taking this so amazingly seriously.

There's nothing actionable about it right now. It's barely noticeable. You can't even do things like slashdot where you filter out all negative comments past a threshold. It's useless and silly.

Why not keep it?

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I'm honestly perplexed and totally amused that people are taking this so amazingly seriously.

There's nothing actionable about it right now. It's barely noticeable. You can't even do things like slashdot where you filter out all negative comments past a threshold. It's useless and silly.

Why not keep it?

Exactly.

Its a little bit of fun that people are taking way too seriously. Its worth keeping JUST for the entertainment of people freaking out over nothing. Yes, nothing.

(Yes I laugh when people trip too.)

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The reputation system is driving some people away from the board, I've yet to see a benefit to post ratings that can make up for that. I think the feature should be removed.

Having said that I don't see why it can't be enabled/disabled on a per-user basis. It's just CSS, no? Wouldn't it be possible to create a modified version of the skin that doesn't display the reputation/voting elements? That way the people who don't like the feature can use that skin and browse the forum blissfully unaware of the popularity contest.

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I'd just like to add my voice to the "I can't believe people are so against this" group. I'm amused by the reactions, honestly.

(Yes, this is totally going to - my rep, but you know what, I don't care! But I do! I better mentally prepare myself for the berating I'm about to receive. *braces self*)

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I'd just like to add my voice to the "I can't believe people are so against this" group. I'm amused by the reactions, honestly.

(Yes, this is totally going to - my rep, but you know what, I don't care! But I do! I better mentally prepare myself for the berating I'm about to receive. *braces self*)

I gave you -1 because I wanted to see you cry. :P

This is the dumbest shit in the history of the board. Which is saying a lot.

That said, if people are honestly having their feelings hurt, then why not just get rid of it? The system doesn't add any value, so why bother with it if it's going to make (overly sensitive and serious) people upset?

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I gave you -1 because I wanted to see you cry. :P

This is the dumbest shit in the history of the board. Which is saying a lot.

That said, if people are honestly having their feelings hurt, then why not just get rid of it? The system doesn't add any value, so why bother with it if it's going to make (overly sensitive and serious) people upset?

:crying:

I don't think I like this rating thing, anymore. Can I change my vote?

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Wj,

I gave you -1 because I wanted to see you cry. tongue.gif

This is the dumbest shit in the history of the board. Which is saying a lot.

That said, if people are honestly having their feelings hurt, then why not just get rid of it? The system doesn't add any value, so why bother with it if it's going to make (overly sensitive and serious) people upset?

I think you've set out why I don't support the system. It adds very little and has show itself to be subject to rather nasty abuse. Regardless of how trivial some perceive the system to be or how neging people is all for the "lulz" its presence has been used for primarily juvenile teasing. It's unwelcoming for newbies. I'd like to see it to go the way of the dodo.

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Say, can we get the sats of how people are voting and correlate it with, like, longevity of board denizenship or gender or age or results of the political compass test or favorite ASOIAF book or which forum one posts in most or reputation received to date or...

I mean, wouldn't that be interesting? :blushing:

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It adds very little and has show itself to be subject to rather nasty abuse.
What nasty abuse?

People could in theory filter based on it (apparently) but they wouldn't, because no one's taking it seriously.

People could be all 'well, I'd believe you but your rating is low' but they can do that for any number of arbitrary reasons, so why does it matter?

People could decide to give some random boarder who posts insane drivel nothing but negative marks, but so what? It doesn't do anything. Heck, they're not even particularly good insults; who knows what it means?

What 'abuse' is there? Are you seriously being hurt because someone arbitrarily and without reason decided that you were a minus 1 that day?

The people who have been rated down the most have been the mods and the people who got into a snit because random people rated down their post. And the end result is...people getting their feelings hurt because they decided to.

Whatever. Like I answered above, I don't really care. It effects me not at all one way or another. But I'm continuously amused at the people who it does affect because they let it, as if it has any value whatsoever.

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Kalbear,

What nasty abuse?

People could in theory filter based on it (apparently) but they wouldn't, because no one's taking it seriously.

People could be all 'well, I'd believe you but your rating is low' but they can do that for any number of arbitrary reasons, so why does it matter?

People could decide to give some random boarder who posts insane drivel nothing but negative marks, but so what? It doesn't do anything. Heck, they're not even particularly good insults; who knows what it means?

What 'abuse' is there? Are you seriously being hurt because someone arbitrarily and without reason decided that you were a minus 1 that day?

No, I'm not saying I'm seriously hurt by the system. However, other's have been. See Chataya's reaction to be targeted for having the temerity to suggest the system be removed.

The people who have been rated down the most have been the mods and the people who got into a snit because random people rated down their post. And the end result is...people getting their feelings hurt because they decided to.

Whatever. Like I answered above, I don't really care. It effects me not at all one way or another. But I'm continuously amused at the people who it does affect because they let it, as if it has any value whatsoever.

The fact that you, and others, don't care about it's use suggests the system adds nothing but the ability to hurt some people's feelings. Therefore, why should the system remain?

Edited by Ser Scot A Ellison
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Personally, as my entire interaction with the board has consisted of either a) me saying something and being totally ignored, and B) me saying something and being aggressively shouted down, I'm pleasantly surprised to discover that I've somehow managed to accumulate a +15 reputation. Don't know how good that is, but hey, it's positive, which was unexpected.

Of course, now that I've said this, my reputation will be hacked up by vengeful bitter (and/or ironic) people, but still, for the moment of pleasant surprise, I vote to keep it.

After all, there are five sorts of people here:

- people who think they're unpopular but actually they aren't

- people who think they're unpopular and actually they are

- people who think they're popular but they aren't

- people who think they're popular and they are

- people who think nobody has an opinion about them, or that they are perfectly divisive, and who end up with ~0 reputation

The first lot benefit from this system by the boost to their egos.

The second lot lose nothing - they just get told what they already know.

The third lot have their egos damaged and get upset - but since this corrects a delusion that is unhelpful to both them and the board, this is a good thing in the long run

The fourth lot, again, just get told what they know.

The fifth lot don't get told anything - which isn't good, but leaves them no worse off than they were before.

EDIT: making it positive-only is the same as getting rid of it, as it makes it impossible to distinguish 'positive' from 'prominent' (and 'negative' from 'overlooked). Making it non-anonymous is the same as making it positive-only - because you can't vote people down if they can see you doing it (or you can, but it's likely to create a great deal of unpleasantness, bitterness and vendetta, so it's not a good idea).

Edited by Wastrel
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It seems to me that the people who are most vocal about getting rid of this are the ones who have decided that reputation is Serious Business. Me, I don't particularly care what my reputation is, and half my points are given in a joking rather than serious manner (i.e. rating Ran down, or negging people who complain most vocally about it). Maybe what's needed is for people to realise that the rating system is just a bit of fun, and develop some thicker skin regarding any negative votes they might receive.

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Malt,

It seems to me that the people who are most vocal about getting rid of this are the ones who have decided that reputation is Serious Business. Me, I don't particularly care what my reputation is, and half my points are given in a joking rather than serious manner (i.e. rating Ran down, or negging people who complain most vocally about it). Maybe what's needed is for people to realise that the rating system is just a bit of fun, and develop some thicker skin regarding any negative votes they might receive.

The fact that some perceive this as "a bit of fun." Does not mean everyone is going to agree. The fact that the down rating is hurtful to some is a reason to eliminate it as I don't see anyone really saying the system adds anything to the board. In my opinion, your fun shouldn't come at someone else's expense.

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