Reputation Meter in Forums

[sensfan]

Concise description:

• Rate a certain post thumbs up or down, or make a section where you can 'thank' the useful post

Specifics/Details:

• On the post there would be a small section where you can click on a thumbs up or down to rate the post.
• After enough negatives it will hide the post as spam. With that we can get rid of the abuse button
• Or you can push the 'Thanks' button and you will have thanked the post because it was useful

How this will benefit the site and/or other comments:

• Gets closer to the other popular sites and their posting systems, etc. Youtube
• It will make mod's job easier
• It can tell after while who just posts blabberish or useless posts and who is really helpful and useful in their posts

Of course, this isn't necessary but I searched and couldnt find anything really alike. If it gets shot down, fine by me. But it would be cool

[MeDeFe]

It's an interesting idea, a few points, however:

The CC forum is not Youtube. A thread is not a collection of comments on something but a discussion in progress, as such the underlying dynamics are somewhat different.

The main issue I see, however, is that there's a certain abuse potential with the idea as you put it. A sufficiently large group of people could mark a post as spam if they merely disagree with the opinion of the poster, no matter how relevant an addition the post may have been in the first place.


A simple "like it/don't like it" system could have some potential though. Maybe some kind of medal for having a certain number of posts liked by a certain number of unique other posters. This could also help us mods assess what the rest of the community actually thinks of a post that has been reported as spam or trolling, where there is a certain amount of interpretational leeway.

[tec805]

In some chat program somewhere, some time in the distant past, I remember a thumbs up smiley (and thumbs down also) that were popular for positive/negative confirmation/vote. Every time I want to give a positive sign I have to use applause, which isn't quite the same.

Here's an image I found that looks oddly familiar but with more smilies


Here's a link to download 300+ smilies for phpBB3 http://www.404techsupport.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/04/smilies.zip

Not too hard and make bunches of people happy I bet (there would be a thumbs-up smiley there, but I couldn't find one!)

[Army of GOD]

Are you like the smiley-man?

[tec805]

I enjoy using them...

[Army of GOD]

No, I know but your avatar is a smiley too. I'm surprised your sig isn't.

[tec805]

Ah, now I understand. The avatar is something I've had for almost 20 years, I don't think about it being a smiley face. A friend made it for me when my nickname was "Happy Pirate" and I just kept the picture

[blakebowling]

I checked the smilies pack, and it is valid for phpBB3. Other than that, this just needs quite a bit of support.

[blakebowling]

In addition to what MeDeFe said: the phpBB forum software would not easily support this addition, and I don't recall any Modifications that would allow for this type of ratings.

[AndyDufresne]

There actually is a mod for something like this ---the 'Karma Mod' ---Twill, an old Community Manager of CC, and I discussed it a few years ago. http://www.phpbb.com/community/viewtopi ... &t=1861325

We investigated it back then. The idea was that to start out, only a certain forum could have karma ratings attached to it perhaps, and the only people that could karma would be a select few (say Team CC to start). Then they'd start to eventually Karma non-team folk, and then those folk would be able to karma, etc, thus expanding the pool of karma, while keeping it on a low end.

After evaluation I think it looked like it would cause more work and headaches over the long term than the positive or the good it would've provided.


--Andy

[Woodruff]

Concise description:

• Rate a certain post thumbs up or down, or make a section where you can 'thank' the useful post

Specifics/Details:

• On the post there would be a small section where you can click on a thumbs up or down to rate the post.
• After enough negatives it will hide the post as spam. With that we can get rid of the abuse button
• Or you can push the 'Thanks' button and you will have thanked the post because it was useful

How this will benefit the site and/or other comments:

• Gets closer to the other popular sites and their posting systems, etc. Youtube
• It will make mod's job easier
• It can tell after while who just posts blabberish or useless posts and who is really helpful and useful in their posts

Of course, this isn't necessary but I searched and couldnt find anything really alike. If it gets shot down, fine by me. But it would be cool

Yes, domination by the majority is always a good thing.

[Army of GOD]

How much support is needed? Couldn't you just like implement it right away? I feel like it's a 3 second thing to change and I don't know anyone who'd be against it...

[greenoaks]

I checked the smilies pack, and it is valid for phpBB3. Other than that, this just needs quite a bit of support.

i don't recall there being any support for the current smilies when they brought them in 3 years ago

in fact i remember a lot of complaints about the shape of the heads, they reminded everyone of an alien


the previous ones had round heads

[Ray Rider]

Concise description:

• A system for giving anonymous, basic + or - feedback to individual's posts throughout the forum

Specifics/Details:

• It's just a general idea, similar to what you see here or here. The first site has a colored "reputation meter," which is a great idea except it doesn't look like it has a negative option like the second site does.
• A + button if you want to give positive feedback, or a - button for negative feedback.
• No moderation of this reputation meter

How this will benefit the site and/or other comments:

• With one quick glance, a person's would be aware of whose posts to pay special attention to and who is probably just trolling again. Newcomers would find this especially useful.
• It would encourage more worthwhile, informative, or funny posts by people wanting to increase their reputation. Yes, some may play the system backwards (trying to get the lowest rating), but they would probably be very few and easy to identify, then block or ban. In a way, it would be self-moderation, since people posting stupid things would get a worse reputation and ignored, thus hopefully encouraging them to either post less or reform.
• Small + and - buttons on the bottom of each post and a reputation meter on the top wouldn't clutter up the forum too much.
• There would be a limit on the number of + and - ratings a person could give out per day, thereby somewhat limiting extreme abuse of the system in addition to making those ratings more valuable.

[Woodruff]

To piggy-back on this interesting idea, include the ability to set a user-defined filter that would block posts by users that reach a certain level of negative, much as current users' posts are blocked with a foe move. In this way, forum-foe'ing would no longer be necessary (or certainly not as necessary).

[Dukasaur]

This would be a nice idea if people could be trusted to use it honestly. Unfortunately, the majority of forum users seem intent on turning everything into a partisan mud-slinging match. Inside of five minutes they would hijack this "reputation meter" and it would tell you not whether their posts are readable or not, but whether they voted for Obama or McCain.

[owenshooter]

within these forums, this would be wildly abused and laughably so...-the black jesus

[sniffie]

Don't we already have something like this?
Whit the rating system you can leave at least 5 stars. So a player can have a rating of 5.0 max. If I see a game open with a player who has a rating 4.5 or less I won't even play him. So in a way the Ratings system displays a players reputation

Greetz sniff

[owenshooter]

and just imagine the moderation that would have to go into this due to abuse of the system... what a headache...-the black jesus

[blakebowling]

Don't we already have something like this?
Whit the rating system you can leave at least 5 stars. So a player can have a rating of 5.0 max. If I see a game open with a player who has a rating 4.5 or less I won't even play him. So in a way the Ratings system displays a players reputation

Greetz sniff

The system you described is for games, this suggestion is a similar system for the forums.

[Woodruff]

Don't we already have something like this?
Whit the rating system you can leave at least 5 stars. So a player can have a rating of 5.0 max. If I see a game open with a player who has a rating 4.5 or less I won't even play him. So in a way the Ratings system displays a players reputation
Greetz sniff

No, the ratings have nothing to do with the forums.

[Ray Rider]

To piggy-back on this interesting idea, include the ability to set a user-defined filter that would block posts by users that reach a certain level of negative, much as current users' posts are blocked with a foe move. In this way, forum-foe'ing would no longer be necessary (or certainly not as necessary).

That would be another option, yes, although I'm not sure I would use it in that way. So far I've never seen the need to foe anyone; and I frequently see others reading the posts of people they have foed...however I would expect that posts made by people with the lowest ratings would (hopefully) be ignored more often, because their status as trolls would be obvious to everyone from a single glance at their meter.

This would be a nice idea if people could be trusted to use it honestly. Unfortunately, the majority of forum users seem intent on turning everything into a partisan mud-slinging match. Inside of five minutes they would hijack this "reputation meter" and it would tell you not whether their posts are readable or not, but whether they voted for Obama or McCain.

The off-topic section is merely one part of the forum, and even if some did use the reputation meter to rate whether they agree or disagree with a post, that person's reputation would naturally equalize over time.

and just imagine the moderation that would have to go into this due to abuse of the system... what a headache...-the black jesus

However if the meter were made totally anonymous, no moderation of the system would be required. I'll add that in the opening post.

Another idea would be to have a limit on how many + or - ratings a user could use per day, thereby making people think a little more before rating someone's post. That would also prevent someone who's having a bad day from going through the forum and rating everyone negatively (or some similar scenario).

[Victor Sullivan]

and just imagine the moderation that would have to go into this due to abuse of the system... what a headache...-the black jesus

You're hired!

But seriously, the idea has merit, but it can and will be abused.

[MeDeFe]

I think that at worst it would be a fun gimmick. Unless CC automatically hides a user's posts if they are below a certain rating I see relatively little possibility for abuse. And considering that more or less every mod and admin would be in the negatives I don't think CC would start doing that.

But I also think that it would be a fun gimmick at best, so I'm not sure whether it's worth the effort to implement it.

[Metsfanmax]

I've seen that in some places, those who have ridiculously negative reputations actually thrive on the attention. Most people don't take it too seriously, and enjoy the fun aspect of it.