mvs wrote:Hi everybody,
One problem is that some of us don't think in terms of power points at all, and others think about it a lot. That second group can't imagine anyone doing anything without power points at stake, and seeing the world through that lens, they mistrust or expect the worst from anything new that might allow "unfair" raises in power points....

This brings up a good point that I haven't seen mentioned in this thread: As an editor or admin on a few pages, I don't receive any power points. No big deal. But, some of those pages I've put a great deal of effort into. Although my name does appear on the page sometimes (if I'm admin, but not if I'm an editor), the page does not appear on my user page unless I manually put it there (which at least a few of us have done in our description of ourselves). Maybe more folks would be willing to be a partner on a page if they actually received some credit. I won't lie, I enjoy seeing my power points rise. But, I always try my best to earn them. And don't let the fact that a given task earns none get in the way of doing that task well. But, as mvs says, not all folks are so magnanimous (sorry if that sounds like self-aggrandizement).

--mark d.

Along the lines of Mark Doiron's comment: why do any work if you aren't proud of it? So of course you want your name on it.

As for PowerPoints-TM: I think they're important for new members as validation: "Thanks, we appreciate your contribution, we value your presence in the community." After some point (50? 100?), they're not particularly motivating because people know your name and value you as such.

PS to gabr1: the REI discount is a long-standing joke -- the more points you have the bigger your discount. Alas, just a joke.

PPS to gabr1: keep an eye out for the other joke, which refers to "this idiot" or "this loser" with a hyperlink that sends each user back to his/her own home page.

PPS. There's another joke, we'll let it be a surprise but it's like the second one.

The amount of routes found through Advanced Search is 8060* and the amount of routes on SP is now: 10578.
This leaves 2518 routes that are not accessible through the Advanced Search (many more in fact since many route pages mention more than one activity, f.i. hiking and scrambling).
This could only be fixed by having the primary info edited. Editing other people's primary info... will that go through?

*
2231 hiking
1777 mountaineering
1082 trad climbing
276 sport climbing
86 top rope
72 bouldering
314 ice climbing
43 aid climbing
40 big wall
236 mixed (LOL)
1260 scrambling
155 via ferrata
43 canyoneering
345 skiing

Good point Mark. I'm wondering about a less automatic Power Point system. I often use a programming website called StackOverflow, and there people earn points by the credibility of their answers to questions.

Part of our issue is that people contribute in lots of different ways here. Some people are almost exclusively forum creatures, and their posts have provided me lots of insight. I'd like to increase their power points if I could. Other people are all about mountains, routes, areas. I agree that is the mainstay of the site, and it seems that the point system rewards those contributors well. Now today, I'm arguing for a new way to contribute, that is by a combination of occasionally creating mountain/route pages, and by roving around editing and improving on public sections. It would be great if that is rewarded too.

Instead of the 1-10 system, which no one seems to know what to do with nowadays, we switch to a "+1" and "-1" system. Not voting means "meh." Voting with a +1 button means, I like it! "-1" is for things like illegal activity, copyright violation, pissing off the Navahos, etc. Any more nuanced criticism can be dealt with in places like "Additions and Corrections," Forums, PMs, Elves, etc. Additionally, these +1/-1 buttons are scattered around. In forums, the "thanks" button can map to a +1 that affects your power points. In page comments, there is an icon next to each user allowing for +1.

I know a big problem is "you scratch my back I'll scratch yours." I think there are algorithms to look at a days voting pattern to find that. Egrigious violators get a -1 that nullifies the attempt to game the system.

Maybe I should have opened that can on a new thread...For the record, I basically vote this way now, using 1 and 10 as the -1 and +1 scores. I know that this style of voting is decried as problematic...

How about a variation on the -1/+1: Thumbs up/thumbs down? Then, that is reduced to one value for display on that page, say "73 thumbs up" for 79 thumbs up and 6 thumbs down.

--mark d.

Why does a page or photo or whatever is presented need to have any sort of "Rating" or "Evaluation/Voting" process at all? Why can't people just post things and it be left as such. Post up a Route or Photo for all and anyone to look at, enjoy or utilize for information.

Who gives a shit how many "Power Points" one has. Really.

MigTigman wrote:Why does a page or photo or whatever is presented need to have any sort of "Rating" or "Evaluation/Voting" process at all? Why can't people just post things and it be left as such. Post up a Route or Photo for all and anyone to look at, enjoy or utilize for information.

Well, partly I agree but I can also see if one has created a page and it gets a bunch of low marks then one recognises that it's not something that people think much of and try to improve it. I think it's particularly important with photos on mountains which everyone goes to and wants to add their pictures to. It would make it very difficult finding the most useful or spectacular ones if one had to browse through hundreds of others. Ideally these would feature on the main page itself but that's often not the case for whatever reason.

I think this whole power point/ rating bend the discussion is taking might be a little out of topic.

It's true points feed vanity, but it is also true that it is nice and useful to have feedback on contributions.
The whole problem with the points is the current voting system give real value to diffent votes and you will have great community feedback and dinamic interaction on the whole website.

That idea has always been seen as impossible to implement though... I can't understand why.

Baarb wrote:
Well, partly I agree but I can also see if one has created a page and it gets a bunch of low marks then one recognises that it's not something that people think much of and try to improve it.

Yeah, but this doesn't always work. Sometimes, the owner of the page has such a massive ego, that he/she makes NO improvements at all, despite the
low marks.

If the pages could be EDITED by a respected and trusted individual, then THAT would solve the problem of the page lacking the updated information.

And, some folks LOVE Power Points, but I have never completely understood WHY. Hey, just the Nature of the Human Beast.

mvs wrote:Now today, I'm arguing for a new way to contribute, that is by a combination of occasionally creating mountain/route pages, and by roving around editing and improving on public sections. It would be great if that is rewarded too.

I would be a bit more conservative on that one, and would prefer if editors of open pages would not receive any power point for their edits, for the following reasons:

1) It would be very difficult to define how an edit should be rewarded. Same reward for a new chapter or for simply correcting a typo?

2) Members obsessed with power points might be tempted to edit virtually everything... (and even with safeguards, they will easily find the loophole)

3) Members currently afraid of the possible novelty will certainly mention the above point as a reason why we should not go partly wiki...

4) Most members willing to contribute in a collaborative way by opening their own pages and improving other open pages are probably not much interested in power points, but more in quality and simply in helping to improve the site.

If a "reward" should be given, then maybe in terms of visibility by automatically mentioning the name of editors somewhere in the page and/or have a line with "number of edit" in you profile page (similar to your "number of posts" in the forum).

Perhaps I can tie power points back into the conversation. At the risk of sounding like a jerk, I am not particularly interested in the opinions of folks who have joined recently and have made no contributions to the site. How they think Summitpost ought to be changed should carry no weight. How a contributor that has a lot of power points (from contributing pages and content rather than just pictures) think Summitpost can be improved, well, their opinion matters since they are the ones who have made the site what it is. The power points are part of what establishes a timocracy. Who do we know these newer members are here to stay? What have they invested into the site to make us think their opinion ought to matter? At this point there is nothing.

Do not construe this as coming out against new members or their participation. On the contrary, I encourage it, but I am just not inclined to take their suggestions seriously. Put differently, I encourage their contributions, not their whinging.

That being said, I think this thread has moved away from the OP, which is the question about how and to what degree or if at all pages should be opened up to public editing. Now it has moved into the "I think this aspect of Summitpost sucks" discussion. While I think that the site does need a significant overhaul (it has been more years between SP2 and SP1 than it was between SP1 and the launch of the site), I do not think one is immediately forthcoming. Ergo, we work within the means that we have to improve Summitpost. That means that those of us who can change how the site works do what they can and what the community thinks best and the rest of us should keep posting pages. Let's be grateful for what we do have on Summitpost, which is, for my money, the most comprehensive outdoor rec site on the internet.

Bruno wrote:

mvs wrote:Now today, I'm arguing for a new way to contribute, that is by a combination of occasionally creating mountain/route pages, and by roving around editing and improving on public sections. It would be great if that is rewarded too.

I would be a bit more conservative on that one, and would prefer if editors of open pages would not receive any power point for their edits, for the following reasons:

1) It would be very difficult to define how an edit should be rewarded. Same reward for a new chapter or for simply correcting a typo?

2) Members obsessed with power points might be tempted to edit virtually everything... (and even with safeguards, they will easily find the loophole)

3) Members currently afraid of the possible novelty will certainly mention the above point as a reason why we should not go partly wiki...

4) Most members willing to contribute in a collaborative way by opening their own pages and improving other open pages are probably not much interested in power points, but more in quality and simply in helping to improve the site.

If a "reward" should be given, then maybe in terms of visibility by automatically mentioning the name of editors somewhere in the page and/or have a line with "number of edit" in you profile page (similar to your "number of posts" in the forum).

I have not thought this one all the way through, but I think that it would be best, even in Summitpost's current configuration, if power points were apportioned by weight of contribution on any given page. For example, I own of Mark Doiron's aforementioned pages in which he has supplied a large quantity of great work (Charon's Garden Wilderness). I have always felt guilty for his not being rewarded for his effort. If we're to be split the points in proportion to our contributions, I think that would be much, much more equitable.

The game with the points may depend on the popularity of a man, if a person has many friends.

Sometimes a lonely queer fish is very busy on SP, but this member can get hardly points for his famous images.

Perhaps this is the solution: You look at points on SP as a welcome and a little recognition of your working, then one point is enough, and sometimes a kindly comment.

Thumbs Up/Thumbs Down is good. And just to keep from changing too many things (as if we aren't already :p), the Up/Down votes need to map to a page score 0-100% just like before.

As for how to divy up points among the different editors of a page, what about keeping track of the # of changed characters per changeset per user, and portioning out points that way. In that case, Mark's Charon's Garden Wilderness page points would mostly go to him, and because Bubba Suess made just a handful of edits it would work out that he'd get 10%. Eventually, after Bubba made dozens of changes over a couple of years, his "changed character count" would be higher than Mark's, and the bulk of points would therefore shift over time to him (rewarding his efforts).

It's a lot of fun stuff, and really this is probably a separate, and equally interesting topic. I daresay it's a bit less divisive too, because seems like I've heard *everybody* complain about one aspect or another of the current voting/point systems.

All the best,
--Michael

ps - just saw Hiltrud's good comment. Indeed, roving gangs who upvote their stuff and downvote others could be an issue. Though we might already have this situation now too. I do know that there are people who, when they find an ignored gem, try to popularize it, and that is good.

mvs wrote:ps - just saw Hiltrud's good comment. Indeed, roving gangs who upvote their stuff and downvote others could be an issue. Though we might already have this situation now too. I do know that there are people who, when they find an ignored gem, try to popularize it, and that is good.

That will always be a problem in any form of community. But as with all things, who contributes for the sake of information, shared experience and for the fun of it, shouldn't mind the point hunters too much they are just part of how things go.