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Re: Blocked out of Voting Thread...

PostPosted: Sat Jan 12, 2013 6:39 pm
by Josh Lewis
Neither am I. Was it deleted? Or archived for moderators only?

Re: Blocked out of Voting Thread...

PostPosted: Sat Jan 12, 2013 6:46 pm
by Noondueler
Yeah. Why put up the thread if we can't respond?

Re: Blocked out of Voting Thread...

PostPosted: Sat Jan 12, 2013 7:20 pm
by Bob Burd
Nothing to see here ... move along ...

Sorry - that would be me. I was having a conversation about the voting system with Matt who suggested I talk with the other elves. I started it in a elves-only forum that is rarely used, and apparently the threads started there pop up on the front page. Anyway, the second part of my discussion with Matt was to open it up to the members for comments, so here it is, if perhaps a bit premature:

We all know the voting system has flaws and doesn't do all it was intended. It manages to sort the pages from good to bad in a fairly good manner, but does so with some level of animosity at times. My proposal, which was really nothing more than a summation of past proposals was as follows:
Change from a 1-10 system to a like/dislike system.
Change all current 10 votes to likes.
Change all current 1-6 votes to dislikes.
Drop all remaining votes.

Matt found that (as we all expected) 96% of 4.3million votes are 10s. He further suggested 7s should be added to dislikes as there weren't many of them.
One fallout is that everyone's points are going to be lowered marginally due to lost votes. I figured if everyone knew this was the case globally, no one would care.
The main reason for this change is to avoid the situation that pops up every other month when a new (or sometimes older) member tries to use the voting system as intended. PMs are sent, threads are started, hair is torn out, teeth are gnashed. This proposal just simplifies what is pretty much being done anyway.

Okay, feel free to add your own comments/suggestions/flames. Shields are up.

(I changed the title of this thread to help garner more feedback)

Re: Blocked out of Voting Thread...

PostPosted: Sat Jan 12, 2013 7:31 pm
by Bubba Suess
Bob Burd wrote:Change from a 1-10 system to a like/dislike system.
Change all current 10 votes to likes.
Change all current 1-6 votes to dislikes.
Drop all remaining votes.

Would the page score simply be the number of likes received or would there be other criteria? Would a 'like' by someone with more power weigh more than someone with little power?

Re: Changes to Voting System

PostPosted: Sat Jan 12, 2013 7:36 pm
by Josh Lewis
This would be awesome! I don't care if my power points drop by 50%, 90%, what ever. This would be a great change. :D If someone "Dislikes" a page of mine, it would seem a lot nicer than a 1/10. :wink: (believe it or not, I've actually gotten a couple)

Re: Blocked out of Voting Thread...

PostPosted: Sat Jan 12, 2013 7:37 pm
by Bob Burd
Bubba Suess wrote:Would the page score simply be the number of likes received or would there be other criteria? Would a 'like' by someone with more power weigh more than someone with little power?


Weighting would still be key. This avoids the creation of new accounts for the sole purpose of padding votes - a big problem in the past that has virtually disappeared.

Re: Changes to Voting System

PostPosted: Sat Jan 12, 2013 7:55 pm
by Matt Lemke
Likes/Dislikes should then be anonomous...seeing who voted on your pages is absurd

Re: Changes to Voting System

PostPosted: Sat Jan 12, 2013 8:20 pm
by Bubba Suess
Matt Lemke wrote:Likes/Dislikes should then be anonomous...seeing who voted on your pages is absurd

If someone disliked my page, I would like to know who it is. This was a problem early on in sp's history and public voting was instituted to remedy anonymous dings. Granted it is less important in a like/dislike system but it should remain public.

Re: Changes to Voting System

PostPosted: Sat Jan 12, 2013 8:25 pm
by Josh Lewis
There is talk about doing away with the current Photo of the Day/Week system. If that happens it would probably be replaced with featured photos. If that happened it wouldn't be as big of a deal for people to see who voted. Right now it's kinda a big deal because I've noticed that the folks who get photo of the day/week are the same folks who vote on a lot of people's stuff. Myself included in that (in the sense of me getting Photo of the Day... I vote on a lot of good shots).

Re: Changes to Voting System

PostPosted: Sat Jan 12, 2013 9:23 pm
by Bob Burd
Bubba Suess wrote:
Matt Lemke wrote:Likes/Dislikes should then be anonomous...seeing who voted on your pages is absurd

If someone disliked my page, I would like to know who it is. This was a problem early on in sp's history and public voting was instituted to remedy anonymous dings. Granted it is less important in a like/dislike system but it should remain public.


I agree. Dislikes could be encouraged, but not not required to add a reason. Anonymous voting was a big problem in the past, as pointed out.

Re: Changes to Voting System

PostPosted: Sat Jan 12, 2013 9:33 pm
by Bob Sihler
My contribution to that discussion:

Bob Sihler wrote:I've been talking with Matt about voting and other changes as well. Instead of muddying the discussion, I'll stick for now to the voting. Here is what I sent Matt in an earlier email:

Matt,

What I meant by the 10% thing is that 7/10 would be 70%, 8/10 80%, and so on.

A like/dislike system like the one Bob Burd suggested sounds simpler to implement.

Some thoughts:

* Would this be the end of vote weight? Many bigger contributors might not like that their say counts as much or as little as someone who just signed up and has done nothing for the site. I can't, however, think of any way to preserve vote weight under such a system. Perhaps, as has been suggested in the past, the more points you have, the more times you can vote in a given time period. But that might be difficult to implement.

* How would current votes be converted? I would suggest making 7-10 convert to "Like" since 7 is "pretty good." Or perhaps 7 should be considered neutral while 8-10 are "Like" and 1-6 are "dislike."

* How would this affect page score? Personally, I don't put much stock in scores except for the very low ones. After all, Mount Rainier is going to get way more hits and votes than an excellent page for some obscure desert peak. In other words, I don't think a high page score necessarily means the page is better than many others, so I wouldn't be upset to see actual scores go.

* To elaborate on my idea about a threshold for voting, I would set it at a number of power points equivalent to what one gets for a mountain page and a route page, which are the heart of SP's content. Of course, there are other routes to getting to that total, but it seems a reasonable minimum contribution and might ward off a return of the avatar games. Furthermore, I would disallow points for gear reviews. Many know that you can do a cut-and-paste "review" and get points for that; there are a few members who have high vote weight due almost exclusively to it. Those are not true contributions to SP, and gear can always be discussed just as well in the forums.

Bob

Re: Changes to Voting System

PostPosted: Sat Jan 12, 2013 9:57 pm
by Josh Lewis
Here's another idea that is far away from all the other ideas. I'm just throwing it out on the table just to give an idea of what might be a more constructive system: http://extensions.joomla.org/extensions ... rev-132897

The link above is to an extension listing. In our case it would be a mountain, route, ect. The system requires you to write a review. This is beneficial in the number of ways:

1) It gives the page owner constructive criticism into making the page into what it should be.
2) It will make the voter have to put more thinking into their vote making it perhaps more accurate.
3) People will know exactly why they voted the way they did.

I'm not proposing that for trip reports and photos. A problem with the idea is that it would reduce the number of votes posted. However, a accurate and constructive vote goes a lot further than a quick and less thought out one. When it comes to voting in the real world I am quite careful with my vote. Sometimes I'm so careful that I don't even vote at all if I feel I'm uneducated enough.

Same goes for SummitPost pages. There are some really good looking SP pages out there. But sometimes I don't vote because I didn't spend the time to look over all the information to make sure it's accurate. While SP is one of the greatest mountaineering resources ever created, I've heard some folks mention inaccuracies. Reviews I think would help to some extent.

Re: Changes to Voting System

PostPosted: Sat Jan 12, 2013 10:15 pm
by Dow Williams
Matt, keep in mind that what many of us refer to when we speak of a more dynamic site, is randomness/diversity.

The current system allows a few to manipulate/suffocate what photos float to the home page for mass public consumption. I would not worry too much about vote weight for those of us who have made more contributions (referred to above). I for one would not give a shit about having any extra weight with my vote or "like".

Rather I recommend a complete new visitor to the site have as much weight as I do in so much as to whether a photo, route beta, trip report, etc is interesting/exceptional. Same goes for all front page material....maybe meet some minimum requirement, i.e. a few "likes" by members...but I suggest you eliminate the games and rampant self promotion all together.

If you want to compete for a larger crowd, make the site truly more dynamic and interesting for members like myself who need to see more diversity before promoting the site as well as making new members and visitors feel welcome and excited about their new contributions.

Re: Changes to Voting System

PostPosted: Sun Jan 13, 2013 12:22 am
by ZeeJay
How about if likes are anonymous but dislikes aren't?

Re: Changes to Voting System

PostPosted: Sun Jan 13, 2013 12:30 am
by Josh Lewis
@ ZeeJay: That's a neat idea. I'd still use the dislike button where appropriate. Then if someone didn't like the fact that I disliked it, they could ask me about it in private. I would explain my reasoning and give them a chance to set it right. Then if they made the appropriate fixes I would remove my dislike. :wink: