SummitPost.org

mrchad9 wrote:Respectfully Fletch... this isn't about being a good or bad climber.

I'm certainly not trying to start a shit storm here, but I sort of think this can be both. I think it is to some degree. I think we would all agree that a half ass page by a good climber is probably a better resource than a good page by a terrible climber, or worse, someone who has never climbed it (or the route in question).

My earlier post was just meant to point out that I think Brian Kalet can be a very strong contributor (I know he is on other sites and I believe he was here in the past). Therefore, it's really a matter of desire more than ability. There may be other solutions here. Him wanting to hoard the pages for ego reasons is one i'm having a hard time believing... maybe he's just busy...

However, in all fairness, it sounds like you've tried the diplomatic approach and that didn't work. If so, then carry on. I'm supportive of your suggestions...

brichardsson wrote:But the voting I've seen is capricious. I have a pic that got a slew of 10/10 votes, and then smack in the middle of it, one 4/10, with no explanation. Please understand: my point is not to complain, but my point is to demonstrate that if there is no effective mechanism of explaining the rhyme or reason for a particular vote, then voting ("challenging") on pages would be an exercise in futility.

Yes, but the 4/10 vote got your attention, no ?

I can't speak for the young man who cast that vote, but there was a "controversy" going on (at that time) regarding "mindlessly" giving 10/10 votes to wildlife, just for the sake it "appeared" to be a cool shot.

I won't open a can of worms, but somebody had posted a "perfect" wildlife shot that was definitely too good to be true, and had reached POTD status. My advise is NOT to take this single 4/10 vote too seriously in the overall SP voting process.

lcarreau wrote:

brichardsson wrote:But the voting I've seen is capricious. I have a pic that got a slew of 10/10 votes, and then smack in the middle of it, one 4/10, with no explanation. Please understand: my point is not to complain, but my point is to demonstrate that if there is no effective mechanism of explaining the rhyme or reason for a particular vote, then voting ("challenging") on pages would be an exercise in futility.

Yes, but the 4/10 vote got your attention, no ?

I can't speak for the young man who cast that vote, but there was a "controversy" going on (at that time) regarding "mindlessly" giving 10/10 votes to wildlife, just for the sake it "appeared" to be a cool shot.

I won't open a can of worms, but somebody had posted a "perfect" wildlife shot that was definitely too good to be true, and had reached POTD status. My advise is NOT to take this single 4/10 vote too seriously in the overall SP voting process.

my point was that anything that involves subjectivity runs the risk of creating a mess. sp has scads and scads of pictures of trees, rocks, trails, waterfalls, sunsets, a host of other things that aren't a"summit". if i decide that i don't like wildlife photos, and i want to vote every wildlife (or bug, or waterfall, or fill-in-the-blank) photo a 1/10, that's my right, and within my ability. but there's no rhyme nor reason. why is a wildlife photo ok to vote down, but a sunset photo isn't? or vice versa? there's no guidelines. and *that's* my point. voting is subjective, and is subject to the whims of the voter. deciding which pages stay due to votes or challenges would, IMHO, wind up creating more problems than it solves.

To me, this is normal "breathing" of a site of this size, with the population it has. Given that SP is over 10 years old, technology has expanded, we agree that what may have passed for quality work back in 2003 may not be acceptable for 2013. That being said, I don't have any better answers than what's been presented other than to take each on a case-by-case basis, and see what you can do individually to shore up weak pages. Instituting a new structure of rules will potentially create unintended new problems down the line. Thus, simpler may be better (i.e. think carefully what rules and structure you want to implement).

For example, a number of Arizona/New Mexico pages were created by John Hamann ("streeyyr") back around 2005-2009. I have hiked with him a number of times. He has left the site, and I simply asked him if he had any objections if I took over some of his pages. He said no. Thus, I have assumed about a dozen of his pages, usually picking them up after I hike the peak and have something to add. His pages are very basic and probably would be voted down nowadays, but back then, they weren't too bad. I have only assumed the ones where information needed to be updated or incorrect route info fixed.

I'm on record that if someone has been off the site for a year or more, then it should be automatic that a new person can assume that inactive person's page(s) without contacting them first. But the new person needs to step up and ask an elf.

That being said, I direct this to "new" people who feel unsure whether to step up: Please do so! If you have ideas or new information, don't let the fear of offending a small minority of grumps deter you. New ideas are always welcome.

I think we would all agree that a half ass page by a good climber is probably a better resource than a good page by a terrible climber

This does not make sense. If I am looking for beta it does not matter how terrible the climber is, if he provide correct and updated information.

Vitaliy M. wrote:

I think we would all agree that a half ass page by a good climber is probably a better resource than a good page by a terrible climber

This does not make sense. If I am looking for beta it does not matter how terrible the climber is, if he provide correct and updated information.

Well...

There are folks that get out and climb and there are folks that sit at thier desks and write pages about climbing... that's all I'm saying. Sometimes those people overlap, but oftentimes not. I see your point though. Maybe I'm being to maniacal about the few times where my handy dandy print outs were blatanly wrong (but boy, did that page look good with a whole bunch of 10 votes!)

What if you could only vote on pages where you sign the climbers log? Wouldn't that be interesting...

Fletch wrote:

Vitaliy M. wrote:

What if you could only vote on pages where you sign the climbers log? Wouldn't that be interesting...

Then obscure peaks would be doomed since they would never be voted on! That would only further make popular mountains ranked higher on the site

What if you could only vote on pages where you sign the climbers log? Wouldn't that be interesting...

Sometimes a page that looks good can have some serious errors that aren't apparent until you make the climb, but if voting was allowed only on mountain pages that you have climbed, anything obscure (even if spectacular) would hardly ever get voted (which is not ideal for quality control). It's hard to find a perfect solution.

Sometimes it does take time to figure out which member's pages are trustworthy and which member's pages are not.

Matt Lemke wrote:That would only further make popular mountains ranked higher on the site

Who cares where they rank on the site??? Who seriously chooses what to climb based on a page score or ranking within the site???

Who cares where they rank on the site??? Who seriously chooses what to climb based on a page score or ranking within the site???

Probably no one. Although it doesn't work as intended, voting is supposed to work as quality control and to point out which pages are abandoned, inaccurate, need work, or are fine as is.

Do you have a better way to distinguish between them (other than some kind of voting/comment system)?

Fletch wrote:

Matt Lemke wrote:That would only further make popular mountains ranked higher on the site

Who cares where they rank on the site??? Who seriously chooses what to climb based on a page score or ranking within the site???

If you put those most popular pages in the hands of the members who are going to the the best work on them, then the problem solves itself. The votes on the popular pages will become warranted.

It is what should happen anyway. I haven't yelled 'I called it first!' in 20 years. Better criteria are available.

Scott wrote:

Who cares where they rank on the site??? Who seriously chooses what to climb based on a page score or ranking within the site???

Probably no one. Although it doesn't work as intended, voting is supposed to work as quality control and to point out which pages are abandoned, inaccurate, need work, or are fine as is.

Do you have a better way to distinguish between them (other than some kind of voting/comment system)?

I agree with you. I think the crux of the whole issue is how to make the content better and how to impliment an idiot proof way to police that without this place turning into Josh's, Scott's, and Dow's content playground...

Another major issue to how to weed out the ego-trippers from the contributors and how to not only police the presentation of the material (Chad's suggestion about the reconfigured voting system), but also the content (my suggestion about only voting on pages where you know what you are talking about).

Look, I don't have any answers for you here. I've made some suggestions on many things many times in the past. That's all I can do. This place is free, so whoever is paying the bill should be the one who ultimately decides. But I just think there are some really insecure people that are looking out for thier precious page scores more than for the overall betterment of the site, the material, and the members. I don't think that Kalet is one of them though...

Fletch wrote:This place is free, so whoever is paying the bill should be the one who ultimately decides.

Yeah. I think Matt has spoken there.

Fletch wrote:But I just think there are some really insecure people that are looking out for thier precious page scores more than for the overall betterment of the site, the material, and the members.

Agreed.

And the existing pages as is documented under his profile indicates he is probably in that pool of people, rather than outside it.

Fletch wrote:There are folks that get out and climb and there are folks that sit at thier desks and write pages about climbing... that's all I'm saying. Sometimes those people overlap, but oftentimes not.

To make a page one has to climb the route/mountain. So it doesn't really matter how great of a climber you are. If your page is superior, you have a better page. If Alex Honnold would take over Avalanche Gulch page, I don't think he would make it much better. Even though he is a better climber. To be honest the more you climb, the less time you have to bullshit about climbing or write pages. Some times the best pages are done by dudes who do 2-3 climbs per year. I feel overwhelmed because I want to write a few TRs, finish stuff at work, finish updating Liberty Ridge page (which I started from scratch), and get out to climb something on the weekend. First world problems....

Vitaliy M. wrote:First world problems....

Agreed...

I think Charles Barkley calls them "white people problems"