Rating of threads

[Winston]

Could we have the rating option activated again? The headline is still there on the forum page, along with "Replies" and "Views", and I seem to recall that the rating feature was only meant to be disabled temporarily, due to the high load we had on the server back then. Or maybe my recollection is wrong, it's been a while now.

Either way, I think having it back would make browsing the forums more interesting.

[Asmodean]

Nice to have, but not need to have

[Nikolai]

I don't see the need. It never was used much when it still was active. I rated a thread with some hundred posts without any other rating more than once.

[Locutus]

1) It wasn't 'disabled' because of high load but because people disliked it and wanted it disabled (and nobody used it except for the occasional case of abuse).

2) It was never actually disabled, it still works fine. The ratings are just invisible for threads with less than (IIRC) 5 votes.

If there's considerable popular support for it, it might be worth considering lowering the 5-vote limit. But of course if there was that limit shouldn't stop ratings from showing up anyway.

[Winston]

Interesting, I don't recall any dislike being voiced in public at all. Maybe it was done in private.

On the other hand, I distinctly remember nearly all active threads in the OT showing a rating at one time. I think it added to the forum experience. Others must have thought so too, judging by the number of ratings that were entered. I'm not the one who rated all those threads.

But if you don't like it, then the logical thing to do would be to skip it altogether. The way it is now is just silly, and potentially confusing. I know it confused me into thinking it was in fact disabled.

I just don't see what the fuss is about, it's like saying people dislike the and icons. Poor threads don't magically turn into good ones, or vice versa, just because people have no meaningful way of conveying their overall opinion.

I've been to forums where you could rate individual posts - and posters. But I suppose that's not currently on the horizon here..

[Locutus]

Originally posted by Winston
On the other hand, I distinctly remember nearly all active threads in the OT showing a rating at one time. I think it added to the forum experience. Others must have thought so too, judging by the number of ratings that were entered. I'm not the one who rated all those threads.

Your memory seems to be deceiving you. Occasionally someone would go in and give all threads on the front page either 1 or 5 stars (which would pollute the forum with meaningless ratings and generate complaints), but other than that the system was virtually unused. At the time we had several discussions about this in the staff room that are evidence of this but that unfortunately I can't link to, but I assure you it was not a popular feature in the slightest (and several people including senior staffers did indeed request that it be deleted altogether).

But if you don't like it, then the logical thing to do would be to skip it altogether. The way it is now is just silly, and potentially confusing. I know it confused me into thinking it was in fact disabled.

I personally don't mind the current system, in some cases like the Creation forums it still has its uses (which is why it was ever implemented to begin with) and if enough people care the ratings will show up. I certainly don't dislike it enough to remove it altogether at this time, which would take more work than its worth.

I just don't see what the fuss is about, it's like saying people dislike the and icons. Poor threads don't magically turn into good ones, or vice versa, just because people have no meaningful way of conveying their overall opinion.

The current setup is mainly to avoid the abuse I described above.

I've been to forums where you could rate individual posts - and posters. But I suppose that's not currently on the horizon here..

Not at the moment. In the long run this might be possible, but I'm not making any promises right now (for one thing we haven't discussed internally to what extent this would be desirable).

[Winston]

If the main concern against it was that it was being abused (whatever the actual resulting damage was, I can't imagine), then how about trying it out for a limited period of time in the OT - to see if it would actually add to or detract from the flow of the forum as it is today? And find out if people would welcome it and use it or if, in fact, they can't be bothered?

Try it out for the month of November, and see how it will play out. I don't see how there's any other way of knowing whether it will be a bonus or a burden to the forum at this time.

I submit this for your further consideration, and will abstain from taking any credit whatsoever should you choose to employ it..

[Locutus]

I can't speak for the rest of the staff but I personally don't feel very strongly about this either way, at least as an experiment. If enough people express they want to try this again I wouldn't mind considering it. It would have to be fairly popular for me to support keeping it though, considerably more popular than it was last time.

FYI some stats: of the 5,000+ OT threads we still have on record of the time period in which ratings were always displayed, only 800 got any ratings at all, 300 got more than 2 votes and only 50 got more than 5 votes. That's OT-only and all OT threads with less than I believe 10 votes were deleted, which considerably staggers the percentages in favour of rated threads.

Of the 45,000 on topic threads from this period about 2500 were rated, 500 of which got more than 2 votes and 100 of those more than 5. No significant number of threads was deleted AFAIK so these numbers are probably more representative, although they're still biased because the ratings were used much more heavily in the Files/Creation forums than anywhere else. Still, using these stats only 1 in 20 threads got rated at all and 1 in 100 threads got more than 2 votes. So aside from the abuse you'd rarely have seen more than 1 rated thread on the first page of most forums (which matches my own memories of this feature and the discussions in the staff room).

[Solver]

Yes, Winston, the fact that you don't see ratings for the current threads is just proof that the feature was never popular. 5 votes would still make a thread's rating show - and I don't think that's happened with any thread since we stopped always showing the ratings.

[Ming]

I would have no problem with "testing" it again if there was enough support to do so... But there would have to be a lot of support.

However, when it was active before, it mostly got used by some jerks to attack other members. Most people didn't grade threads... the ones that did would do so to give negative ratings to threads started by people they disagreed with. This went on for a long time, and it was decided that the rankings were providing no real value.
It was never a measure of the value of the thread... but it became a value of how much people hated or liked the thread starter... with nothing to do with the actual content.

So in reality, it has been tested already, and it didn't add anything... It only was yet another form for people to use to pick on others

[Wiglaf]

It is fine now, what use is showing 2 or 3 votes?

[DrSpike]

Originally posted by Ming
I would have no problem with "testing" it again if there was enough support to do so... But there would have to be a lot of support.

An even spread so far.

[Kontiki]

If it helps, I just rated this thread a 1.

[Andemagne]

thread rating can be used to good and evil. we don't want evil things happen, so..... give me 3 pounds of bananas.

[Ming]

Originally posted by DrSpike
An even spread so far.

Yeah... the masses have spoken... a whole 8 people so far