F1technical.net

WhiteBlue wrote:Inflamatory is not a good reason to downvote. It is just as dumb as unpopular for a downvoting reason. A bit of provocation is ok if it is handled in a cool and competent way and if there is not an attack ad hominem involved. A site like F1t need unpopular opinions and the opportunity to voice them freely.

There is s a difference when it comes to chauvinism, being uninformed and unfriendly. If people are polite and voice unpopular ideas they should be protected from waves of downvoting.

By "inflammatory" I did NOT mean simply "unpopular". I meant exactly something like ad hominem attacks, chauvinism, or statements intended purely to illicit a reaction, ie trolling.

I like the idea of needing to select a reason behind the vote, since it should help with the 'this person agrees with me' voters. But the selection of choices needs to be fairly accommodating. For example, I think 'funny' should be on the list, along with things like 'interesting', 'informative', or 'insightful'.

The question then is what to do about posts which have been unjustly voted up or down. At the moment, if you see a 'me too', you just vote it back down; but if you have to make a selection, then what choice do you make? Same with posts that have been voted down out of spite - do you call an ordinary post 'insightful' just to neutralize a bad down-vote?

Also, is the reason for the vote displayed for everyone to see? If so, what happens if one person chooses 'interesting', and another 'informative'?

As for the post count/vote number display, I don't think it matters.

I think the only threads that should be closed to voting are ones which are potentially contentious - particularly, fast-moving ones like the race threads where a flame war can rage for pages before a moderator can catch it. The team threads seem fairly well behaved to me.

It comes down to what the goals of the voting are. If the primary goal is to showcase technical content, then you've got to limit voting only to the technical sub-forums and maybe the car threads (and probably be content with much less voting). If it's primarily to just encourage good posts and discourage bad ones in general, then probably it's fine the way it is. Personally, I think the current system doesn't do much for the former, though I do think it has improved the latter. I started off being rather ambivalent about the system, feeling that there were perhaps better ways of dealing with some of the typical forum problems. But I've tried to play along, and in the process have come around to seeing the system as being overall a benefit, though certainly not a panacea. I've seen examples of abuse; but also examples of the system working exactly as designed. Mostly, when I see it not working, it's in the realm of 'why on earth was that voted up/down?', and probably the best shot at fixing that is to have to pick a reason for your vote. Psychologically, I think it's a decent enough barrier that it will cut out a good chunk of that.

SectorOne wrote:Get rid of the voting system, it´s just stupid.
I really don´t care if someone has 500 or -25 stars..

/\ THIS. 100% agree with SectorOne. Who cares about some silly rating? We survived without it before so why do we need it? IMO, get rid of it. It clutters the layout and seems pointless voting for posts. The system has also been open to abuse. Some simply downvote posts if they do not agree with someone, which I think is wrong. The majority of posters are mature enough to post useful information in threads without the need for votes. Leave the upvoting to the likes of Facebook etc (see what I did there? ). If someone is spamming threads just report them. Anyway, keep up the good work.

Predator wrote:

SectorOne wrote:Get rid of the voting system, it´s just stupid.
I really don´t care if someone has 500 or -25 stars..

/\ THIS. 100% agree with SectorOne. Who cares about some silly rating? We survived without it before so why do we need it? IMO, get rid of it. It clutters the layout and seems pointless voting for posts. The system has also been open to abuse. Some simply downvote posts if they do not agree with someone, which I think is wrong. The majority of posters are mature enough to post useful information in threads without the need for votes. Leave the upvoting to the likes of Facebook etc (see what I did there? ). If someone is spamming threads just report them. Anyway, keep up the good work.

Exactly.

The voting system is nothing more than a high school popularity contest, and should not exist period.

No forum I've ever posted on has ever utilized, or saw the need to utilize such a feature. I get what the idea behind it was, but it's unfortunately something that is highly subjective in terms of what qualifies as a downvote/upvote.

It essentially boils down to people not liking something said, then downvoting it purely on their own irrational beliefs.

More of a general comment not related to the voting system...

I don't really pay attention to this forum any longer since the amount of irrationality or genuine stupidity on display here defies all belief. It's turned into a fanboy paradise...and fanboys as they pertain to all sports are a turnoff. One F1 engineer I'm friends with told me he stopped coming here due to the fanboy drivel becoming so rampant, that he grew tired of wading through it to find the few genuinely useful posts.

Just my 2 cents, nothing more.

I have no problem with the voting, as I pay little attention to it. but it does show displeasure about some rather innane comments. mr g (red bull thread) was down voted from 0 to -8 this morning, for his insulting put-downs. but I would rather that a person who resorts to that sort of comment, be restricted from posting.
but if you are going to use voting, then let ALL who use the site and contribute to it, vote a person down if they want

I don't find up/downvoting a mature/positive way to go: it rewards mediocrity

Other forums use a "Thanks" butto to show appreciation for helpful or informative posts. Since not everyone is not completely sold on the rating system, this may be better. Or, use the system Pup suggested and track the individual rating. The only negative I can see coming from this is people trying to be the class clown for the most funny votes, which may be entertaining, but contraditory to the goal of the site.

I can see that there is several "ThankYou" modifications and also "Like" mod for phpbb software... you can try both of them and see which one is better... the first one I think it is with rating system... you can see that.

Secondly, you can fix "tweet" posting because i don't see any message when it comes under tweet tag.

thanks.

I'd like the ultimate downvote: poster blocking. Allow viewers to have posts from those they can't stand reduced to a single line with the message "you have blocked this poster." This works very well on other forums that have members who just spout gibberish and who waste page space by excessively repeating complete long posts and posts with a long series of pictures.

SectorOne wrote:Get rid of the voting system, it´s just stupid.
I really don´t care if someone has 500 or -25 stars..

That's also my position ever since the system was introduced.

If something like this should exist let it be simply "like" and "dislike". And say ten "likes" or "dislikes" count for one rating point.

Assessing the value of a post is a very subjective matter, it's quite personal but has an effect on a given member's status nevertheless. A bit unfair I think.
Also, not all of us have the required education and knowledge to compete with some (not many) of the forum members.
I bit unfair too.

P.S. I have to admit that even though I can give upvotes, more often than not I simply forget to do it. Even if I appreciate a given post

Dragonfly wrote:...not all of us have the required education and knowledge to compete with some (not many) of the forum members.

I don't know. I just looked at the member list by reputation and it's obvious that the top ranked people aren't exclusively the experts of the forum. Far from it. I do think the list (perhaps with the exclusion of a certain typing canine) accurately represents people who've added a lot of value to the forum, even if their contributions aren't strictly technical. Now, perhaps to the admins, that's a shortcoming of the system, but I don't see it that way.

I might suggest that we simply not display the user reputation at all. Keep the voting, and perhaps the reputation within the user's profile if anyone wants to look, and give people whatever benefits or penalties are due a low or high reputation - but just don't advertise it, so that it's not a popularity thing. After all, it's supposed to be about the posts and not the poster, right?

To add some rationale for that suggestion, one thing I've noticed is that the votes people have given me seem to have accelerated as my reputation has increased. That may be coincidence, since this is the time of year when I'm most interested in the sport and therefore more active here; but it also could be a psychological thing where people attribute undue weight to my posts simply because I now have a fairly high reputation. Something to consider, I think.

I also might suggest that the posts which have been voted up could be made more visible in a way. Perhaps a different background shading or text color or something - if possible. That would make valuable posts more apparent, and would also call more attention to some of the poor voting that happens (which may or may not be a good thing, depending on your perspective).

Beyond the voting system, we need an overt forum rule stating an individual's posts must contain new information compared to their earlier posts.

We had a huge problem with this in two of the threads I frequent and the rules were found to be a bit unhelpful for fixing the situation.

On that note, if we need to state a reason for a downvote, I nominate, "Beating a Dead Horse!" as one of the options.

Cocles wrote:I nominate, "Beating a Dead Horse!" as one of the options.

Bravo...I agree =D>

GitanesBlondes wrote:.....More of a general comment not related to the voting system...

I don't really pay attention to this forum any longer since the amount of irrationality or genuine stupidity on display here defies all belief. It's turned into a fanboy paradise...and fanboys as they pertain to all sports are a turnoff. One F1 engineer I'm friends with told me he stopped coming here due to the fanboy drivel becoming so rampant, that he grew tired of wading through it to find the few genuinely useful posts. .....

I'd have to agree. I can't prove it, but my recollection is that years ago there was a much higher percentage of posts by truly technically knowledgeable people. Now, there are far too many posts along the lines of: "I don't know anything about xxxxx, but here's what wrong with car Y.......... And, I just know they will have new parts/new design/etc. done next week." All without a shred of logic or technical reasoning.

So I repeat my request for poster blocking. This would make it faster to skim the pages of posts in search of good ones.

[insert film clip of Mr.T admonishing Rocky : You're going' down, Balboa!