The AnimeSuki Forum Reputation System has been retired

[Westlo]

Goodbye rubbish system, no replacement please.

[Cosmic Eagle]

Originally Posted by relentlessflame

But it's also true that some people judged those who were hiding their rep as if they had something shameful to hide (otherwise, why not show it like everyone else? ...or so the theory goes). There probably also were people who were in fact hiding it for this reason, perpetuating the stereotype. In the end, it's really just another form of using rep to judge people, but this is using the fact that someone's rep points are hidden as another judgement. (If you were hiding rep to avoiding being judged for your point value, you were still being judged for not showing your point value... )

I'm not really trying to say that this is totally unreasonable... but it is also unfortunate.

I have 3 green marks....wonder if there's secret 11 green marker somewhere beneath one of the blackened users

[Kanon]

Damn, if I had known, I would have tried to neg somebody before the system was shut down. I never negged anybody so I never got to see what kind of messaged popped up. Something "thank you for decreasing the reputation of this poster"?

First, I'd like to say that while the reputation system had its drawbacks, I think it had positive effects as well. Receiving a pos rep could encourage some posters to contribute more, and more importantly, contribute well. I don't mind the reputation system being retired (though I will miss my green bars, it made my posts look prettier) but I definitely think a system to give feedback should be put in place, especially since Animesuki discourages posting only to thank somebody or agreeing with them. How do we do that now? VM/PM doesn't seem very appropriate to me. The rep system was much simpler, you clicked on a button and that was it (I often didn't bother writing a message, all that was important is that the poster knew his contribution was appreciated).

Originally Posted by totoum

I like sayde's idea of keeping neutral rep as well, using VMs and PMs for the sort of messages you'd send in rep comments seems like overkill to me,it would be like using a cargo plane to send a letter.

So it wouldn't be used for any rating purposes,just for sending quick messages of approval or disapproval.

I like that idea as well. The problem is that people could still flame or insult in their comments. Removal of Anonymity would probably solve that though.

Some sort of thank you system could be good too, but not a public one. Only the user himself should be able to see how many thank yous he has gotten. No e-peen competition this way.

[TinyRedLeaf]

Originally Posted by Ledgem

I don't really understand why so many people claiming dislike for the system have reputation enabled. You're all aware that it was a feature that you could opt out of, right? And you know that you could "hide" the reputation comments in your user control panel, right? If it bothered you so much, why did you engage in it?

I don't dislike the system, and as long as people don't cry foul about receiving negreps, it works fine, I feel. Unfortunately, negreps clearly bother a lot of people and, worse, they make many people afraid of posting unpopular but credible opinions.

That being the case, I strongly support getting rid of the reputation system for good. I strongly discourage replacing it with another system, as it will invite the same problems, and I most certainly do not want a system that allows only posreps, as it would be inherently unbalanced.

Originally Posted by Cosmic Eagle

I have 3 green marks....wonder if there's secret 11 green marker somewhere beneath one of the blackened users

Oh, I'm sure there is one or two. Felix is a possible candidate. I gave cookies to anyone who made a good post, regardless whether he or she made his reputation visible.

[cyth]

I'm quitting this forum. The rep system was the only thing keeping me posting. I've strived day and night for people to like me, to add me as their friend, to chat in PM as a direct result of exchanging signed pos rep ... Eh, who am I kidding? Burn the witch!

But good luck cleaning after people who will display their frustrations over other members in legit discussions, instead of dumping their shit on them anonymously via rep.

[Kyero Fox]

Just when I got a awesome sig and avy too :-(

XD oh well.

[Triple_R]

Originally Posted by TinyRedLeaf

That being the case, I strongly support getting rid of the reputation system for good. I strongly discourage replacing it with another system,

So are you strongly against the like system that papermario13689 brought up here?

Personally, I think it's a very good idea.

Some people on this thread have expressed a desire to be able to give positive feedback on a particular post without having to use VMs, PMs, or spam posts.

A "like" system would enable that, I think.

[Liddo-kun]

Sad and disappointed. I posted several anime convention reports at the cosplay thread which helped my rep increase in past few months. Anyway, the only constant thing is change..

[Ledgem]

Originally Posted by TinyRedLeaf

Unfortunately, negreps clearly bother a lot of people and, worse, they make many people afraid of posting unpopular but credible opinions.

I remember being bothered by negative rep that had no explanation. Many people were. We had a fix for that implemented: any negative rep needed to have a comment attached to it. It wasn't perfect, of course, but we could have tweaked that further. Putting in a minimum character count would have been a start, but clearly it wouldn't be fool-proof. So perhaps another, better solution would have been to remove the anonymity behind the rep system.

I suspect there's more to it than that, though. Removing anonymity would encourage people to seek retribution in some form or other. If the goal is to create a forum with little to no conflict, that wouldn't work well.

[Wild Goose]

I have mixed feelings, since my rep actually only really took off this year after a number of thought provoking, in-depth, and generally awesome posts I made in the SAO and Total Eclipse threads, schooling trolls with that great power of British legal training: A wall of text and methodical points. Thus, it is with a heavy heart that I mourn the passing of the reputation system! O cruel world!

... nah, not really. [/jk]

Rep was kinda fun to me because I could see which posts people actually really liked, and well, it was kinda amusing. But I've also gotten negrep for disagreeing with people, so I'm not sad to see this system go away.

In replacement, what I'd suggest instead would be a similar system to the Xenforo boards that Spacebattles uses: you can't negrep someone, but you can Like their posts, and the likes are publicly available and visible.

At the same time, likes do absolutely nothing for a rep level; all the record shows is just which of your posts people have liked.

And yes, as with others, I would like it if a few days before rep is permanently taken offline, we could see all our rep, good and bad, and save the memories, placing them into a scrapbook to warm ourselves on a cold day - just like Vimes and the Assassin's Guild.

[larethian]

I've personally stopped dishing out bad rep for about a year, only good rep (and I never sign my good rep too). Since I'm a believer of 'what comes around goes around'. And I only get bad rep once in a blue moon. I also think the way it can be abused is drastically reduced by the fact that the same person can't spam neg rep you.

The only thing I feel that it's retarded is where people can remain anonymous. And the funny thing is that there are times where the rep-per obviously misread my post or totally misunderstood, as evident from his comment in the rep column, and I can't reply to it And of course not to mention the fact that people can rep irresponsibly, though I seldom get that.

So all in all, it's good that we get rid of this.

EDIT: on second thoughts, actually, why can't we have a system where people can't remain anonymous?

[Gooral]

Finally. It's amazing that it took you so many years to realize that it's a bad system. Mangahelpers solution (where you can only "like" a certain post or thank the user by clicking a button) is better but also unnecessary IMO. It encourages some (childish) people to write things they think will get positive attention (e.g. writing on One Piece forums "this chapter is awesome <3" or something like that or trying to be funny, etc.) which results in lowering the quality of the forum (since many pointless posts appear).

[Wild Goose]

Originally Posted by Gooral

Finally. It's amazing that it took you so many years to realize that it's a bad system. Mangahelpers solution (where you can only "like" a certain post or thank the user by clicking a button) is better but also unnecessary IMO. It encourages some (childish) people to write things they think will get positive attention (e.g. writing on One Piece forums "this chapter is awesome <3" or something like that or trying to be funny, etc.) which results in lowering the quality of the forum (since many pointless posts appear).

Depends on the forum in question - Spacebattles uses a similar system, and so far in the year-odd that I've been hanging out there it seems to work fairly well.

[Klashikari]

Originally Posted by Gooral

Finally. It's amazing that it took you so many years to realize that it's a bad system.

Except that it just didn't take "many years" for that. Discussions took a certain amount of time regarding what kind of substitute we could put in place and what kind of damage control we should perform when the rep system was live. That and observation of some cliques that were having "fun" in manipulating rep on a certain scale.
Also, the initial years of the rep system wasn't exactly plagued by major issues.

The rep system was always seen as a bag of mixed feelings for 5 years though and went on the sloppy tangeant for 2-3 years.

[TinyRedLeaf]

Originally Posted by Ledgem

I remember being bothered by negative rep that had no explanation. Many people were. We had a fix for that implemented: any negative rep needed to have a comment attached to it. It wasn't perfect, of course, but we could have tweaked that further. Putting in a minimum character count would have been a start, but clearly it wouldn't be fool-proof. So perhaps another, better solution would have been to remove the anonymity behind the rep system.

Originally Posted by Triple_R

So are you strongly against the like system that papermario13689 brought up here?

Some people on this thread have expressed a desire to be able to give positive feedback on a particular post without having to use VMs, PMs, or spam posts.

A "like" system would enable that, I think.

My stance is that we if can't give out negrep than we shouldn't bother posting posrep either, regardless of what form the reputation takes.

Much as I was annoyed and sometimes upset by the anonymous negreps I received, I took them all in my stride. The system was heavily biased towards posrep in the first place, so the chances were very good that if you made good sense, it wouldn't matter in the long run how many negreps you received for hurting other people's sensitive feelings — you will ultimately receive more than enough cookies to balance out the negatives, be they deserved or not.

More importantly, I did find the majority of negreps I received to be useful. I'm only human after all, and I did have off-days when I lashed out before I could think. There were also plenty of other times when I made terrible arguments and fully deserved the criticism and vote-downs that I got.

It didn't matter how "trollish" the negreps were. The fact that I received them was enough to give me pause and reflect on what I posted. And often enough, I agreed I could have done better.

Free speech shouldn't mean freedom from criticism. In principle, I fail to see the point of having a reputation system that delivers only plaudits and no criticism. I don't see why we should coddle people to such an extent.

By all means use VMs or PMs to support or dislike someone's post. I don't see why this needs to be further reinforced with "likes", because from my experience of social media like Facebook and YouTube, it's really quite pointless and not much better than our now defunct reputation system. In the end, all such systems tend to reward popularity more than it does quality.

That being the case, why bring back any reputation system at all? It'll just be the same problems, all over again. Let's just be done with it, for good.

[Afternoon Tea]

Maybe instead of rep points, you can add a "Thank" or "Like" button integrated as a feature when viewing others posts. Which has a public (or not) viewing of who liked or thanked that post (sorta like the polls). Not only does it contribute to people posting positive things, but it stops the one liners if you want to show gratitude when you like something! The negative stuff can be defended via post. Just my two cents Nevermind lol I just scrolled at some pages and PaperMario explained it nicely, But I would like to add as maybe we should have some community incentive for contributing. Like a community member of the week/month featureing a forum member who routinely goes above and beyond for their fellow forum members, a positive and active member of the forums. This can be followed by maybe an interview, and a badge next to there name?

[Triple_R]

Originally Posted by TinyRedLeaf

My stance is that we if can't give out negrep than we shouldn't bother posting posrep either, regardless of what form the reputation takes.

But liking a post doesn't impact the poster directly like posrep did. Liking a post is a comment on a post that doesn't "spill over" to the poster himself/herself to the degree that a posrep does.

Free speech shouldn't mean freedom from criticism.

Agreed. But criticism is only constructive if it is explanatory in nature (this is why I disagree with you, or this is why I think that's not a good thing to write). This is why anonymous negrep without any explanation given for it was completely worthless, imo.

But liking a post has a constructive value even if no explanation is given for it. Simple approval speaks for itself in a way that disapproval (without further explanation) doesn't really do.


Besides, criticism is going to be inherent in any discussion where differing opinions come into play. So free speech on this site will never mean freedom from criticism as long as contrary opinions are allowed to be voiced.

In principle, I fail to see the point of having a reputation system that delivers only plaudits and no criticism. I don't see why we should coddle people to such an extent.

Where's the harm in giving people a very quick and easy way of showing support to another person's posts? We've already discussed on this thread the problems with the various alternatives.

I'm not just joking around about those "Quoted For Truth!" posts, by the way. They are fairly commonplace on other message boards I'm on that don't have a reputation system in place. And I suspect that they come up because on those boards there's no other quick and easy way to show approval of another member's post.

By all means use VMs or PMs to support or dislike someone's post. I don't see why this needs to be further reinforced with "likes", because from my experience of social media like Facebook and YouTube, it's really quite pointless and not much better than our now defunct reputation system.

Honestly, in my experience, I disagree. Many of the highest rated YouTube comments I've read are pretty witty one-liners that gave me a good chuckle.

In the end, all such systems tend to reward popularity more than it does quality.

What would you consider a high quality post?

That being the case, why bring back any reputation system at all? It'll just be the same problems, all over again.

With all due respect, I think you're being a bit too simplistic in your thinking here (see, you can have criticism without having it embedded within a reputation or like system ).

There are major differences between the reputation system that Anime Suki had, and what papermario13689 is proposing. One such difference is how the reputation system targets the poster first and foremost, while papermario13689's proposal exclusively targets the post.

These differences mean that the problems of one system won't necessarily come up with the different system.

[ChainLegacy]

The like system sounds better, but I think it might detract from truly rounded discussion. Some people will inevitably judge a post by the likes and might even skip over other posts not getting any attention. It also does not alleviate the supposed clique problem the moderators have alluded to as friends would jack up each others likes. Not that I understand the motivation of forming these e-cliques, but apparently it was something of a problem.

I was at this forum before rep was very consequential. Everyone just had one or two green dots. It was still, by and large, very similar with high quality discussion, if my memory serves me correctly. I do think, and perhaps it is my own perception and not accurate - that without rep everyone's posts were read with the same 'weight,' inactive or new members were on the same rung as daily forum-goers. I don't think this line of thinking applies to everyone, but I can't help but get the impression people sometimes might have an interesting point and some members will overlook it due to their low rep (or, similarly, flock to the high-rep post to see their opinion, without really considering the interesting thing said by joe-1-bar). Like the mods have pointed out, that isn't a good thing for fostering discussion.

[sayde]

Originally Posted by totoum

I like sayde's idea of keeping neutral rep as well, using VMs and PMs for the sort of messages you'd send in rep comments seems like overkill to me,it would be like using a cargo plane to send a letter.

So it wouldn't be used for any rating purposes,just for sending quick messages of approval or disapproval.

^^Pretty much this. I realize there are other methods of contacting someone to express your opinion on whatever they may say. But the rep system was by far the easiest and fastest way to do it (assuming you were allowed to rep that person in the first place). You didn't even have to leave the page or bring up a new window to send the message. And honestly, if all I want to tell someone is "I agree" or "that's very interesting", I shouldn't have to clutter up their inbox or start up a new private conversation just to do so.

[Ledgem]

Originally Posted by ChainLegacy

I was at this forum before rep was very consequential. Everyone just had one or two green dots. It was still, by and large, very similar with high quality discussion, if my memory serves me correctly. I do think, and perhaps it is my own perception and not accurate - that without rep everyone's posts were read with the same 'weight,' inactive or new members were on the same rung as daily forum-goers. I don't think this line of thinking applies to everyone, but I can't help but get the impression people sometimes might have an interesting point and some members will overlook it due to their low rep (or, similarly, flock to the high-rep post to see their opinion, without really considering the interesting thing said by joe-1-bar). Like the mods have pointed out, that isn't a good thing for fostering discussion.

I've heard this assertion made a few times now. Am I really unique in not using someone's rep meter to judge whether a post should be read or not? I can tell you that I've had plenty of my own posts skipped over in discussions (usually because they were too lengthy), so I certainly don't think that having more green blocks resulted in people giving extra attention to someone's posts.