Downvotes / Hiding Survey

@Prof.NightJack  
This one issue cannot be properly addressed until the issue I mentioned is. As the general idea of “comment why you dislike it” is rendered moot when negative comments a treated like the antichrist. After that aggressive reaction to negativity is somewhat resolved would be the opportune time to worry about the downvoting system. I never meant to be “kicking them while they’re down.” I was simply putting my final thoughts into things and letting it be that.
 
@ArkyNoid  
That’s fair, they are volunteering so I give them props for that. My “ranking” if you will solely come from the fact the resolution to the downvoting problem is heavily “blocked” if you will, by the community’s problem with responding to negativity. You can’t properly fix a leak on the roof if your ladder to get on the roof is split in two, now can you?
 
 
@WingbeatPony  
That’s fair, and that’s what I’ve been doing is giving my feedback, as I said before. That comment was just my final thoughts put together into one post.

@Dusk Ealain  
But you think they are not working on other issues at the same time?  
They just got around to this bit with the downvotes after kicking it around for some time, like they said, but they are still working on other issues.  
That’s why I asked about if addressing this one issue is wrong and they have to get all others first.

For those just joining the thread:  
Here’s an FAQ/thread summary type thing for you all here on page 34.  

@WingbeatPony  
So, uh, I’m curious… what is the consensus on the “downvote explanation” idea?

what di you want about in this chat forum

@WingbeatPony
 
You could just let people see by themselves instead of agitating them to join your point of view…

@Prof.NightJack  
What I’m saying is I don’t think they have the proper things in place to properly tackle this issue at the moment. End of story, bye-bye.
 
Seriously I’m fucking off now.

@Stooped_hooy  
He was just summing up the repeated points from the 34 pages for people that don’t want to read it all.

@Prof.NightJack
 
People right here are just the most loud ones, not actually “everyone” or anything like that.

@DanTheMan  
I don’t believe there’s an official remark on this, nor as clear-cut a majority opinion, but from what I’ve seen it’s a case of “looks good on paper.” Most notably, you’d either force users to write a useless comment (be honest, do you think anyone would write a well-thought-out comment every time they tried to downvote, or would it just be random vitriol if anything coherent was written at all), or make them choose from a limited selection of options (and again, what’s to prevent someone from just picking one at random). Add to that the idea that it’s a little unfair to put that restriction on downvotes alone, and it becomes clear why some people think it’d be a lot of work just to make matters worse.

@Stooped_hooy  
What does that have to do with summing up repeated point said in the thread?

@Prof.NightJack
 
First of all these points may not reflect accurate survey situation.  
And posts like that manipulate newcomers into believing without seeing for themselves.  
It’s like shoving your opinion to everyone and saying that everything else written here is absolute garbage.

@Stooped_hooy  
But they are actully things that got repeated, so it informs people that do not want to look over it all what things have been said many times over so they know about them.  
And no, it’s not like shoving your opinion and calling the rest garbage, it;s only pointing out the repeated points.

After reading about half of this thread, I’d like to say a few things, myself, if I may. Also, I do/did have an account, but I forgot what it is, and I may or may not just make a new one…
 
I am not going to demonize either down-voting or up-voting. Both can be abused. However, I’d like to touch on what I dislike about the modern rating system. upvote/downvote, like/dislike, approve/disapprove, etc sometimes only one option present…
 
I joined youtube maybe a few years before all of their radical changes and generally massive screw-ups. I have actually felt strongly discouraged from rating any videos at all ever since like/dislike was rolled-out. The problem with polarized vote systems is it only works when something is actually 100% worthy of receiving either vote. In the majority of cases, this is just simply not happening. I feel genuinely bad if I give something I only mildly like a down-vote, but I don’t feel it merits an up-vote, either. Thus, I just don’t tend to rate on sites with the polarized voting systems.
 
I have experienced first hand when these systems fail because of abuse. I am currently perma-banned from a site where this happens a lot. (besides general drama, and some highly abusive mods that you don’t DARE to call-out for it) I am one of the users that got a lot of this, and I must say, it wasn’t pleasant. I was made to feel like absolute shit for what I believed in, what I said/did, and the smallest of screw-ups.
 
And that brings me to my next point, I respect fully censorship isn’t great. In fact, some of you might find it extreme just how far I believe censorship needs to be pushed-back. However, and again citing that one site, there’s a difference between not sugar-coating something, and just being an ass. There’s also a difference between valid criticism, and personal bias. The site I speak of seems not to care about this whatsoever. The things that they’ve told many artists are just appalling. It’s either downright hurtful, or implies they’re doing art “the wrong way”.
 
I also fairly recently watched an episode of Gumball that really puts this whole issue into perspective: you give these people the ability to rate, and they get some kind of god complex going and rate everything they don’t like, for totally petty reasons, very poorly. Likewise, the whole herd follows suit, engaging in both the same behavior, and no longer forming their own opinions. The impacts of these ratings on the people being rated tend to bring everything to a screeching halt, and can discourage them from doing ANYTHING… Even so, I don’t think ratings should be banned, but they DO need to be moderated. No matter what system you put in place, someone will abuse it. Sometimes your own enforcers will.
 
What I will say is you might consider not having a polarized rating system. I have tremendous respect for those who still use the star model, it gives more accurate feedback (when used correctly). Giving reasons for votes also is more useful. If I see a down vote on my art, to me that’s just a down vote. Maybe it hurts, but whoever left it isn’t giving me any reason WHY they did it. I don’t known what I could improve, I don’t know if they’re just trolling (unless they do it to EVERYTHING). The same if they up-vote it. Big whoop, what did they like? what can I improve?
 
Putting in the hands of artists to block these features I have mixed feelings about. I won’t give a yes or no answer because it never will be the right one. While generally, you should not be allowed to block public criticism, there are some matters where people will just be assholes. Thus, people disable features like rating and comments. It annoys me, though, when I have valid feedback to give, and can’t give it.
 
Anyways, I don’t think what I have to say will have any impact, but I felt like it should be said. Maybe someone finds it of some worth.

@Stooped_hooy  
For the record, my source of information for all of those points came from things staff have said in this thread, and an objective overview of the most common responses made by other users who were attempting to clear up misconceptions.
 
Apart from the last point about Derpibooru not being a tyrannical hugbox, I think you’d be hard-pressed to argue any sort of personal opinion on my behalf being presented in that summary at all.

We need the hide button. To end the drama this is for the best of us.

@Stooped_hooy  
@WingbeatPony  
@Prof.NightJack  
The purpose of the survey is to determine the community’s overall opinions on voting, image scores, image hiding, and the abuse of those features. The results of this survey will be used to help us determine what changes need to be made (both technical and policy).

@Joey  
How many responses to the survey have you gotten so far?

@Prof.NightJack  
@WingbeatPony
 
Let’s see.  
How can you anyone beside mods or admins say that downvoting spam is rare?  
Some users even don’t know what this button for and how to use it correctly or what is considered spamming.  
But people just keep repeating this “downvoting spam is rare, calm your tits”.
 
That was just one example because I’m too lazy.  
And no, I’m not and will not be convinced that it’s okay to sum up things like that.

@Stooped_hooy  
We get that from the admins telling us that…  
But no, you say it’s opinions and stuff, so it clearly isn’t somthing we know the admins say, because you know all.

@Joey
 
I do understand what this survey is for.  
My responce was just because people calling the survey “just a formality” cause big-boss-users in da thread already have decided what the future will be.

@Stooped_hooy  
Oh, and just in case you didn’t know, I’ve been on staff here for 5 years, and only very recently stepped down to deal with IRL stuff. I kinda know what I’m talking about.

@Stooped_hooy  
He said the first QUESTION was a formality, not the whole survey, I have seen no one say the whole thing was just a formality.

@Stooped_hooy  

 
Exactly!
 
Me either…

@Zeb  
… Holy crap. Did he use bots?