Downvotes are taken very seriously here. Over on reddit, downvotes are a sort of "Hey, the downvote button is not a disagree buton *wink wink" type of deal. Here, if you downvote and the post is not spam or a repost, people will be offended. Be very judicious with your downvotes.
I went to find your snap to see if I could spot anything that might have reasonably warranted a downvote, but I couldn't see even a hint of a good reason - you got your downvote from someone viewing the /t/music page, but that's really where your snap best fit in. Sorry you had that happen to you - I really liked it.
I just took a quick look and noticed you put it into videos. I think it's more suitable for a music tribe since it just had a stagnant picture. I dig it though - it's pretty groovy.
For posts with links, there's an "analysis" list on the right side of the screen that breaks down the net upvotes by tribe. It's really handy for seeing not only who is viewing your material, but where it's fitting in.
When a snap is first posted, it'll have a little bar graph thing on the right. A fresh snap with no votes yet looks like this. As people vote on it, the snap keeps track of where those votes come from - if someone sees the snap while browsing their front page, the vote will be added to that bar. If someone downvotes from /t/music, the /t/music bar will decrease. See screenshot of rothelys snap here. This shows that most of his upvotes came from people viewing his snap from their front page or live feed. The empty /t/music bar shows that someone downvoted it on the /t/music page.
Note: this also affects how the vote counts are displayed. For instance, I have a music video snap that has received two upvotes, screenshot here. However, it didn't receive any of those upvotes from /t/music, so when you go to the /t/music page it doesn't show that it has received any upvotes because within the music tribe, it hasn't. Screenshot here.
Indeed. I've also found myself often deciding against posting certain comments because I thought people would not understand the intended jokes or underlying sarcasm.
Over on reddit, downvotes are a sort of "Hey, the downvote button is not a disagree buton *wink wink" type of deal.
So, what systems do you have in place for downvotes that are different than Reddit? The same, right? Don't trivialize the problem by pretending Reddit ignored it. I've seen subs that put stern warnings on the button, or remove it entirely. Sometimes it worked, sometimes it didn't. People still got pissed when it happened.
Overall, though, downvoting and the reactions to it are not unique to Snapzu or Reddit. I think the real cause is just economies of scale at work with a high population at Reddit.
Oh, I'm not saying the site is immune to something like that. And this is part of the reason why so much of the discussion lately in the meta subs and on the lounge has been regarding downvotes and some of the best ways to retain this type of attitude towards downvotes as the site grows larger. I was mainly commenting on the current culture of the site. Something downvoted to zero here would garner a much worse reaction than if it was downvoted to zero on a very small sub on reddit. On reddit, people would just walk away from a post that is downvoted to zero. Currently, people here would very much take offense to genuine content having a zero score. Another example would be the comments. You would be strained to find a non-spam comment that is not at least at a +1 score. Go to any subreddit of the same size or activity and you'll probably find a couple in each thread.
That's one think I've always disliked about Reddit. People often just downvote for the sake of downvoting, not because the comment/post was poor quality. Very frustrating.
What if it's a shit post? Like personally, I think this one is pretty bad. The title isn't a question and the actual question isn't anything I consider interesting.
Shouldn't low quality posts be punished? The fact that posting gets you benefits encourages posting a lot and if there is no disincentive to making low quality posts my best bet to level quickly is to just comment on every snap I see with whatever comes to mind.
That's coming as a new user, and is a real question.
Well for one, I believe posting many low quality posts does hurt your reputation because it makes it harder to raise. Makes sense as it is a percentage. And the point of the downvote isn't to punish lower quality posts. It is to punish spam. The upvote button, however, is to reward quality posts. So, if it isn't spam and it isn't high quality, it should fit right in the middle as neither an upvote nor a downvote.
If it doesn't exist, I wouldn't be against it being added. If Snapzu values more quality discussion, the need to be responsible with your voting habits, because they're visible, would seem to align with this. But I may be wrong.
There's been some discussion of it over in ideas for Snapzu and elsewhere. There are some really good points as to why identifying where a down vote came from would be a bad reason as it opens the door for abusive of harassing PMs and the like and the down vote does have a legitimate function so it would be poor form to make people "afraid" of down voting something even if it's for a good reason.
I'm still torn on the issue, but at the very least make it mandatory to specify a reason for the down vote. If there are a couple that indicate it's in the wrong tribe, then the poster knows how to fix it.
As in, can we see that you personally voted on someones post? No. It is completely anonymous. Though there has been suggestions tossed around for people's usernames to be displayed when downvoting snaps in order to encourage people to only downvote snaps that they would be willing to defend their downvotes for.
This makes me feel so much more at home here. It's exactly how I've always handled downvotes on reddit and wish others would as well. Also one of the reasons I CSS-disabled downvotes in one of my subreddits.
I think it would be pretty cool have down votes only affect that post, not the account. Only have up votes tie to the account. If that post gets down votes, the post still gets buried, but the account wouldn't show it, just the up votes. I think that would make users that are prone to be lurkers (me included) much more comfortable in contributing.
Another thought would be, in order to down vote a post you have to reply to that post. Without a reply, the down vote wouldn't stick. I think that would go a long way in moving the conversation forward.
That sort of defeats the purpose of the reputation system, no? If there is no way for your reputation to go down then there is a lot less reason not to spam.
The second idea is interesting, but it doesn't really work with the downvote.. The point of the downvote is because a post doesn't contriubte/ is spam, so if there is anything worth commenting, then you shouldn't be downvoting anyways.
Downvotes are taken very seriously here. Over on reddit, downvotes are a sort of "Hey, the downvote button is not a disagree buton *wink wink" type of deal. Here, if you downvote and the post is not spam or a repost, people will be offended. Be very judicious with your downvotes.
I love this position so much. It's such a complete turnaround from where if you don't say something stupid or funny, you get downvoted
I also see this as a strong point for a good community, but my first and so far only snap got downvoted with no reason.
I went to find your snap to see if I could spot anything that might have reasonably warranted a downvote, but I couldn't see even a hint of a good reason - you got your downvote from someone viewing the /t/music page, but that's really where your snap best fit in. Sorry you had that happen to you - I really liked it.
Thanks for checking it out. I just deal with it since I don't really care about a random downvote. Glad you liked it.
That's the tribe that my only down vote has come from, as well. I wonder if someone just really hates seeing music they don't like...
I just took a quick look and noticed you put it into videos. I think it's more suitable for a music tribe since it just had a stagnant picture. I dig it though - it's pretty groovy.
The strange thing is that he got his downvote from someone who was viewing his snap on the music tribe itself, which makes the least sense of all.
How do you see where the votes come from?
For posts with links, there's an "analysis" list on the right side of the screen that breaks down the net upvotes by tribe. It's really handy for seeing not only who is viewing your material, but where it's fitting in.
When a snap is first posted, it'll have a little bar graph thing on the right. A fresh snap with no votes yet looks like this. As people vote on it, the snap keeps track of where those votes come from - if someone sees the snap while browsing their front page, the vote will be added to that bar. If someone downvotes from /t/music, the /t/music bar will decrease. See screenshot of rothelys snap here. This shows that most of his upvotes came from people viewing his snap from their front page or live feed. The empty /t/music bar shows that someone downvoted it on the /t/music page.
Note: this also affects how the vote counts are displayed. For instance, I have a music video snap that has received two upvotes, screenshot here. However, it didn't receive any of those upvotes from /t/music, so when you go to the /t/music page it doesn't show that it has received any upvotes because within the music tribe, it hasn't. Screenshot here.
I really didn't know where else to put it. It's groovy indeed.
Aww I love electroswing. I've never heard this song either.
That's an interesting point and completely true. I really felt pressured to tell jokes if I wanted any upvotes.
Indeed. I've also found myself often deciding against posting certain comments because I thought people would not understand the intended jokes or underlying sarcasm.
So, what systems do you have in place for downvotes that are different than Reddit? The same, right? Don't trivialize the problem by pretending Reddit ignored it. I've seen subs that put stern warnings on the button, or remove it entirely. Sometimes it worked, sometimes it didn't. People still got pissed when it happened.
Overall, though, downvoting and the reactions to it are not unique to Snapzu or Reddit. I think the real cause is just economies of scale at work with a high population at Reddit.
Oh, I'm not saying the site is immune to something like that. And this is part of the reason why so much of the discussion lately in the meta subs and on the lounge has been regarding downvotes and some of the best ways to retain this type of attitude towards downvotes as the site grows larger. I was mainly commenting on the current culture of the site. Something downvoted to zero here would garner a much worse reaction than if it was downvoted to zero on a very small sub on reddit. On reddit, people would just walk away from a post that is downvoted to zero. Currently, people here would very much take offense to genuine content having a zero score. Another example would be the comments. You would be strained to find a non-spam comment that is not at least at a +1 score. Go to any subreddit of the same size or activity and you'll probably find a couple in each thread.
That's one think I've always disliked about Reddit. People often just downvote for the sake of downvoting, not because the comment/post was poor quality. Very frustrating.
It's taking all of my might not to give "hillarious" ironic downvotes to these type of posts. I'm feeling very proud of myself.
What if it's a shit post? Like personally, I think this one is pretty bad. The title isn't a question and the actual question isn't anything I consider interesting.
I'd personally ignore it and let it get buried under other, more quality posts getting upvotes.
That's a good way of thinking of it. There's no need to downvote something if you can just let it get buried.
I would just not upvote it. It's a low quality post but isn't spam.
Shouldn't low quality posts be punished? The fact that posting gets you benefits encourages posting a lot and if there is no disincentive to making low quality posts my best bet to level quickly is to just comment on every snap I see with whatever comes to mind.
That's coming as a new user, and is a real question.
Well for one, I believe posting many low quality posts does hurt your reputation because it makes it harder to raise. Makes sense as it is a percentage. And the point of the downvote isn't to punish lower quality posts. It is to punish spam. The upvote button, however, is to reward quality posts. So, if it isn't spam and it isn't high quality, it should fit right in the middle as neither an upvote nor a downvote.
I wouldn't downvote or upvote it. But I wouldn't be apprehensive if you downvoted.
Not sure how to ask this without it seeming like "herp derp, who cares if I offend someone", but it is really out of genuine curiosity...
are my votes (up or down) somehow visible to others, either globally or to the person being voted on?
If it doesn't exist, I wouldn't be against it being added. If Snapzu values more quality discussion, the need to be responsible with your voting habits, because they're visible, would seem to align with this. But I may be wrong.
There's been some discussion of it over in ideas for Snapzu and elsewhere. There are some really good points as to why identifying where a down vote came from would be a bad reason as it opens the door for abusive of harassing PMs and the like and the down vote does have a legitimate function so it would be poor form to make people "afraid" of down voting something even if it's for a good reason.
I'm still torn on the issue, but at the very least make it mandatory to specify a reason for the down vote. If there are a couple that indicate it's in the wrong tribe, then the poster knows how to fix it.
As in, can we see that you personally voted on someones post? No. It is completely anonymous. Though there has been suggestions tossed around for people's usernames to be displayed when downvoting snaps in order to encourage people to only downvote snaps that they would be willing to defend their downvotes for.
I"m guessing that's because of the smaller nature, 'upvotes' are less common here now?
Obviously not as common as reddit, but people aren't shy about upvoting.
This makes me feel so much more at home here. It's exactly how I've always handled downvotes on reddit and wish others would as well. Also one of the reasons I CSS-disabled downvotes in one of my subreddits.
I think it would be pretty cool have down votes only affect that post, not the account. Only have up votes tie to the account. If that post gets down votes, the post still gets buried, but the account wouldn't show it, just the up votes. I think that would make users that are prone to be lurkers (me included) much more comfortable in contributing.
Another thought would be, in order to down vote a post you have to reply to that post. Without a reply, the down vote wouldn't stick. I think that would go a long way in moving the conversation forward.
That sort of defeats the purpose of the reputation system, no? If there is no way for your reputation to go down then there is a lot less reason not to spam.
The second idea is interesting, but it doesn't really work with the downvote.. The point of the downvote is because a post doesn't contriubte/ is spam, so if there is anything worth commenting, then you shouldn't be downvoting anyways.