[Update] Voting system and all sub-systems dependent on it
Hi everyone, there was/is a number of discussions on voting related feedback as well as functionality suggestions that have sprouted up as of late. Actually most of yesterday to be exact. I would have posted this update last night, but decided that it would be better if I had a chance to sleep on it and discuss it with the team before I went any further. Alright, lets get started.
The purpose of Voting & Reputation
The voting functionality is a big part of the underlying mechanics of Snapzu, and is here to stay. We will not be removing the ability for users to down vote content because a number of very important sub-systems are dependent on up/down votes to function.
The general concept of reputation is explained below, and I will explain why its important that we don't change the way voting works.
Your reputation score is the sum of collected votes that illustrates the dynamically changing feedback from your more recent engagements based on up/down votes received from the rest of the Snapzu community.
A good way to visualize reputation is to imagine a literal pool that holds a limited amount of up and down votes instead of water. As time passes incoming votes will replace (spill out) the oldest votes and thus change the ratio within the pool. Your reputation score is the number of up votes vs the number of down votes currently in that pool which changes daily.
Because reputation needs to be contextual, it cannot be a forever increasing number where the user with the most reputation has the highest score, this wouldn't really be considered reputation as there is no benchmark to compare it to and would be useless in the context of what reputation should represent.
Because reputation is calculated from a ratio (up vs down votes) and then converted into a number represented by a percentage it can never truly reach 100%. In addition, as Snapzu's community grows, the benchmark score (currently 99%) will decrease as the number of users and their general approach to down voting increases.
This means that a peak reputation today will not be attainable a few months down the road. Don't panic however, this is all relative to the benchmark score which is dictated by the ever changing landscape of the Snapzu community!
In order for our reputation system to work, our community needs the ability to place both up and down votes freely. Without that freedom the reputation system along with other sub-systems (anti-spam, xp, leveling and content management) based on it will fall apart. There are of course guidelines on when to downvote, and there are new limitations to how many downvotes new members have, but we cannot disable or convert the downvote into something else because it would break the system. Voting & reputation is the freedom for anyone to anonymously make a decision based on the content they see without the fear of witch hunts, downvote brigades and other unpleasant situations that would form based on other members publicly reacting to down votes which I'm sure we can all agree can happen.
As we continue to make improvements we will introduce additional functionality that will help educate new members on when is the appropriate time to down vote. We will expand the down vote reason functionality into all areas of our platform. We don't expect for the system to be perfect, but then again nothing ever is. We as a community need to mitigate and absorb incoming downvotes and accept them as a necessary evil brought in by our democratic approach and freedom to ultimately govern ourselves. Just like a small town accepts some level of crime to happen within their community, we should expect some abuse to the system.
Here is what we are looking to do over the next few weeks to improve the vote system as well as educate new members on how it works:
- We will update the prologue as well as other documentation to further stress the voting system as a moderation tool and not a disagree button.
- I will personally look through our sub-systems to make any improvements to vote algorithms to assure abuse is kept to a minimum.
- We will update the down vote reason functionality to be slightly more noticeable as well as accessible on all votable elements (Text Posts, Snaps & Comments)
- We will read all comments & suggestions in this post for ideas on how we can better improve the current system. Please note that we wont be changing the underlying functionality however, so if you do have some great ideas, please focus them on the system we already have in place.
We appreciate everyone that took part in yesterday's discussions it has really given us a lot to think about as we move forward. We are always looking to make improvements to this platform, so we keep our eyes open and ears to the ground to make sure that we are headed in the right direction!
Thanks all, I will keep updates flowing as we move ahead!
Join the Discussion
Thanks for the update.
I know it was discussed in some places and I get that we can't ditch the downvoting button, but can't we change the appearance of it? I think what a down arrow represents could be misconstrued on face value; people may think it is a disagree button while some sort of other flag type button could be seen otherwise.
So the flags would be in the same place in your reputation algorithm as the downvote button would be but there should be less confusion about its use. Just an idea.
Hmm...how would people react if up and down arrows were replaced by + and x symbols to represent appropriate versus inappropriate content? I'm just brainstorming here, but one aspect about it that appeals to me is the way it would differentiate voting on this site from others.
It's a really really good idea. Changing the signs would help the mentality I think.
Yes, I think while having more forced information out there about a downvoting button will help a bit... I think we have to realize that those of us having this discussion are the users that really care. A majority of people probably ignore a lot of information given to them and once again... a down arrow has an implied connotation that people who did not read about the function of the button will mess up.
Yep. So additional information in the prologue, downvote reasons on everything and a change of graphics would be the best course of actions I think.
I think this is a really great solution! Keeps the purpose of the buttons of helping the moderators and admin not have too much work but still to swamp them, yet moves away from the agree, disagree mindset.
Not sure if it is easy to do or not, but I would maybe add putting them on opposite sides of the post to mentally seperate the association with each other and hence furthering them being thought as opposites, but that's just a small added thought..
Edit: Oops, meant to comment on /u/spaceghoti 's post haha
Hahaha well it's still valid to my own comment anyhow :)
I was originally thinking of leaving the up arrow and just making (-) be there for "down vote". My go-to instinct was for a "off topic" and I thought of a dash, but your idea of + and x makes a lot of sense and the visual appearance of it is....pleasant.
To me, if I was a new user and didn't know about what the buttons did, it would feel like an "add content" button and "remove content" button. I think all buttons with the "plus" icon should be reserved for adding content and not "up voting" something.
I believe the up vote symbol should never change. It has been ingrained in most web users minds that up vote means agreement, positivity, appropriateness. It's like if Microsoft decided that the action for closing windows was "-" instead of "x". That is just taking away from decades of user experience.
However, if our down voting is different in that it is intended to remove or discourage inappropriate content, then I think it would be okay for a symbol change specifically for the down vote button. Maybe a flag icon, as this is associated with bringing attention to, informing others of something, or saying watch out.
Icon changes are tough and make a gigantic impact. I'm don't think I'm on board for changing either one.
That's my point. The fact that these symbols are so ingrained in so many people's minds is precisely why I suggest it. We're not Microsoft, just as we're not Reddit or voat or any other site with a voting system. Reputation is not karma or any of the other words used to describe the overall effects of voting. Changing both symbols (or even just one) would help to break that association and allow us to retrain new users who come here.
I'm not married to the idea, I simply throw it out there as a suggestion for how to break the habit of using upvotes or downvotes as proxy for whether or not you agree.
To your last point: no worries, it's discussion and we're all brainstorming! I'm just trying to give counterarguments to help think through all aspects of an idea. I don't know the answers.
Back to topic: I think it's possible that a change to the down vote button could work, since our ideology behind the action is different. But for an up vote, a symbol change will end up confusing users (old and new), and leave a bad impression on the usability of the site, in my opinion.
Also, perhaps not putting them right next to each other would be a good change. When you have UP and DOWN you assume that one is the opposite of the other. Same with +/-. But if there's UP button in one corner and "INAPPROPRIATE" in another (kind of like how some "REPORT" buttons are) it might reduce unwarranted downvotes.
I really like this idea. I think the flag would probably deter new users from mass using it, as most new users lately (myself included) are coming from Reddit, where we're used to the down arrow being used for a different purpose than it is here. By changing the arrow to the flag, you'd be breaking the association between it and new users are probably more likely not to use it unless warranted.
This is interesting, because I've been hearing that the purpose of Reddit's downvote button is the same as Snapzu but with the sheer userbase that Reddit has the downvote's function became bastardized over time.
This could easily happen here at Snapzu with the influx of members.
Exactly what I was about to say. The reddiquette essentially is the same as it is here, but over time, the people started using it as a disagree button, even though a lot of subs discourage it a lot.
Although it never asked for a reason to be given, which I believe adds the extra question to thenuser as to whether they want to do this. Plus with it being the exact opposite symbol to the upvote it's not hard to imagine how the association developed.
Although is it possible to add, "don't like comment" as a reason. If they click this it lights up their button and does nothing. Haha nah just teasing :P
Reddit's downvote serves the exact same purpose as Snapzu's. It has, as you said, been bastardized to being a "you suck" button, essentially. Still occasionally used for "off topic" marker, but overall just crap.
Although it never asked for a reason to be given, which I believe adds the extra question to the user as to whether they want to do this. Plus with it being the exact opposite symbol to the upvote it's not hard to imagine how the association developed.
Haha, you have a quite way with words. I agree, and haven't heard it put so well.
Reddit's downvote is the same function, in principal. Not in practice, though.
Like you said, I think changing the down arrow to a Flag symbol makes the most sense. A down arrow really does connote disapproval or disagreement, whereas a Flag would convey more of a "this is needlessly offensive" or "this is spam" message.
I think a flag would be good too, but maybe it's because I can't think of anything else lol. But ultimately I think we should really consider how much effect a superficial adjustment will have, I think it's big.
[This comment was removed]
This comment has been removed
I'm glad to see that the reason functionality will be expanded to all other votable elements.
I would like the reason selection to be a required action before a down vote can be cast. Obviously abuse of this system will still happen, but a required reason will at least get the user to re-think why they are down voting. Because the down vote button should only be used when necessary, it should be somewhat difficult for the user to perform. When it is an easy action, it is natural for it to be used as a disagree button.
One other idea that I would love people's opinion on is if the user who got down voted, should they receive a notification explaining the reasoning behind it? Would it be helpful for a notification to pop-up, such as:
I know lots of comments get edited to say:
I think the user who got down voted deserves to know. Opinions?
Lastly, thank you admins for all the hard work you are putting into this system. I appreciate your attentiveness to our voices and I look forward to seeing Snapzu improve and grow.
I think there should be a required reason given when downvoting... and not only for snaps, for everything. The information should be public and it maybe should be reversible. If enough users look at the downvote reason and reverse it, it goes away. I know this is a really complicated system... but just brainstorming.
By public, do you mean having the reason visible by that comment/snap for other user's to view?
I don't think that is a very good idea. If my comment was down voted for being "Off-topic" and that reason was displayed beside it, every time a user reads my comment they will also see that it was marked as "Off-topic". They may have not initially thought my comment was "Off-topic", but because the system displayed that message, subconsciously they were suggested that it is "Off-topic". Basically, if a down vote reason is made public, I think it may inadvertently encourage more down votes.
Same way that you have to inquire about your downvote reasons now, by clicking then it appearing, it would appear for anyone else. So unless someone was curious as to why your post was downvoted, they wouldn't see it. I see what you're saying, but I think the benefit would outweigh the "herding" mentality you're talking about.
Thanks for the information. In case you didn't see my idea over in one of the /ideas threads:
What if the downvote button was only available inside the snap itself. It wouldn't prevent legitimate downvoting, but it would prevent people from just downvoting from the frontpage.
If you're going to downvote, you should at least look inside the snap in case there is more information, related links or relevant comments.
Already you can't click through to an article without going to the snap first anyway (unless I'm missing something).
Thoughts?
[This comment was removed]
It would make downvoting more of an effort, which won't stop ideologues but would discourage the casual troll. It's been suggested that there should be fairness: upvotes should be given the same restrictions as downvotes but I don't know that I agree with that. Not voting should be all the commentary needed if a snap or comment isn't worth your time.
Really happy that the reason functionality will be more noticeable. I'm eager to see what you guys have in store for that since it was a main concern that was brought up 10 days ago in Mandatory Reason for Downvote.
Thanks for all your hard work!
EDIT: Also, per /u/drunkenninja's request in today's Daily Dose post, about cross-referencing what we wrote there, this is what I said in regards to communication between admins and the Snapzu community:
The voting system sounds very well thought out, I like it. Limiting down votes by account level and detecting auto suspending users, this stuff makes this user very happy.
Let me pitch in,
I don't want to drop qualifications (specially since they are not that impressive and unique), but I think this is a bit important for the context,
I'm an UI&UX planning professional, so my opinions are a mixture of personal opinion, with informed experience and analysis. And since this field of work is ever evolving with global culture, everything I'm about to say is at the same time my professional opinion and an educated guess. That said:
From everything I saw to this day, on the up-and-down voting system there seems to be some sort of bakunian anarchist behavior as a event horizon regarding downvotes. It only works in small circles.
The paradigm of the system is that upvotes are for stuff that contribute with content and downvotes are things that do not contribute with content.
This seems to work on smaller communities; early reddit, niche reddit clones, and to some extent current slashdot;
The problem is that if the system has a premisse that defines itself and it is only upheld as long the users obey it, when the community sphere reaches non-personalization, (that is, when we consider ourselves just a speck of dust in the higher machine), the actions of users seem a bit more inconsequential and the system laws are often disregarded.
What that means is that people start downvoting with things they disagree with, because that's what people do when they are not serious about a system, they revert to individual relevance over infrastructure maintenance. Specially when the downvote button is ridiculously easy to use, and on a semiotics context the go-to button to systematically punish confronting ideas, by morally scoring negatively an idea and systematically pushing that idea out of evidence.
This makes nearly impossible to upheld the downvoting button as a "not-disagree" button.
There you have two options,
Accept that it IS going to be used for disagreement or change the system.
The first case is easy and it is what the majority does, which is mindnumbing, because as stated, it is basically the foundation of the system. So there's a perpetual dissonance in what the system should be doing from what it does.
The second option scares the hell out of people, because people hate to change the foundation of systems,
So in this case, the best option would be to tweak it. See what is wrong with the system and take the edges off to balance the user experience to the intended behavior.
As I said in another post, the Snapzu platform is better than some alternatives because it takes a bit of anonymity of the user. Not that it requires REAL WORLD Id. It's not a binary system.
Snapzu gives people avatars, XP levels, it is invite only (for now), etc...
Those are characteristics that make the user feel a bit more responsible for what ideas his image is professing into the world.
But that is not enough, the downvote button is still shielded by anonymity. (And that's a good thing BTW).
Then we would have to make simple changes on how the downvote button is associated with its proposed function, and the responsibilities that come with the usage.
Then we can have a plethora of suggestion on how to change it, let me give you a few (most have already been echoed in several threads on several platforms for years by many users):
- Make the downvote button NOT the imagetic opposite to upvote, instead of a downarrow and the name "Downvote" something more akin to "Report" "Not Contributing", and changing the forma...
... Read FullThis is a problem with the UI/UX of the website, which makes expertise on the matter ever more important. Thank you for your suggestions above and I agree with you.
As I've said many times before, no amount of reminders or convincing will ever change the general user's interaction with the down vote button. Up vote is agreement or positive content; down vote arrow is opposite to up vote, which in turn means disagreement or negative content. That's how it is on every web platform in existence and that will never change, no matter how many times we link to the voting FAQ. You cannot change a user's natural impulse. If they dislike an article, and they find an icon that reminds them of disagreement or negativity, they will click it. That will never change.
I don't know why anyone would want the downvote functionality removed, anyway. It either means what you wrote as a comment or posted as a snap was either unnecessary or incendiary. It's not like it publicly shows up anywhere, and while your rep can go down, you'd have to actively try to go below 65% rep with how welcoming and accepting this community is.
True, I think it's useful functionality that has way more positives currently than negatives. I believe the worry is that as the site grows, the culture & usage habits of the downvote become diluted and it starts getting used as a dislike button which it isn't meant for. That's why many suggestions seem to be around changing how the button is presented, so as to not be as strongly associated with the upvote (which does basically work as a like, along with being a "good contribution" button).
I suppose that makes sense, but on the other hand, the people that would engage in egregious behavior with a downvote button will just find other ways to be obnoxious, anyway. This seems like the least awful way of going about it, at least in my opinion.
True, a downvote isn't a overly awful way of being obnoxious. Other ways would seem to have a tendency of being more accountable though (e.g. making a angry rant in the comments is visible to everyone, being hateful in private messages can probably be reported to the admins somehow). But if downvotes end up being more commonplace (hopefully not), they are probably the easiest of those to ignore.
This is great! I think that with the need to input a reason, the downvote system will be pretty much the best version of the system it can be.
Thanks for the update! I really like the communication flow from the admins /u/drunkenninja, keep up the insanely good work! :D
edit: Here's what I said in the other thread, so that it tracks here:
Hello!
Well first of all, for the downvote system, I had an idea yesterday, which I will repost here : The upvote system already servers the purpose of weeding out the best content and sending it to the top. A downvote currently acts much the same way, but with added force, which really isn't all that useful.
Why not make the downvote give a reason for the downvote, which could be transparent to the owner of the comment.
Example:
This comment has 5 downvotes:
3x Harassing
1x non-constructive (does not contribute)
1x Bad Language
Reasons I see would be a downvote:
Harassment (covers hate speech and racism and others), Does not contribute to the discussion, Violent language, spam, Troll, Over self-promoting, Does not belong to the tribe.
The downvote system should work like a soft report system, instead of a disagree button. And since there is no disagree choice in there, you limit the times the system will be abused.
As for communication, I really like the transparency displayed by the admins here. The more involved admins will be in actually explaining things to their community, the less the risk of a backlash in case of a misunderstood move, but much more than that, I really like to see involved admins. It makes it seem much more important and personal, to me.
I don't understand why you can't just change the icon for downvoting? And perhaps position. And name. To me this could be solved psychologically rather than a major system upheaval. The fact is that we can already see lots of people misusing downvotes - this will only grow as the site expands.
Hi everyone, and thank you for participating in this thread and leaving your suggestions on how we can improve the current voting concept. In the coming weeks we will be applying general fixes to the concept to improve it, as well as working on larger system wide changes over the next month or two. We have a lot on our plate, so we cannot guarantee how quick this update will be released but we have what we need to move forward.
Thanks again everyone, we will post regular updates on releases as they come.
I just got a couple of downvotes today again.
I would like to see the following:
1. Make a reason mandatory
2. Show who downvoted, make the User PUBLIC. If he has a valid reason to down vote there is no shame in showing it.
3. Let other people decide if the down vote was justified, if not hurt the down voter.
4. Or even better, make a downvote only count if, lets say 3 people have down voted for that exact reason to verify it is valid.
In my book this would eliminate troll down voters or at least make it harder.
1. Fair point, but it should be quick to do.
2. Making a user public for downvoting, quite frankly, would be a terrible idea. It would be incredibly easy to witch-hunt and make people targets for harassment.
3/4. And why should someone's downvote need to be validated by other people? As in, my opinion doesn't matter unless someone else agrees with me? Maybe have a threshold of downvotes before something is reported, but a single downvote should count on its own. And penalizing a downvoter if others don't agree with them seems spiteful.
As far as I can tell in my experience here, there aren't any 'troll' users going around downvoting people. Besides, the limit on votes (which is fairly stringent) really effectively prevents that from happening.
Hi ekyris , thx for the reply.
2) Why would it be so terrible? I am a big fan of transparency. If you are down voting you should stand for it and if you are right there is nothing to worry about.
3/4) I see your point and you are not wrong. This is simply a way they could handle it. Obviously i would like nothing more if it would not be necessary but i think it would be a reasonable way to verify a down vote reason. If you get two or three down votes for the same reason that makes it MUCH more likely that it's valid, don't you think?
On a second note. Why is it spiteful to "judge" down votes? The down vote itself judges a snap so why shouldn't it be reasonable to judge the down vote itself? In my book it makes much more sense to judge a down vote because it is mostly negative feedback which should be reviewed more critical.
I mean, I'm a fan of transparency myself, and yes people shouldn't be ashamed of a downvote. But as the community grows, unfortunately we are going to get people who abuse the system and downvote improperly. Downvotes becoming public makes it incredibly easy to return-downvote someone out of spite or even anger, plus even going through someone's history and downvoting their other posts. Again, shitty behavior, but I did hear about it happening on reddit. The benefits of a system like that does not (imo) outweigh the risks.
Well yes, a downvote is more valid if others agree with you. However I'm uncomfortable with the idea that my downvote only 'counts' if someone agrees, especially/mostly in smaller tribes. If a post is only getting a few (let's say 3) upvotes, a single downvote is more significant that 5 downvotes on a post with 100 upvotes. Maybe there could be some sort of rule in place for larger tribes, but we don't really have default tribes like reddit does to I'm not sure where to draw the line of a 'big enough' community.
The distinction I'm making in terms of spitefulness is that there is a difference between the act of downvoting and the person downvoting. For example: say I downvote something for a reason you think is unreasonable. If more people agree with you, maybe have some system where my downvote is 'judged' and mitigated (which would be incredibly hard to do, but that's outside the scope here). However, I do not think I should be punished because you all disagreed with my reason for downvoting. If I find something offensive, I would downvote it, but that's a personal opinion. The fact I disagree with the majority about the offensiveness of a post should not penalize my account. Does that make sense?
This isn't exactly on topic, but something thats been bothering me about the XP system and account leveling.
What is to stop someone from selling their high level account to marketers? If this site were to get bigger, it would be extremely lucrative to level up accounts and sell them to companies in order for them to use them to advertise.
What is going to be put in place to prevent abuse of advertisements such as this?
People who have accounts with high reputation will even be targeted by companies to sell their accounts to them. Who would say no to selling their random Snapzu account for $1000?
I fear, if this place were to get as big as reddit, power users could become a problem due to the current system in place.
Reporting such posts as spam would alert the Snapzu team. I guess any account resorting to this would be terminated pretty quickly.
Technically this could be a problem with any website that uses a progression approach. A hard stance on buy/selling accounts should be enough to stop 99% of it happening as no one would want to loose an account that took years to level up.
Well, depending on how overt the advertising is, I'd imagine the reputation of that user would fall quite quickly. It may still be deemed that it would be a worthwhile investment, though I'd assume a quick negative reaction through negative reputation would perhaps lead to questioning if the move is hurting or helping their goal of advertising. I'd also imagine users that suddenly start spamming a lot would end up getting banned, possibly before the reach desired was achieved, which could create disincentive for going this route (very unreliable ROI).
I see you mention limiting the downvotes of the new users. What are people's thoughts on if maybe, for the first two levels you can't downvote but instead if you are lvl 1 or 2 you get sent to a page explaining the rules of downvotes. It really doesn't take long to get through the first 2 levels but by then hopefully they are more used to the system. Just a thougt. Also note I have zero idea how easy it is to implement things I suggest so take it with a grain of salt. :)
Yeah, sounds like a good idea, though I'd probably expand it even to level 5 maybe. Shouldn't take terribly long to get to though it does start slowing down and allows even more time to immerse yourself in the culture before you get your own tools of affecting it strongly.
Very true! :)
Can a third button be added for "I disagree"? If the "I disagree" button is chosen then neither the upvote or downvote button could also be chosen so that a user disagreeing with a statement would not affect the vote count -- or it could be that if you choose the "I disagree" button then you could still upvote (but not downvote) to promote a good response that you just happen to disagree with.
That sounds kind of negative so maybe it could be called something better than "I disagree" or also include an "I agree" button if having four different buttons isn't too crazy.
I'm sorry, but who the hell downvotes a post like this?
"Hey, this is how the voting system currently works, and we want to get your feedback to fine-tune it to give you the best and fairest possible way of interacting as a healthy community."
"Blarg fuck you I want this to the reddit."