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Closed Remove 'Downvoting' or restrict up/down voting to the suggestions forum.

These suggestions have been dropped by the suggestor or rejected by staff.
Charmaylarg Dufrain

Charmaylarg Dufrain

🎖️ Game Master
In my opinion, the up-and-downvoting system has not been utilized lately by the community at large the way it was intended and has mostly been used to mass-vote by one group or anotheron people's individual posts irrelevant to topics and has created a toxic atmosphere and situations we could do without here.

I would like to either restrict the ability to vote up or down to the Suggestions forum, or if at all possible Remove the downvoting feature altogether as having the ability to downvote doesnt show that a post or submission is disliked by the community but more by individuals which are easily identified and can create unneeded tension or accusations which this community does not need, and hides the support of the community for ideas or submissions when someone is downvoted which has no purpose beyond having the possibility to dash someones ideas when it hits the negetive or create drama. Leaving only upvotes if possible would show how much support that submission or suggestion has without it being manipulated.
 
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This suggestion has been closed. Votes are no longer accepted.
I want to know if ideas are popular or unpopular in the style of sites like Reddit. Without downvoting, my ability to know how people feel about something, without forcing them to type something (e.g. some people won't say anything because they don't want to avoid confrontation but they'll anonymously vote) could be lessened. I get that sometimes people downvote because they're being jerks, but I am concerned what's going to happen if we remove downvotes is even the most terrible ideas will have positive vote scores which is confusing, or could imply the site approves of something that's bad. I guess I need some convincing. What do other people think?
 
I think that downvoting should indeed be removed, because like Char said it’s being abused by multiple people - myself included, which is something I regret and apologize for - to suppress the ideas of people they don’t like or have disagreements with.

If downvoting were to be removed, there’s nothing stopping those who want to avoid confrontation from sending their feedback to a staff member, who can post in their stead - thus preserving their anonymity while still making their voice heard.

The fact that the suggestion was downvoted (it doesn’t show that way because I upvoted it) also lends credence to the fact that it’s simply too easy to abuse the votes for petty political or personal reasons.

Edit: The number of votes something has should also never guarantee that something should be implemented (or removed) from the setting - because even the most terrible ideas (i.e. some that both sides pitched during the Asterian days) can accumulate tons of votes if popular individuals/GMs/FMs/etc. influence their players/friends/etc. to vote a certain way.
 
FrostJaeger said:
The fact that the suggestion was downvoted (it doesn’t show that way because I upvoted it) also lends credence to the fact that it’s simply too easy to abuse the votes for petty political or personal reasons.
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How?
 
Wes said:
How?
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By demonstrating that anyone with a grudge against Char can anonymously torpedo the proposal with the press of a button.

Edit: Am I being too paranoid? Probably; I’m (physically) sick with a virus or something in real life and tired after a long shift at work. But I know from back in the day what it’s like to aggressively go after the “enemy” on all fronts - be they roleplay, faction aspects (such as the starship speed standard), characters, setting submissions, and so forth - and in my personal opinion there’s sadly some of that still occurring today.
 
If it helps, I downvoted it because I disagree with the motion to remove the downvote - nothing to do with who made it or why. Either leave it as is, or remove the voting system entirely and require people to post their vote.
 
iaincarter said:
If it helps, I downvoted it because I disagree with the motion to remove the downvote - nothing to do with who made it or why. Either leave it as is, or remove the voting system entirely and require people to post their vote.
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I’m personally in favor of making voting transparent by requiring that names be attached to votes, but what about those that wish to remain anonymous? I don’t think the forum software supports “mixed” - where votes can be transparent or anonymous - voting …
 
Thats kind of the likes system which has more than just thumbs up tbh.

And if people dont want it thats fine. Just didnt feel like it was being utilized to show support or not when I see more 0s and - numbers when I pay attention than actual upvoting. Thats why I proposed getting rid of downvoting just to leave the upvoting metric to see how much support a post has instead of how much it can not have but wes wasnt wrong on his first comment either imo.
 
I would be careful not to jump to conclusions about what people's intentions are considering the system is set up so that we don't know who voted, or why. It seems like there's accusations of "abuse" when it could simply be disagreement with the idea. The accusations could be unfounded.

One member who didn't feel comfortable posting their reasoning here, likely downvoted it but only PMed me their reasons. They said essentially "It would only show one side of the coin."

I have mixed feelings here. I originally downvoted the suggestion for the reasons I posted above but I'm neutral now because basically the abuse accusations and witchhunts coming from people who are salty about downvotes (whether they're wrong or right) are frustrating to me as an admin who has to respond to them. People have literally stalked the "who's online" to try to catch people downvoting them and that's not healthy.
 
I believe the solution is not to eliminate half of the opinion system, as that would hinder individuals from expressing a clear "No, I don't like this" sentiment. I acknowledge the concerns about potential abuse. Several years ago, accusations were made against me and Yuuki, suggesting that we influenced participants in my storyline to downvote certain content. Unfortunately, those accusers were merely paranoid.

I maintain a neutral stance on suggestions. Whether I like an idea or not, it receives an upvote or downvote based on its merit. Over time, I've observed instances where individuals who haven't even participated in role-playing here for two years managed to influence votes to suit their preferences. Addressing abuse involves holding individuals accountable for their actions.

Take this thread as an example. I've downvoted the suggestion because I don't favor it. Perhaps requiring an actual statement for a downvote to be counted could be a way to ensure responsible and thoughtful voting.
 
This would be a lot easier if the score said "6 up, 5 down" instead of just the total of 1, for example. That way you could tell ignored suggestions from highly controversial ones.
 
The reddit style up/down system seems fine to me in all cases except for polls with multiple options. As a feeler for community sentiment on changes up/down is fine, and has never really been binding. I&S as well as negatively downvoted NTSE submissions have been implemented in the past, for example. Seems to be working like Wes' intentions stated in this thread.

For things like premier election, ooc awards, player of the month (if it were a public vote), and similar polls then it should only be upvotes because it's a form of ballot. And you don't get to downvote what you don't like on ballots, only cast a vote for what you do like.
 
Soban said:
I think we should try that if possible. A controversial suggestion and a ignored suggestion are two entirely different beasts.
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We could do this with some sort of mod but also it occurs to me we could just use the forum's poll option. However then the poster has to remember to set it up, instead of it being automatically added like the current system.
 
raz said:
The reddit style up/down system seems fine to me in all cases except for polls with multiple options. As a feeler for community sentiment on changes up/down is fine, and has never really been binding. I&S as well as negatively downvoted NTSE submissions have been implemented in the past, for example. Seems to be working like Wes' intentions stated in this thread.

For things like premier election, ooc awards, player of the month (if it were a public vote), and similar polls then it should only be upvotes because it's a form of ballot. And you don't get to downvote what you don't like on ballots, only cast a vote for what you do like.
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What's I&S? Not trying to be rude or cause drama, just curious, as I don't remember anything major or recent that goes by that acronym.
 
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