Forum Structure

Tonight I was bothered to find that a forum member, who has over 1000 posts, had the title "Professional". I do not think that this member has earned the title; I do not think that this member is a good representative of our community.

/This thread is not about that forum member./

Other websites have somewhat more nuanced rank-giving systems. I have heard references to an "infractions" system on the Elitist Jerks forum: I'm not sure how that system works. Also, Voldemort's forum* has a system where members can give each other "reputation" if they think a good post has been made: the more reputation you have, the more reputation you can give. This helps the community stay more personally involved in ranking each other.

Would it be worth reworking the forum to have a better ranking system? Does anyone besides me care?

Please be very judicious about your use of names here. I would prefer this to be as impersonal as possible- better for the thread to die an untimely death because nobody were interested than to become another flamefield.

*Not really Voldemort's. Just a website-that-must-not-be-named.

to be honest, i don't really pay attention to the 'titles' people have. It's more of an e-peen stroking thing i think really, same as the stars.
A high number of posts in no way relates to their quality or the value they add to the forum/community.

A rating/ranking system would be good, but would mean alot of work on the forum owners/mods' behalf, and probably not really worth it as people (in my experience) don't know how to click two buttons and prefer to ask the mods to do something.

After reading a couple hundred posts you should quickly get a feel of who is childish, who is professional, who is sarcastic, who has tourettes etc :-)

some actually fit all 4 examples above ;)
-Zub

ow damn, you're only a "beginner"... yuk!
not sure why i answered your post.



ow Damn, i just did it again >.<

;-p

True story. If you aint a professional you need to GET OUT!





Wait....

;(

Ah sometimes I wish WoW had in game system like Voldemort', but a bit more complex, then just giving rep to next guy just cuz he gave you rep...

I personally like what youtube and wowhead have.
most worthless (by majority) post gets rated down and out of view,
and all good and informative get to stand out in crowd :thumbup:




PS:
your first sentence gives you away. . .
honestly IMO this all thing doesn't warrant such a major change, but maybe it does (two moders are gone now :( )
but I still rather be on netrual ground :whistling:

WOOT!

<<<< 100th POST

and it is also worthless one :thumbdown:
but proves Seraphaw's and Zub's point :P

Titles and reputation bother me about as much as the level of the character people use to post on the WoW Forums - not at all.

HOWEVER... I absolutely love the system used over at EJ - the majority of people will generally only conduct themselves properly if there are consequences for not doing so 8o

slashdot type ranking (and community moderation) should work ? I agree having some collaborative filtering could be nice - though it could turn into popularity contests but... better than nothing ? (and yes the "pro" stuff is a bit offensive)

Heh- I have no pretensions about my standing here!

Elitist Jerks's forums have a description of the infraction system at the bottom of their posting guidelines: EJ
And this seems to be the most relevant part of Slashdot's FAQ about moderation: /.

Edit: Formatting.

The problem with these rank giving systems is that they only work for large communities. In a smaller community (like the db community) individual votes weigh too heavy to calculate an objective user/post rating.