monkdiscuss
mojotoad
Recently, buried in [Front Page with Negative Rep..] we had a [id://167249|discussion] regarding the concept of a <em>Node Tension</em> value display for any particular node.
<p>
The basic idea would be to illustrate the relative contention over a node rather than the tally of plus and minus votes. This would be a measure of how controversial the node is rather than any absolute measure of its generated approbration or opprobrium. This value would be visible before actually voting on the node.
<readmore>
<p>
I provided the following illustration:
<p>
<table border=1 cellspacing=0>
<tr><th>++</th><th>--</th><th> Total vote </th><th> tension </th><tr>
<tr><td>100</td><td>5</td><td>95</td><td>low</td></tr>
<tr><td>10</td><td>5</td><td>5</td><td>low</td></tr>
<tr><td>5</td><td>100</td><td>-95</td><td>low</td></tr>
<tr><td>5</td><td>5</td><td>0</td><td>low</td></tr>
<tr><td>100</td><td>100</td><td>0</td><td>high</td></tr>
<tr><td>20</td><td>20</td><td>0</td><td>medium</td></tr>
<tr><td>50</td><td>20</td><td>30</td><td>medium-high</td></tr>
</table>
<p>
In response, [giulienk] provided an interesting [id://167443|attempt] at an empirical formulation of the idea. I played with it, but it was not quite satisfactory, especially since it seemed coarse-grained at lower magnitudes.
<p>
The core issue is capturing the magnitude of opposing votes. 100 positive votes and 0 negative represents no contention. 5 positive and 5 negative represents <em>some</em>, but not huge contention. So I employed Occam's Razor on the formulation and decided:
<p>
<ol>
<li>All non-opposed votes have no effect.</li>
<li>The remaining delta serves as an effective indicator of tension</li>
<li>Further qualification (low, med, high, etc) might be unnecessary</li>
</ol>
<p>
Formula: <code> $t = min($plus, $minus) * 2</code>
<p>
Recasting the original example, this would yield:
<p>
<table border=1 cellspacing=0>
<tr><th>++</th><th>--</th><th> Total vote </th><th> tension </th><tr>
<tr><td>100</td><td>5</td><td>95</td><td>10</td></tr>
<tr><td>10</td><td>5</td><td>5</td><td>10</td></tr>
<tr><td>5</td><td>100</td><td>-95</td><td>10</td></tr>
<tr><td>5</td><td>5</td><td>0</td><td>10</td></tr>
<tr><td>100</td><td>100</td><td>0</td><td>200</td></tr>
<tr><td>20</td><td>20</td><td>0</td><td>40</td></tr>
<tr><td>50</td><td>20</td><td>30</td><td>40</td></tr>
</table>
<p>
This accurately captures the magnitude of contention without revealing, beyond bare necessity, the actual votes cast.
<p>
Questions:
<p>
<ol>
<li>Is this something other monks would like to see on pre-voted nodes, perhaps as an option? What about while <em>considering</em> a node?</li>
<li>If interested, what better ideas (if any) can we come up with for representing tension?</li>
</ol>
Thank you for your time,<br>
Matt