It is a major change. There is no denying that. It is hoped to be a change for the better. There has actually been a fair amount of prior discussion in the Monastery about vote bloat and what to do about it ( cf. here, an early concern about XP whores here, a long thread ). I am not trying to claim the proposed solution was specifically mentioned, but there has been a long running thread of concern with respect to the XP system.

I do not think this caters to the "old school" monks ( of which I am likely one ). It takes a few good articles in any portion of the Monastery to get the initial votes and anybody can attain monk level. This new method is trying to encourage greater participation by rewarding those who actively ask and answer questions, interact with the community, etc.

Is it just numbers? I don't know. I can tell you I have been incredibly frustrated at times by the fact that I try very hard to contribute ( I will let others gauge my success ) and I am outranked by somebody who has never written a single article simply because I refuse to use my votes for the sake of the vote-out bonus. This method is an attempt to even that imbalance out.

Given that the goals are to reward interaction, keep the signal/noise ratio as high as possible and make the levels indicative not of skill at perl but interest in the community, what would you propose instead? Everybody has a voice here. vroom has shown himself to be a rational Overlord and listens to good ideas. How would you change it to make it more fair?

mikfire