I've read quite a few writeups recently with the same general topic: How do we focus on the signal and ignore the noise? After long thought, about 30 or 40 seconds, this occured to me... Perhaps an eBay-like "rating" should be added to the author's name.

That is, for any given monk, take the average reputation for all his/her nodes with a +/-reputation (zeros excluded by default):
In the case of someone, shall we say, less than useful, there'd be a big ol' void where the "stars" would go.
In the case of someone somewhat useful, you'd see: by a_useful_monk *****
In the case of someone useful, say, vroom, you'd see: by vroom **********

This could be implemented via perl's x operator.

Replies are listed 'Best First'.
RE: Yet Another Post on Experience
by gregorovius (Friar) on May 22, 2000 at 22:18 UTC
    I think that having this would discourage conversation. When I vote I usually do so for the posting with the main idea and not for the subsequent postings from the same author.

    I do think this would be useful but not in such a crude manner as dividing votes by number of posts. Maybe we could take the sum of votes per discussion thread to elaborate this index. This wouldn't discourage conversation as much and would still be meaningful. 
    $MonkRating = $SumOfAllVotes / $NumberOfThreadsHeHasParticipatedOn;

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    Still I don't feel too comfortable with this idea. It may be fun but it will probably intimidate newcomers.
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[d/l]
RE: Yet Another Post on Experience
by royalanjr (Chaplain) on May 23, 2000 at 00:41 UTC


    Maybe I am missing a huge point. If so, apologies in advance. There seems to be an awful lot of talk on different ways to rate people and so forth. To me, it seems a little on the exesive side. If you hang around, and read enough, you will quickly learn who knows what they are talking about and who does not.

    For example, you might notice that I have not contributed an answer to a Perl question. This is because I am new, and would not presume to hand out an answer at this point. Others who breath Perl might have different areas of strengths than another. To me, it just seems like too much to put a blanket score on people to the depth and extent that is being talked about.

    Again, I might be wrong, but you are welcome to my couple pennies bent as they may be.

    Roy Alan

    "I am Drunkard of Borg. Resultance is floor tile!"
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RE: Yet Another Post on Experience
by Russ (Deacon) on May 22, 2000 at 21:32 UTC
    I like the idea. Perhaps you should also include the zeros in the equation.

    A poster who consistently receives positive votes is (?) more readable than one who rarely has a voteable post, even if the few posts which do receive votes get lots of them.

    (sheesh, what a terrible sentence construction, please interpret...) ;-)

    I would like to see 

    $Rating = $SumOfAllVotes / $NumberOfPosts

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    A poster who consistently gets positive votes on most of his/her posts should be rewarded for the quality of the submissions. We already reward volume in Saints In Our Book, lets add a way to reward quality.

    Russ

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      That would put vroom and merlyn's rating at something ridiculously small. But still, this is an interesting idea. Positive reinforcement is good -- can't have fewer than 0 stars (I hope). As opposed to XP -- Worst Nodes makes me a little ill, actually. It's not really mean-spirited, more like tough love, but I still am not a fan.

      e-mail neshura

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        That would put vroom and merlyn's rating at something ridiculously small.

        Why? Most of vroom's and merlyn's posts get a good number of positive votes, from what I have seen, so they would be rated high. Or am I missing something?

        The problem with such a scheme is that it would discourage posts like this one, that are not likely to be voted on, because they are just part of an ongoing discussion. Such a post is good for the discussion, but it would damage my rating.

        --ZZamboni

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RE: Yet Another Post on Experience
by mcwee (Pilgrim) on May 23, 2000 at 03:23 UTC
    It seem sto me that a star-rating is unneccesary, mostly because I can always go to a monk's home node and check out ALL of his/her past posts-- which gives me a superb idea of how many grains of salt I should take with his or her advice. I admit that the star system would be faster (an at-a-glance aid, I guess) but i really prefer the depth of actually browsing their past posts (and secretly fear that I'd get lazy if the starts were offered. Ah mi.)

    The Autonomic Pilot

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RE: Yet Another Post on Experience
by Maqs (Deacon) on May 24, 2000 at 15:16 UTC
    This might be a good idea, but in my humble opinion it will result in ignoring of the majority of the newbies' posts. Of course it'll be great to show the coolnes of the author in the post info to make this info more representative, but IMO, this is a community, where newbies could learn on their mistakes and be corrected by gurus.
    /Maqs.
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RE: Yet Another Post on Experience
by t0mas (Priest) on May 23, 2000 at 10:31 UTC
    Why do we need to have a negative vote? The idea of negative voting is quite "unmonkish" I think. Isn't it better to post a comment if there is something to correct or add on the subject in question.
    We would then have rated answers/comments (those that are voted for) and unrated (those that are not).
    /t0mas
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      It can be good sometimes to discourage off-topic comments and stuff. I received a negative reputation on a comment I made a while back, which is fine, because it was kinda off-topic. IMO, the comment I replied to, was too, but that's another story. :)

      Just my $0.02...

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        Yes, discouraging off-topic comments and stuff is good, if you, the posting monk, _know_ why you get negative reputation. But I still think that kindly telling (commenting) the posting monk of the comment/question/stuff _what_ is wrong is a better approach.
        /t0mas
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