Despite the fact that people sometimes say that Node Rep is meaningless, I think we can mostly all agree that it does mean something, otherwise the whole thing wouldn't exist. Leaving the whole XP debate aside, I personally see Node Rep as having the following benefit to the usability of this site:

Granted the system is not perfect, people up-/down-vote for other reasons than actual node quality, XP can get in the way of an objective vote, good nodes are ignored and not given the reputation they might deserve, etc. But it's the closest thing we have. Spam, trolls and off-topic nodes are usually downvoted (and sometimes reaped in extreme cases), and useless or average nodes frequently hover in the 0-$NORM range.

Could we boost the usefulness of this whole system by allowing filtering and searching based on Node Rep?

Ideas along these lines have been suggested, but nothing really came of them, although I didn't see any strong objection:

I think it could be something in user settings (like "Don't show nodes below rep __" and/or an option in Super Search

This would make the Node Rep something that Monks could use as a tool when using the site to avoid seeing content that is unlikely to be of interest to them.

The only objection I really see is that the Node Rep has this semi-secret status to it, in that we don't show the Node Rep until you vote on the node (although Best Nodes, Selected Best Nodes and Worst Nodes all reveal node rep despite lack of vote). I don't think this really conflicts, since we don't have to show the node rep, just allow the user to do something with it.

The other obvious problem is that new nodes start off at zero, so filtering on a number like $NORM would cause all new nodes to automatically be filtered out, but I think this could still be useful for Super Search, and a person's permanent setting could be filtered at 0 rep, to eliminate noise but preserve fresh/mediocre material. Or, we could make it "Don't show nodes below __ rep that are at least __ days old". That way 0-rated new nodes will be seen, but week-old ones might not, with the assumption that if it hasn't garnered any positive votes in that time, I can assume I don't want to see it.

Any thoughts?

--
edan

In reply to Filter by Node Rep by edan

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