What does the thumbs up / down thing mean?

People can give a thread or post a rating........positive by hitting "thumbs up", and negative by "thumbs down". Also, by hitting the thumbs down on a thread you can ignore it, and you won't see it on your screen.

I find the thumbs up handy when I think that a thread or post is valuable. The numbers indicate the number of people who think the same way, and have voted positively. I use the thumbs down, when I want to remove a thread from view of which I am not interested. It makes going through the new threads much more efficient when you don't have to scroll through threads of which you have no interest, again and again.

aha! Much thanks x

They're pretty much meaningless as it stands. It's a popularity contest and no indication of the quality of a post's content.

I use thumbs down for the reason Phoenix stated. It clears the view of posts that don't interest me. It says nothing of the quality or value of those posts.

Right- There are a lot of threads that are perfectly fine, but have no interest to me.

For example, in Bear's thread about his aunt, my sympathies were voted down.

Mr. P. just walked by, and saw me writing to this thread. He asked me if I knew the original meaning of the terms. He said that it went back to the days of the gladiators. I looked it up, and voila!

http://ancienthistory.about.com/od/games/a/thumbsup.htm

Fascinating!

Right. For me voting thumbs down feels negative no matter how much I try to mentally and emotionally attach a different meaning to it. I still wish there was a means of ignoring a thread without devaluing it for others.

Voting down somebody's post always indicates a negative and, as CJ indicates, more often indicates dislike of the member rather than what is actually said. Equally 'offensive' posts by a different member do not receive the same treatment. On the other hand, some posts are so offensive I will vote them down for that reason, but it has to be truly offensive which, for me, means being unnecessarily hateful or cruel to another member. Most political incorrectness or opposing opinion doesn't merit such treatment in my opinion.

I wish there was a means to thumbs down the stupid offensive tags people attach to some posts.

It would be nice if there were a "not interested in topic" designation, but that would probably be technically difficult.

Yeah--I know that's going to happen. It's a partial Ignore.

It's there and I use it for myself. I wish it wasn't there maybe because of it's use for what you are objecting to. But it's there. The first few times I tried it I just clicked on them to see what would happen. I sincerely hope I didn't upset anybody.

It's like your guns. Guns are there in the US. Some people don't use them at all, some use them to polish or for target practice or last ditch protection, some for robbing banks and killing people. A lot of reasons. It's not the guns, as you often say--it's the people.

It's amazing that Phoenix didn't know where the thumbs up sign is said to have originated. That's really clever. You have to be really clever to have avoided all that shite about the gladiators that's in all the schoolbooks and movies nd all, and even pub quizes. It's her husband that's dumb for believing clap-trap like that. A gesture of that nature must have originated in the foggy ruins of time. Before speech maybe. The Romans weren't artistic enough for a thing like that. They got it from the tribes. Obviously. The lower class of the times segment.

So-as nobody knows what originated in the foggy ruins of time, nor ever will, Phoenix's intellectual excellence is not diminished one iota by her not knowing. On the other hand her husband has demonstrated a woeful lack of that quality and is obviously a very fortunate man to have " married up", as we say.

When I was in history class, I used to spend my time flirting with the cute guy in the next row!

That was me in chem class, Phoe. It worked, too.

On the other hand, all those latin classes were good for something, re what happened at the colosseum. Or did it? I read somewhere that a lot of activities ascribed to the colosseum were actually held in the circus maximus.

Yes--I had imagined that was the case. Not much point in knowing that the thumbs up sign originated in the Roman Games whether it is true or not is there? When it isn't true there's even less.

You only have so many brain cells after all and cluttering them up with useless and pointless knowledge only reduces their capabilities in more important areas.

I went to an all boys school where they explained how to avoid ladies like you.

Not that it did any good mind you. In fact I think they only warned us about you in order to have you fascinate us all the more.

Has "he" read these exchanges?