Thumbs down, Up yours

You've been saying this for over a year now, but haven't been able to show a single example of how it hurts the exchange of ideas.



You went from predicting a2k's demise to claiming that the demise just didn't happen because people don't use the features you don't like. Thing is, you are just making things up yet again and have no idea how much people use any of the features.

They use them a lot, and no your predictions about the demise of exchange of ideas on a2k has not come to pass and will not.



Back when you started complaining about it I checked and this is a lie.

This is a deliberate lie hawkeye. You are the one who's always tried to make the voting about you. You are unpopular because of social retardation, and because you advocate loosening restrictions on pedophilia not because of the voting system. Quit blaming the software for your unpopularity, it is your own doing.

My motivation for including the voting was to ease the top-down censorship we engaged in by giving members tools to customize their own experiences. There was a lot of pressure on me to ban folks like you, and tools like ignore and voting let me tell people to be adults and take care of themselves.

Voting here is about democratizing the censure and letting individuals censor for themselves without forcing the whole community to accept the same censorship. It lets people have different thresholds and different experiences without us having to force one on everyone.



You aren't silenced at all, despite how much you whine about it. And the features you complain about are the types of features that let unpopular folks stay in forums. Without them people have no control over their experiences and demand top-down action.

With features like voting and ignore when people ask for folks like you to be banned I can ignore it because they have the tools to ban you from their own world. The most annoying irony about all this is that this is the very kind of feature that lets someone like you stay around yet you claim it "silences" you somehow.

I will ask you yet again to show me how it does so, otherwise this is just more of your not-so-silent hot air. I may not like what you have to say but I defend your right to say it here. However, others have the right to decide whether they want to have to read you or not. Your rights to self-expression end where the rights of others to peaceful coexistence begins.

Hi Sun,
You always let me know!
And I've missed you today.
If you truly want to show appreciation you should update your friends list. that way you can find us in an instant.
xxxxxx
Mark

It tells you it's honest, Hawk. If someone came into your home and started criticizing what you own and how you decorate and who you married and what you eat, you'd sure enough tell them what's what. This is no different.

You think you have an ally, but I think not.

If if helps you feel better sometime sun, I never pay any attention to the thumbs up or down, and never give any, one way or the other.

Just like banner ads, I don't even see/register them.

but how do you know what online games to play, or where to find your same sex lover

By popularity I was, of course, referring to the 'popular' area you have at the top of the screen, the topics with the highest counts are all there.
The popular area is where a lot of people go to to see what is current and happening, the very fact you have a 'popular' area and place for threads says that you are judged my your count, that if the topic goes well it is rewarded by being put in a more 'prominent' position.
So although I would not deny that I have some value of numbers, I would say that it is you who have base most value on them for having the very place and easier swifter and more direct access to the 'popular' threads.
So don't think to badly of someone who does hold some value on 'numbers' ratings when my only inspiration and model and influence to go from is this very forum and as its very first short cut and direct access to material is a place that is based solely on 'numbers' and ratings.

Again we dealt with bad posters and trolls differently back where I came from, we studied them, we were open and communicative with them, we never judged them harshly, but we did call them out and ask for them to defend them selves, which would lead to one of two things, they went away or we turned them into productive and decent members.
I cant help thinking this button of negativity spreads said negativity.
It could easily turn into a bully tactic as well.
If you have a gun chances are it is going to get shot.
I just don't and cant see the need for a negative button and if the best excuse you can come up is that it will punish the sinners then there will never be any chance for rehabilitation and far to much room to become the sinners yourselves.
As said trolls thrive on attention especially negative attention this is not a deterrent this is an allure.

I understand about being popular on a personal scale, I cant wait for inspiration to come so as to share it with you and become a fixture in your heart and mind, but this will not be popularity in its use or term, this will be me being as beautiful as I can personally for those each who I meet and can reach, again this is not popular this is individually personal, you will love me or hate me and I certainly am not going to be loved by a great many few.
But I do not care if I am popular personality wise I just care about being in the 'popular' area, I care about being PROFESSIONALLY popular, put in an area where people go to first, an area that has swifter and more direct access to my work. And the score that puts you there is being corrupted by ignorance not by awareness. I am being professionally assassinated each time some one chooses to 'have me off their screen'.
(I know a bit of an exaggeration but that is what some writers do).
You cant say a lot of people wont go directly to the popular area else why have one.
So in conclusion, if you don't want me concerned or put value on 'numbers' don't make it a concern or value of our forum.

All the bestest, sometime sun

dj, I think it might involve a bit of rolfing.

That's funny. I've been here nearly 8 years and I don't think I ever knew there was a "popular" button. I just looked at the results. I won't be using that button again.

I didn't even know we had a "Popular area" - funny. And don't you think one person's popular differs from another's?

I may not be the least bit interested in your writing, so may never see your work, but as a person, I value your contributions to other threads. You're going to get some of that, you know.

I think Letty's a doll, but I don't care for poetry, so I never go there. I also never visit her Radio thread; but that doesn't mean I don't like her. I don't visit any of ehBeth's rainforest threads or soz's sozlet threads, but I really like and respect both of them.

Anyway, I think I'm spitting in the wind. You feel what you have to and do what you have to. Just saying, rationally speaking, those numbers mean nothing, and if you haven't gotten that by now, you likely never will.

Good luck, SS.

That's so funny!

Are you saying that the depth of your professional reputation hinges not on the quality and content of your writing, but on the number of votes a thread gets on a popularity list while using an anonymous screen name on the internet?

I only look at Popular in case I want to find the box to enter an unusual word into the tag box to find some old thread. In other words, that's the page the tag box is on, therefore I use the page once in a while, maybe once a month. Usually, though, I search via the 'google custom (a2k) search' box at the top right of most pages, or my own tags. (I never look at the popular part of the page.)

By George (no offense intended to any of our Georges), I think you've got it.

Firstly I must admit I can come across testy when I am in a rush and it has been all rush rush rush for the past few days.
You are correct I could and should have been far more pleasant to you even if still disagreeing with you, for one I did not thank you for your reply, so thank you for that one and this one.
You are most welcome to pull me up on anything.
There is no excuse for bad manners.
But my thank you was implied by the length of my reply,
In future the longer my reply to anyone is a bigger thank you and compliment from me. You may not like what I write, sometimes neither do I but longer my reply the more grateful I am to you.

I have had a hard time finding what it is you want an explanation for.
If it is that I said you used adult here wrongly.
My reply is that you described an adult as someone who has no opinion.
The option of adulthood is to prove yourself to your self, Humanity, the world and God. And doing this is rarely achieved by rolling over every time something important is not up to snuff.

I like this a lot.
But you cannot exchange an idea with out it being open to inspection.
I keep my faith as wide eyed as possible.
Nothing blind about me but for what I choose not to see.
I chose to see you and could not find total agreement with you.
I am sad I may have hurt you, but I will not be able to not question everything I ever find interesting enough to inspect.
Put nicely I found you interesting.

I am just waiting for that, but just because you know someone as nasty does not mean you should repay in kind.
Try to reach, or turn of the cheek.

Possibly projecting possibly not reading well or possibly coming to my own conclusion about things that does not seat well with you so you must think it is my ignorance rather than your reluctance to ask me for an explanation.
Or possibly I still dont know what you are talking about.
A lot of reading and forum work is guess work.
I have a stunted sense of humour which means I am more likely to take pain from a joke than a laugh unless it is clearly indicated with a smile, but I can dismiss this pain as said there is a lot of guess work that goes on when reading in general, it is a naked language, you must take an awful lot on faith.

Another example of why I don't like them, I am an acquired taste but not got a bad intention in my being, so with so many people not wanting to taste me means I also could be by this 'marker' be judged as nasty.
You are not doing a very good job justifying this feature but I do like a easy fight (sun smile)
Does this mean that when you are 'marked' so many times you get kicked out?
Again it just seems to me a troll is looking for you to sully yourself by pressing such a button, they win even if they know they wont be here long they have made you do a negative act.

Quite frankly the whole idea is worrisome to me, seems like an eye for an eye.
I can just about get on board with the thumb down post that has no connection to the topic and is self contained.
I have already in this topic noticed people keep going with the thumbs down pushing people into negative numbers, how much of an indication do you need to make that you did not like something to strip it of basic foundations.
That screams nastiness to me.
Highly upsetting, you are so bad you are worse than zero.
This really has steeled me to the forum, so please I do have a warm heart but here I feel as if I must be on watch and wear armour.
I hope you can see this genuinely upsets me as well as confuses me.
I did not open this topic for kicks I opened it for a rationalisation which to my measure still has not been adequately provided.
But I am at least getting closer to a resolution on the matter which means there will be less room to be hurt in the future.
I do not like nostalgia all to much but back where I came from you could put your name in a thank you to someone and they would know it from you and that you would receive them and they could NOT be taken from you with out a by your leave.
It was a pleasant environment that rewarded good work singularly and had no interest in 'punishing' the wicked, one reason we so rarely ever had to ban any one back there was because there was no way the nasties knew they were getting to you.
We asked them to explain them selves and tried to show them their error.
We had success in transforming a couple of wannabe trolls into productive active members.
Believe me this thumb down business does NOT deter bad behaviour, it elicits it.

I still and it may be principal cannot agree with this.
I was not saying you did this gentle person, I was saying this is the impression and feeling you get, you are left confused wondering if you have deserved the hair pull or if it was just someoenes boredom and the law of the playground .and you cannot deny some petty vindictive people would do such a thing.
I have been giving you the contrary evidence but will use my old forum as the best example we had no punishment system such as this and we ran with almost no trolls.
Please I keep hearing 'the best thing' no one has told me what it achieves positively for any one other than as a marker for the 'bad' people.
People complain to the authorities if they are being harassed or abused, they should not be looking to own arms in their own home. Innocent People are being shot in the crossfire.
It seems for the relatively few horrible people you are saying this goes some way into sorting out there is a whole forum under marshal law.
As said if you have a gun you are more likely to shoot it.
Do you prefer your members to be armed when there ought be a strong police force any way.
It to my sensibilities is weak willed of those who use it.
And no one here has yet made a decent argument for the use of such WEAPONS


You are justifying hand held weapons, you sound as if you may listen to far to much propaganda.
What country do you belong and they belong to you?
The best defence is the argument is the rationalisation of things.
Not knee jerk politics and justifications.
'if they can do it to me, I can do it to them' but what ends up happening 'if they can do it to me, I can do it to anyone'

What exactly did you advise me to do?
I must have missed it.
'outside my realm of experience'
no no just outside my realm as this makes no sense, please if you will give me the credit of your company in the future, show and quote me so I will know what you are taking about so I can adequately defend and prove myself.

Thanks for reading and making yourself available to me.
sometime sun

me either.

I do not understand this at all.

I repeat myself It is not just how much they get it is what is being stolen from them

Neither did I. Like Beth, I checked it out and won't be using it again.

I'd be surprised if this isn't a misreading.