A Modest Proposal

I'm pretty sure that this idea won't fix anything in relation to the thumbs up/down problem.

Ultimately, a2k needs to just kill the whole thumbs up/down system.

Hey hey ho ho, all the thumbs have got to go!


It doesn't prove useful on any of the sites where I've seen it.

Given you words it hit me as amusing that after reading your post I still thumb the post up before thinking of the contradictions involved in doing so.

While I understand it's not just a matter of migrating a database; given I strongly suspect the current forum software used here is probably EOL and/or not the latest version of it, I'd think an upgrade of the forum software would be a far better idea. As more recent forum software will likely have stronger protections and filters in place already, rather than continuing to patch an outdated mess.

Also, I think that there are some members here (who would be banned for good at other forums, if they posted the same abuse there that they post here) that should have a ban imposed on them. As at the end of the day, if some are going to abuse others no matter what when others are simply disagreeing with them, then they are obviously not capable of being civilized. In that case the only real answer is to remove them from the forum altogether, if they are unable to control themselves. And it doesn't mean everyone has to always agree with each other, or be perfect either.

All of that said, in regards to the voting system; the last forum I participated in, being a Linux forum, did have a "reputation system" where you could not actually give negative reputation (although vBulletin does have an option to enable that though), you could only give positive reputation or not give any reputation to a post(s) at all. But it didn't stop people from abusing the system though, for example, if the main developer of a certain Linux distro just posted what they had for lunch, they would get a ton of reputation even though it didn't help anyone with any technical problem, let alone answered any technical questions - but they still had/have more reputation than posts made by them. So the simple fact is that if humans use it, someone will abuse it, that's life. The only way to totally prevent any abuse would be to adopt tsarstepan's suggestion, and get rid of the voting system here altogether. But again, it would be smarter to upgrade the forum software, regardless of whether or not the admins here adopt that suggestion or not.

And yes, I did up vote tsarstepan's post for the record...

What if the owners of this place write their own software from scratch?

At any rate, if anyone here is incapable of being civilized, it would be you.

You're the one who always relies on childish name-calling and never makes an intelligent argument.

The owner said some time back that he is looking to upgrade the site (low priority) and is not looking to invest any more time into this version of it. It's something he does as a project, not to make money. (No ads, no personal info collected, etc).

Yeah, I don't blame them for not wanting to invest anymore time into the current version of the forum software... I wouldn't either if it were up to me.

That said, they don't actually need to write their own forum software. As that would be quite a task, and it isn't as easy as just learning the syntax of some programming language - you need to actually know programming. There are existing solutions already available though, including FOSS licensed (like the GPL license for one, but not limited to) packages available. But it obviously does depend on what features they would be after, as well as other factors though.

So did I. In the end I just want to end the abuse. If its going to be a nuclear option, so be it.

I think they've got that covered.

A counter proposal would be to only activate thumbs after a certain number of posts so that the person has to be an active member.

Or require a minimum number of posts within the past three months, so that accounts have to remain active in order to vote.

Didn't that used to happen? Maybe I'm thinking of 'permission' to send PM's? It's been so long since I first joined, my recollection is probably fuzzy.

I like that. Its a requirement on some other sites.

1. The thumbs up/down system isn't perfect.
2. With that being said, I still want the feature to remain.
3. I vote thumbs up to keep the feature in place.
4. I am not oppose to making some changes to the thumbing feature.

1. That's a good idea.
2. I like that suggestion.
3. I also voted thumbs up for your suggestion.

1. That is also a good idea.
2. I like that suggestion.
3. I also voted thumbs up for your suggestion.

Another suggestion is to not allow access to the thumb up/down feature
until you have made at least 20 posts on A2K.

1. Another suggestion is to put a cap on how many times any member can use the thumb up/down feature.

2. That cap could be a daily cap.

3. That cap could be a weekly cap.

4. That cap could be a monthly cap.

5. The way that would work is once the A2k member has reach their cap for that day, week, or month, they would not be able to use the thumbing feature again until the new day, new week, or new month began.

This is exactly why I suggested an upgrade of the forum software would be a far better first step, as a more modern solution would already have the sort of safeguards that are being suggested. For instance, vBulletin already has a time and member component to prevent at least some abuse of it's reputation system. The problem with patching the current software is that; it wouldn't just be a couple of if statements, it would be hundreds of lines of extra code that would need to be added to add the suggested features/safeguards being suggested, if not thousands of lines of extra code, and quite possibly at least some existing code/functions that would need to be modified to support that. As result, it would make the code far more difficult to maintain (if not virtually impossible), and could introduce more problems in the process (even if the site admin does know programming) - which would be likely why they don't seem interested in investing anymore time in the current code. I don't think people making all of these suggestions understand that. So I wouldn't blame the site's admin for not bothering to go to the trouble.

There is also another issue, which I even discussed with another member in PM's with them. And to copy verbatim what I said to them: In all honesty, and while I don't really care too much about the voting/reputation system here, and while I'm sure there are at least a few that abuse it; at least in terms of the regular posters here, the votes seem to go the right way a lot of the time. But that said, it's also clear to me that a lot of people here (on both sides of the political and ideological coin) don't vote on the "substance" of posts here, they vote on their particular ideological bend. So for example, if I posted something in support of trump (who I don't support, anymore than I support the democrats), I know I'd get downvoted a lot more than I'd get up voted. I'll also add to that in saying; I've seen posts here many times where I didn't think based on the "substance" of said posts, they should have been downvoted in to the negatives - even some posts from people I have no time for here in some cases. I've also seen the opposite of that too, where based on "substance", said posts didn't deserve to be up voted - as those posts where clearly nothing but an attack on another member. Personally, I try to vote based on the substance of a post, **not** based on my ideological or political bend.

Therefore, the problem is largely a byproduct of people voting based on their ideological/political bend, and I don't think there is any technical solution for that.

PS: I've only up or down voted two posts in this thread, as I didn't feel strongly enough about the rest to vote one way or the other.