[color=#e53e00]BFW: Locking this. I think the community point has been made already - can’t see any benefit in further discussion. Nanako - you are currently welcome to discuss ideas and offer feedback, but not in this tone. Forum folks - I appreciate your responses and the effort you’ve made to answer the issue raised here. Please cease, for now {including those thumbs ;) }. And a reminder for everyone, this is not your typical internet forum - we aspire to greater civility, and mostly, achieve it. Could all sides continue to bear this in mind?[/color]
I would like to discuss this voting system we have here. i’d like to enquire others perspectives on why it exists, and what purpose it serves. And to offer my own thoughts on the matter.
Sometimes, having discussions here feels like holding a debate in the Wildweald Court. Perhaps not a wise idea, to be sure You sit round a table with those others interested in the discussion, and exchange words and ideas on the matter, while a crowd of variously souled apes hangs around in the rafters observing.
Having an audience is natural on the internet, and unavoidable. it’s also a good thing to be able to spread ideas to many.
But when a forum has a two way voting system added in, this changes things. Now it’s like the monkeys are anonymously flinging peanuts from above at whoever they don’t like.
If they want to have a voice in a debate, the option is there for them to speak, why not use it? And if you are planning to speak anyway, what’s the point of flinging a peanut at your opponent first, it doesn’t set a good tone for a conversation. If people are not planning to participate in conversation, then why give a voice to those who have nothing to say?
I feel like the anonymity of it is perhaps the largest problem There’s no way to tell if something is unpopular generally, or if you’ve just made a rather determined enemy Being able to see who voted would be an improvement, and why facilitate anonymous harassment.
It would also help with the issue that a very controversial post, with a high number of votes in both directions, will appear somewhere near zero, and the vote count won’t distinguish it at all from an uninteresting post that nobody noticed.
At best, i feel this system is a distraction. But worse, it can fuel forum drama and divide people, turning debate into a popularity contest.
I’d like other thoughts on the matter, and on this perspective of things.
While i’m rather expecting this to be my most red-thumbed post of all time, i would kindly ask people to refrain from using that system, in a thread which is specifically about it. I will personally not vote on anything posted in this thread, one way or another.
edited by babelfishwars on 2/8/2016