Do away with "ratings"

Agreed Remo.

There are two reasons for ratings:

1) To give the community a rough outline of a person's behavior and skill

2) To encourage good behavior by granting a bonus for positive ratings

The problem is these two things can't be done together.

Once you give a reward for a certian type of statistic, people will 'game' that statistic, creating a large amount of noise in the informational aspect.

This is why I proposed splitting informational (#1) from encouragement/bonus (#2). However #2 is implemented, I'm not so concerned, but I really want to see #1 done without any kind of bonus or reward so that the information can be as telling as possible.

#2 will still be gamed, but at least #1 should provide a much higher signal to noise ratio when you want to know more about a person.

Ratings made sense when your tax credit was what kept builds up in world. You do good things you get more tax credit to put up more prims/land, you do bad things you get knocked and have to work back up.

Now you buy all that with your US$.

Let's make ratings influence land holdings, bring it back to being community reinforcement dealing in resource distribution.

I didn't read this whole thread yet but...YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES to the first one.

It's especially good because it really doesn't matter. Turns "rating" into more of a fun/entertainment thing (like SL is supposed to be, you know?) rather than whatever it is now.

I have to say that I also agree with all of the points raised in Kex's original post. I've been saying it since the beta: the current ratings system is hideously broken.

The only thing the ratings system encourages is rate farming. All I have to do to get a high Build rating is to show up to tons of events and shout "LOL" (or perhaps "LOLOLOL" to be truly k-r4d l33t an' in wif da AOLer majority) every once in a while. Huh? I get Build rating points for standing around and contributing nothing? No, it just doesn't make sense.

Of course, the last time we had this discussion it was basically concluded that Linden Lab just wants to encourage any behaviour that causes large numbers of residents to gather in one place. Given that, I suppose it's unlikely that the current ratings system -- which does encourage gathering, for the purpose of rate farming -- will be changed.

btw don't we already have a checkbox-style self rating system in our profiles?

I had a thought, what about something like you can only rate a person if you've been around them for X amount of time?

This way only people who truely know you will be able to rate you, rather than Joe Jacka*s with his 50 accounts who mule rates you.

The only problem with this is then you can't neg-rate a greifer... so...

Maybe only have it so that for ones that effect your bonus people who have been around you X amount of time can rate you.

Then you can still negatively rate someone for greifing, but not so much that it will effect their bonus. People will still be warned about greifers through the ratings, and won't have to worry about mule-rating effecting their balance. (but they could still be abused from the anyone-can-rate-you rating, so its not a complete fix)

It really takes more than 5 seconds to get to know someone, alot of the problem is when someone walks up to you and can just rate you however they want without even talking or even looking at you really.

While not a perfect solution, it is something to think about.

Just sortof scan read through, but cant help thinking, is the rating system so broken? If you see someone +200, -0, that says something about that person. If you see someone +40, -10 taht says another. Its annoying when someone negrates you for something unjustified but hey were all in the same boat and some people seem to be luckier than others. I think it all averages out? If we change the system that largely serves its purpose, maybe we risk breaking it?

No system is perfect, and the SL system is better than many.

Not saying change wouldnt be a good idea, just be careful, it's a little like changing the constitution...

Azelda

As long as the giving of ratings, or measurement of any kind, is in the hands of the residents of secondlife then it will be open to abuse. The only truly objective measurement would be one that is imposed by the software, but even then - if the calculation is made public there will be ways to play the numbers I expect.

So mad idea from me..

My own preference would be a single, simple Reputation measurement maintained entirely by the software and affected by so many factors that it would be hard as hell to really bend it with any single action on the part of the residents. In addition we should all have just 5 positive 'votes' per calendar month to bestow and 5 negative ones also. No more. Incremental changes should be minute, and it is right that it could take a year or more to reach the higher numbers.

Lets say we all start at 0 and the range is -100 to +100.

Getting a positive vote would increase your reputation as would many other actions. Selling an item might incur you extra reputation, perhaps proportionate to its value. Rezzing of objects you have created might equally be a measure of popularity for the items you make. Time spent inworld as an average and on your land (dwell), time you have dwelled elsewhere, number of events attended, Land owned, Groups in which you are active.. so on..

Then there would be negative affectors, number of negative votes, sustained absence from the world, number of abuse reports filed against you and so on.

If there were enough small affectors on reputation, cheating that system would be hard to do in any significant way. Being a solid citizen for a long period is really the only way to reach the higher scores.

[you can tell I'm bored at work cant you.. lol]

The rating system IS broken, though.

In one day 2 weeks ago, I got a triple negative rating from a newbie who was angry I wouldn't let him firebomb my tower (i banned him from the land), and TWO triple negative ratings from a person - one as her main account and the other as her alternate account. The reasoning was I told her to stop being a troll on the forums.

I went from "mildly annoying" to "social pariah", by the numbers, in a 24 hour period.

If anyone's talked to me before, you could get the impression that I'm generally a nice guy. HOWEVER, according to the numbers, I deserved to be thrown out of town on my butt with the likes of grimmy moonflower.

I don't care what anyone says, there IS a significant amount of people who bring up your profile every time you walk by, and they DO look at how many negative ratings you have. You might have 6000 positive ratings, but if you're skirting 10 negative ratings, you're a "bad person", someone who puts razor blades in candy and punches kittens.

1.4 should do the following:

1) Fix the rating system
2) Implement havok 2.0 (yeah, right, but I can dream)

That's it.

LF

I support/endorse the idea of doing away with the rateing system as it currently stands, or fixing it to be more like Kex's suggestion in the orginal post. Some of the other ideas in here are great as well. But the way the rateing system currently stands, it is broken and stinks badly.

As I don't do much in game except try to do nice things for other people, I would stand to lose considerable bonus if the rating system were removed. Nevertheless, I agree with almost all the detractors points above and enter my plea for the removal of the rating system.

As it is, virtually no one has negative ratings for fear of retribution, the number of positive ratings is roughly proportional to time in game or effort expended rate-mining. It has gotten to the point where when I do rate my messages often look like "Nice avatar, Siggy (not rate-mining)".

Perhaps more importantly, I cannot derive any information about someone from their rate totals. One of the things that initially impressed me about SL was persistence of name (yes, folks have mules/alternates, but I'm ignoring that for the moment). In a community where reputations do matter, Knowing that Malachi is Malachi is both helpful to me (as I think I'm somewhat well regarded) and to others in that I don't want my reputation sullied. This persistence of identity is emminently human and quite primal.

There are a number of suggestions above about social network alternatives, any of which I believe would be better than the current system. And I would like to amplify the point that bonuses made a lot more sense when taxation was in place.

Oh well, guess I better get busy learning a trade.

ok, i just read through this entire thread.. almost word for word.. ack!

what i come away with is this..

Kex, original idea in first post.. excllent idea! only thing i would change is, allow for.. say.. 3 'this person is best is' slots.. as in a 1st/2nd/3rd best at.. giving a bit more flexibility to it, instead of being limited.. this would solve the problem of people wanting to give/get multiple ratings..

also, seperate ratings from bonuses..

let the ratings stand as that.. just ratings..

let bonuses be based on something else entirely, maybe leave the dwell bonus 'as is'.. just for the heck of it.. even though that's broken too.. but, include more than just dwell..

maybe..

dwell + active socializing + active building + active scripting + ratings on items, not people... ?

discuss.

This is a serious issue that affects us daily. Fix or remove the current raiting system!

Fix or remove the people who use the system badly!

i'm ALWAYS looking for this. if a persons ratings don't meet my standard i refuse to talk to them. i tend to notice that chartered beta's are the best company.

no one in the game has 6000, btw except one of my secret alt-avs that i only use for special occasions.

i wouldn't worry too much about the ratings. most people don't care. it's for assigning reward, not for popularity. unfortunately social contribution weighs in heavier than building or scripting. that's life.

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I don't know why this stresses me out so much. But it's not something I have conscious control over.

Just remove the ratings system. Don't replace it with *anything*. Just take it away. Please. It does more harm than good.

That's fine as long as you keep paying me my ratings bonus, because without it, I'm pretty much dead in the water; unable to buy land, unable to upload textures.

Well, I guess I could always become a land baron. (hahaha). Or I suppose I could start buying L$ from Linden for US$.

Oh.

Crap.

"Game over, man! Game over!"

"Uh, San Francisco. We've got a problem..."

"Something is rotten in the state of SL."

See my other posts about REALLY not wanting this to become a money game.

Please don't penalize me for spending time alone.

also big ups to Kex's system.

well assuming they're not gonna ditch the system entirely... lets roll back to the 1.0 days... MERGE the positives and negatives into one 'figure'

i don care how... go back to addin them

average them

give ratios

percentile readings

*SOMETHING* so that -0 -0 -0 isn't PERFECT

and -1 -1 -1 isn't THE HUGE INFINITE NON RECOVERABLE FALL FROM PERFECTION

the older way worked better and people were more likely to give negs when deserved.. and there wasn't a whole hell of alof of a 'point' to givin them when they weren't



the real tragedy with the ratings system is its causing alot of anguish for the best and brightest of SL, the people who really should be spending their time having fun, enjoying the game, and creating cool stuff. Not worrying whether their +1000 combined total will be drowned out by some unknown 'new' players' -3 on a whim vote

Another bonus-allocation rating system which I've been thinking about is a hybrid of the system on everything2.com and the concept of "whuffie" from the sci-fi short novel, Down and Out in the Magic Kingdom.

Here's the core concept:

Each day we are given a small pool of rating points to spend.

We can use those points to rate people positively or negatively. Rating them positively increases their "whuffie" score. Rating them negatively decreases it.

Once we have used our daily allocation of rating points, we can still rate people, but we will lose a point from our own "whuffie" score for each rating we give.

I want to ask everyone else what they think the details should be:

1. How many pooled rating points should we be allocated each day to give?
   - Should this number increase with seniority (like on everything2)?
   - Should this number reflect time actually spent in world (to prevent mule accounts from accumulating many points)?
   
2. Should pooled rating points accumulate (like "carryover" cell phone minutes), and if so:
   - for how many days?
   - for what maximum number?
   - should these limits also be affected by seniority or time spent in world?
   
3. What should be the limit on how many ratings can be given in a unit of time? "You can give another resident n ratings per (day/week/month)"
   
4. Should your "whuffie" rating be able to go into the negative?
   
5. Should the recipent of a rating be informed that they have recieved a rating at the time it is given?
   
6. Should the identity of the rating-giver be always shown, always hidden, or be an option for the giver?
   

I think this would work out as a great system. Here are a few reasons which I think this system would be beneficial:

1. You'll be able to repeatedly reward someone who has been especially helpful or who is especially talented. I don't know how many times I've wanted to reward someone more than once.
   
2. One problem we are having lately with the negative attitudes is that once you've been rated negatively by someone, there's no reason for you to hold back on that person, since they can't neg you again. This causes an escalation of hostilities since there is "nothing more to lose".
   
   The threat of Mutually Assured Destruction will encourage people to compromise. If neither side can compromise, then they will both lose, and their inability to compromise will be reflected in their score. However, I think a braking system should be in place to prevent two people from issuing more than n ratings per hour/day/week/month against someone else, giving them time to cool off rather than destroying each other in one transaction.
   
3. The numbers will definitely become much more varied and distinct. Rating scores for especially talented people who are helpful will probably become very distinct from the griefers and troublemakers.
   
   As it is now we have a very small margin of difference in the current system between the treasures and the troublemakers because the ratings system is so limited; I think a new system similar to this one will allow our star residents to really shine.
   
4. Alts/mules will have less rating-giving ability than the persons's main resident agent (especially if pool points are given based on time spent in-world).
   

To re-assure the status-quo who is resistent to change for fear of losing all their hard-won positive ratings, the hand-over from the current system to the new system could be done easily by calculating your new score as a sum of your positives minus the sum of your negatives, as eltee mentioned above. This would make for a smooth transition which maintains a fair score for your past efforts.

No system is perfect; however can anyone see any problems with this system which would be gamed any worse than the current system?

In general, I like this. The main change from the exisitng system, besides reframing the question of negative ratings to a more positive-normalized scale, is that it would make community-rating feedback an ongoing, adaptive, process.

I would say this should be a relatively small value, say, one point per active hour spent online. It seems ideal that one's ability to rate is related to the degree to which they participate within the community. Is there a better scale of this than time spent actively online? That said, the daily maximum should cap our relatively low, say, at 5 or maybe 10 points (accrued at 1 point per hour online). It's especially appealing because you would need to build up "ratings steam" each day you wanted to rate. Perhaps a combination where you were given 3 points, plus one per hour up to five hours would be best?

Seniority / wuffie should be... irrelevant... to one's ability to void a ratings-related opinion.


I'd say yes, but that there should be an accumulation cap and/or occasonal zeroing (perhaps at the start of each billing period). Again, toss seniority to the wolves.


I'd suggest one rating per target per day. Wuffie should be normalized with a minimum value ot '0'. The last two points are... meh, indifference inspiring.
I know some people will NEED to know, but I don't perseonally care.

Kex, good suggestions. Integrating Wuffie into a rating system would be a nice, smart, and hip way for Linden to stay on the cutting edge of virtual community culture. It'd certainly be an improvement over what we have, now. Again, I live the fact that it makes community ratings an ongoing process. The limited number of ratings would also mean that each one is potentially more meaningful (gotta make 'em count!). Hopefully nobody would try to sell ratings on e-bay....

[/B]

I can log on my alt account every day and neg you repeatedly, instead of just once.

I can log on my alt account on days I'm not pissed at someone and positive rate myself repeatedly, instead of just once.

The current system of rating once curbs "rating inflation" since you can't effectively buy rating points like an alt account with repeatable ratings would present. While I think being able to reward people multiple times is a good idea, it opens the door to rate bots even more so than the current system.

two things i would like to see additionally in accordance with kex's system...

1) the ability to 'lock' in a rating for your friends....

im not sure exactly how to work it within the frame of a whuffle system... but i would like to set it so that the 5-6 people i really do actively work with and admire could be guaranteed a rating from me without me having to specifically remember to give it to them all the time and/or constantly check to see if it has expired. This would only be permissable for positives and would probably also cost abit more than a 'standard' given out every day rating... either that or offer purchasable 'locks' say on a renewing basis aka each lock slot might cost $25 lindens a week so that as you become more of an asset to the community and stable in your SL income, you can increasingly afford to expand your 'circle' of friends whom you want to give the nod to

2) no one should ever know from whom or when ratings are given to them. nor should negatives ever be seperately discernable from the floating total of a person

Part of the reason the 'neg' has become such a conspicuous tool of grief now is that the neg giver KNOWS the neg reciever will get the message, a slap in the face as it were... thats also the reason that the neg system is currently near impossible to use properly, since for every -1 given out you KNOW -3 are coming back.

Making the entire negative system invisble to the person on the recieving end may seem counter-intuitive at first... but by removing it as a tool for direct in your face griefing, and enabling it to be used as more of a transient non 'PERMANENT SL SCAR' it will become much more socially acceptable and useful to give minuses to people who actually deserve them (since it will have a much greater immediate economic impact on the next 'cycle') and much less useful tool of grief.. since a fairly well respected resident would probably have more than enough transient *and* locked positives that they wouldn't know a negative had been recieved.

Essentially actual griefers, bad neighbors, and mean spirited people in general whom would get few 'good' ratings a day, and even fewer long term lock in goods would get hit harder by negatives than on the current system since their cyclical totals could actually slide negative, while actual well respected and long time community members would be harmed either emotionally or socially much much less than with the current system since their overall high marks would only be pressed down abit, in such a way that neither they, nor the world at large be able to stigmatize anyone over a single dealing they had with a jerk.


as a small correlation to that *ALL* scripting tools related to rating honestly should be scrapped. I'm not sure exactly *WHAT* the idea of exposing someones rating to LSL scripts was meant to accomplish... but i can't see it doing ANYTHING honestly good for anyone.

i don't think theres a single use for ratings within LSL that would be anything but disasterous for the community at large... that'd be like if people were forced to walk around the streets of new york city with their credit reports stapled to their forehead.

Who should i mug? ooh look at that guy, hes has a $30,00 max visa with no balance... or wow look at that person over there on the park bench, they declared BANKRUPTCY 4 years ago god damn i better not get anywhere near them

its one of those things that sounds kinda neat on paper i guess but would honestly rip apart the entire social/emotional fabric of the community if it were *EVER* actually implemented

fairly easily fixed by adding a scalar to successive ratings... aka costs you one point to rate yerself once... costs ya two points to rate yerself again... three points to rate yerself a third time.. aka it'd be totally economically unfeasable to loop ratings to yourself like that...

also this system would assumably be implemented cyclically over say a period of a week, not clearing and re-starting but along the lines of a FIFO buffer where yer today's 'rating' would be say the sum of your ratings for the past 7 days at all time... rather than a permanent ever-accumulating force

If there's one thing I've learned in online games, never underestimate the ability of people to do boring, repetitive tasks if it will bring them the slightest gain.

I've said it before and I'll say it again.. The ratings problems are social, they're in the way we see the system, they're in the way we use the system. There has to come a point at which you realize that all the checks and balances and counters and limits and rules to counteract the social issues make it unworkable without a PhD. In the meantime, people will still abuse the system, they'll still overreact to the system, they'll still game the system. So you add more rules to counter it and it just gets worse.

The only problem I see with the current system is the permanent black mark left by negative ratings causes a high level of grief among various players. Ratings are a core component of SecondLife, and they need to be adjusted slowly not gutted.

Of course, the one solution to all this is true Whuffie, where it's all read directly from our brain with zero manual involvement. But I think the neural interface peripheral is a few years off.