Reputation System

My real life roommate and i have both been griefed with the rating system REPEATEDLY for reporting griefers.

This is getting EXTREMELY annoying. It's getting to the point that i can't go anywhere, not even my own home, without someone griefer that's gotten a warning from the Lindens for using illegal scripts on me.

Several key points that I want to make.
1. We can't fight griefers back, if we do, we risk getting into just as much trouble.
2. We can't report griefers because if we do, we get negative ratings from the people we report.
3. We can't very well rate them because then we get rated negatively back.

The way i see it, there is no legitimate usage for negative ratings as they are only used by griefers. It is putting more griefing tools in the hands of griefers...

Soon, ghost shields will be disabled which means that griefers will be able to do even more to me! The griefing problem is getting to the point that I'm about to cancel my account (which is tiered up for 4096+m land)!

My suggestion is simply remove the option to give negative ratings for players. Only Lindens should be able to give negative ratings. Negative ratings in the hand of players will only be abused and is used by griefers the vast majority of the time.

I can not deny i like the stipend bonus of good ratings, however, the neg ratings are mostly given by the worst of people. The ratings should only be nuetral and positive. With the exception of Lindens giving negative rating, for repeatedly having to warn griefers.

Basically, a person is supposed to be guilty until proven innocent, will with negative ratings, everyone can run around and claim the people they don't like are guilty, and thier victims stipend is directly effected by that. Being that the lindens are the law of the SecondLife, it is they who should get to decide who is guilty. Not everyone else. I realize that this will cause more work for the lindens, and i am sorry for that, and wish there was another way. Or the lindens can keep the same work load, and the negative ratings go alost entirely unused except for the worst cases, inwhich lindens would have to get involved with anyway.

the average SL citizen shuld only beable to rate a pperson as nuetral being the worst rating, as people tend to give everyone they run into and exchange a few words with positive ratings. However. i think it would also be benificial, if notes window, is also on the rating window, so you can leave yourself a note as to why the person has only nuetral from you.

thats all well and good David, but not every account with the same billing info is an alt, sometimes it's a different person in the sae household. (Annoyed my that i didn't get a free trial because Myra already had one x_x)

Me too, I think it's a good one. For example, I have a nice rating category that indicates that I'm a pretty good builder - and all I can make is those little boxes...so it isn't very accurate. I like Lordfly's choice of categories too. Appearance, Behavior and Building is pretty generic. To have a checkbox list or the like might be a more accurate system.

Hm.

I would like to vote for a constant size ratings pool. Each person has a pool of rating-osity which they can divide up among other people. They keep track of who is in this pool and their share. When a person is removed from that pool, their rating takes a dip. Possibly a SMALL (5% / year style) increase in pool size based on ???.

A maximum pool chunk (ala 1%/2%) should be set to avoid n00b and other large fluctuations.
Absolutely no history is kept of a person's past rating to prevent abuse.
Absolutely no way is provided of seeing whose pool you are included in.

This reduces wackiness while making a rating a much more valuable commodity.



disclaimer - I haven't read ALL of these posts, and probably won't

Been involved with rep systems for 6 years now... problems with all of them, but then, we have con men in RL as well. You cannot design your way to a perfect solution. Reputation systems also tend to break down once group size gets too big. At the same time, that size protects predators because it enables relative anonymity -- obv. what the rep system tries to defend against.

As a noob, I rather enjoy the ability to say "nice outfit/work/attitude" with an L$. Have not had to face the impact of neg ratings yet, so I haven't experienced their impact, but the random, anon social neg ratings do seem problematic.

I agree with other posts here that transactions should be the focus. Neg ratings should be in place to protect people engaging in commerce, thus neg ratings without context and identities are less useful. As LL enhances the permissions and commerce capabilities, they should shift the reputation system to a transactional one.

I haven't been following this thread lately... It's gotten too long. But I did get a new idea the other night and decided to toss it in to this bottomless pit with the others.

The general idea is "matching funds", so if you like someone, you choose rate and are presented with this form:

Your Contribution (between L$1-XXX): ______

(Linden matching funds will be L$YYY for a total of L$ZZZ)

Pick up to three of the following:

  1st  2nd  3rd   Category
   o              General Positive Rating
   o    o    o    Appearance
   o    o    o    Building
   o    o    o    Entertaining
   o    o    o    Helpfullness
   o    o    o    Scripting
   o    o    o    Personality
                  [Ed: ...and others]


                                               ( OKAY )  ( Cancel )

The XXX is an upper limit to how much L$ you can grant the person in question and get a Linden matching contribution. The YYY is how many matching L$ Linden Lab will add based on the number you enter, maybe at 2 to 1. ZZZ is the total.

The XXX could be throttled by: a) How much you've given that person in the past (recent or total) so you can't keep doing it. b) How much you've given to everyone (recently or in total) so other people can do the same without creating too many new L$. c) How much that person has given you.

All accounts on the same CC are all considered to be the same individual for the L$ half of this form. The second half with the categories is separate. This is so one player's alts can't give each other money, nor can that player's friend give grants to each of the alts.

The YYY might start at 10:1 with a L$1 contribution, but fall to 1:1 at some fixed number (maybe L$100, dunno) where it is pinned. Any further L$s given result in no more matching grant money, and are no different than a simple Pay command.

It should not have anything to do with how many ratings you've gotten, since that has nothing to do with how good someone else is.

The list section doesn't have any effect on money, either way. You can even leave the money part blank and just pick from the list. The numbers from the list go into the player's profile.

In this way, money and ratings are separate, but related by being in the same menu.

I would expect:

a) Established players will tend to make larger grants, as they have the funds and have been around long enough to know when they REALLY like something
b) Established players will be more interested in getting the ratings than the small L$ awards, since a reputation as a top builder might be more valueable than a couple hundred L$ a week.
b) New players won't be making high contributions, but will be using the ratings half instead, since they won't have mouch money.
c) New players...

SCREEEEECH!

*sigh*
You spend time coming up with an idea, then in the middle of writing it up you find a glaring hole so big... Well, it sinks the whole thing.

Has anyone seen the hole? Here it is: "Here, I'll give you L$100. Then you rate me for L$100, and I get the bonus. I'll do the same for you. Thanks. Okay, who's next in line?"

Well, there's another idea in my mind, but it's not fleshed out yet. And I better check IT for holes this big. Oh well. I'll leave the (bad) idea above in this post so you can see where I was going. Who knows, maybe someone has a non-complicated fix.

I know it's been forever since I've posted here, but I've been reading the responses as they come in. The original idea of completely revamping the reputation system to something driven by behavior and user-to-user connections is still a goal, but probably not something we'll implement in the next six months or so. Given that, I think an overhaul of the rating system in the short term is in order. I'm going to go back through this whole thread and start pulling ideas for what we need to do. I'll put something new up for you to react to, hopefully by the end of next week. So keep the ideas coming, and thanks, as always, for your patience as we sort through ideas and priorities.

Robin, from what I've read, the easiest and most effective short-term interim solution is to remove neg ratings. The negative ratings are the portion that causes the most grief and anguish, and they seem to have little real correlation to actual behavior.

Keep they game's atmosphere positive by not building in negatives.

In real life we are taught that if we have nothing good say, we shouldn't say anything at all. In those rare cases when we must speak up, we do so at risk to our own reputation. This means that people only really speak up against you in extreme circumstances. Perhaps we should increase the cost of negative ratings (Say 100 L$, or maybe even a negative ding on your own profile) so that people think long and hard about sending a negative rating. This would mean that any negative ratings you see would be earned and could be taken seriously. Positive ratings are probably fine where they are now, especially since there is a lockout to prevent multiple positive ratings to keep people from cheating with their friends.

Thankyou Robin for being interested in what us slers are thinking and questioning. I too have no skills or talents in the creating and selling dept as of yet being 3 months old,but hope to develop some. I enjoy getting the stipend each week rather then buying in gom which was in the past a bit spendy. I'd be willing to give it up though to get rid of the rateing system that makes no sense. I think the reputation system would likly be abused like the rateing system is. I just hope I don't run into anyone that decides they dont like me as of my first neg rateing has me looking over my shoulder lol. Gotta keep my fingers crossed when I walk out the door. Anyways great comments and suggestions and im so grateful your looking into this.

I think instead of removing the rating system a modification to it would work better. instead of just rating people and putting in a little "Hello" in the comment box, make the comment box actually mean something. Change the numbers in the profile to link to comments so we know WHY they recieved a positive rating or negative rating. It tells us more about the person in the process. So we know "Hey this guy really is a builder, I wonder if they can help me with this." for example. There is the chance people would use the negative ratings to make a person look bad with false accusations. Simply rip off ebay and add the ability to post a single reply to a negative rating. *shrugs* just my 2 cents.. Would give people more reason to browse profiles at least...

One of the thing I have personaly enjoyed in games are multiptude of ways to win. Forinstance in q3a, people can chose to fucus on accuracy, speed, high score, persistion, special skills, and many other areas. I guess what i'm trying to say is if there are many diffrent systems used fore reputation and rewards there might be some thing for every one.

other ideas:

valued options from trusted sources: each player has a guest book, but people can only see comments made by people who are in their contact list.

Map Social Networks: use a set of tools to determine the relation ships between avatars. Use the relation ships to identify and map groups of avatars. Use the groups in cross reference to relation ship to rank avatars position in the group. Rank each group by size. Map relations ships between groups to identify the larger social networks.

I agree neg rates aren't needed, I once thought they was a good thing lol. But when you receive all 3 neg ratings for no reason and then they get friends to, whats the point in that.

Someone offends you, you can add them to ignore and not ever hear another word they say.

Could say alot more, but that pretty much simplifies it

That works in IRC, but it fails utterly in a 3d environment such as SL.

So you can't hear what the griefer is saying. So? Push guns don't talk either. Neither do orbiting cannons, firebombing particle scripts, auto-rezzers, zombies, and even negative rates in general.

Ignoring a problem doesn't make it go away, sadly.

LF

If we're sticking with the current system more or less for a while, here's some simple changes that I'd suggest:

- Make them anonymous
- Increase the price substantially (10x)
- Do not notify the recipient when they get rated

I agree, except that I would make no. 2 x100

I don't really get this preoccupation with making ratings more expensive?

I mean I don't rate much now, but I sure as hell aren't gonna if it's costing me 100 or prolly even 10 L$ to do so.

Unless thats what you want? "If we're keeping the current system, lets make it too expensive to be bothered with"

I agree with Kris - wouldn't it deter people because you'd spend more on the ratings than you'd ever manage to get as a bonus?

Er... are you two NOT trolling....

I agree with what willow said... she's the cleverer twin...

Kris,

That's the whole idea. To deter people from using ratings casually.

If I really think someone is great, and I want to give them something to show them my appreciation, I would have no problem with spending $L100 to do so. In the same way, if someone *really* did something dire to me, I might in the heat of the moment be prepared to spend that amount to deter them.

But it would stop all the abuse that currently goes on, and would make ratings really mean something. That, I think would be only a good thing.

Actually, IMHO I think ratings should be totaly seperated from a global funding aspect. Currently a person pays 1-3 lindens to rate someone. Hmmm interestingly enough that equates to how much they make weekly. Well thats kind of ambigious. Why because one week a person may be mad at you and the next after they forgot you your still penalised for their irrational moment.

So Simply Put I say take the association of weekly Ratings Bonus away. Replace it with a productivity bonus which I will explain shortly.

However, Keep the Ratings system semi intact except this time if its a Positive Rating put in there an option to Pay that Individual like a Donation. If its a Negative Rating give the option to fill in a simple check block an example would be.

Building

...........0 I like the Construction but the Textures are lacking
...........0 I don't like this build as its unappealing
...........0 This structure is inappropriate and offensive

Or something more eloquently worded.

#1 Doing this by setting up a system where an individual could get critical feed back without affecting their weekly income would be a much more benificial tool for all.

#2 By notifying someone as a generalised statement of their short commings the ratee has the chance to contact the Rator and ask what they feel they can do to make it better.

Its all cooperation by doing something of this nature as a whole it might build the tighter community we once had.

I mean if a person get 400 ratings that are negative for a build and 20 positive ones it would give them a guage to look at per the responces. If all the responses said "This structure is inappropriate and offensive" that would tell the person that the majority feels the build is against the grain.

If thats what they were going for and it doesnt violate the TOS then they have achieved their market audience.

But all in all I don't think ratings should be tied to a weekly amount of funds based on ratings because it can be gamed to easily and unfair across the board.

Now earlier I mentioned a Longevity Bonus to replace the Ratings one. Its rather simple and would be very easy for LL to keep up with.

Simply this. Each day if a person logs in for at least 1hr they recieve a longevity point. Now these points would accumulate from initial log in through out the duration of thier first year in SL. From that point a percentage ratio of the first year would become a base and cumulative addition.

So to give a quick example Joe Smoe logs in for 14 days strait from onset and gains 1 point per day and evaluation would come on pay days so 14points /14 hrs =100% activity. Each week LL sets up a fund per person of a max of 700L$ so this newb would gain their base stip and 700 for thier continued efforts of keeping that 1hrs minimum in effect.

Now its 28 days later but Joe only spent 7 days at an hour each and logged out after 30 mins on 7 other days. Well now Joe has 21points / 28hrs = 75% thus recieves 525 per week till the next pay day.

So next payday comes up and Joe spent his full hour each day in world and now has 28points against 35hrs which =80% and now Joe gets 560 for longevity.

Ok 3 months pass now Joe made it a point to stay in world each night or day for at least one hour but still missed 5 days so 28+85=113 days joe made it and the cumulative for his total time in is 35+90=125 so 113/125=90%=630.

A year goes by and Joe only missed a total of 12 days meaning now for 365 days he has 353 active days in world. 353/365=98% meaning he gets 686 that week for Longevity.

Now the part where it gets to be fun and encourages continued participation.

Over that first year in SL Joe was active 98% of the duration in game. So He should be rewarded as such. Well giving him 686 per week locked in is a bit much. However, taking 1/10 of that ,69 basically, would be what Joe would start getting automaticaly for the new year in addition to his new total.

So for the first 90days of the new year Joe was only in world 80 of those days due to holidays n such means his new year cumulative total would be 80/90=89% and 89% of 700 would be 623 and adding his Longevity rate for the first year would be 692

This sort of system would reward over a long period of time. It would encourage participation in world. Yes it could be semi gamed by Alts but what would be the point. 1 person can have 5 alts to a credit card. If they had 2 credit cards that would be 10 alts. Unless that person has 10hrs a day to spend bouncing from one alt to another to make a pidley 500 a week its not benificial to to try to game. I mean yes it can be done but what would be the point.

All in all it would reward efforts of an individuals participation and not be gleaned from the irrational behavior of others but the simple behavior of the individual.

Hope this made sense.

Sincerely, Shadow

I'm not sure if I can agree on the "longevity bonus". Half of my time spent with Second Life is done outside Second Life - participating in forums, creating textures and clothes in Photoshop, doing animations, and generally staying in touch with other residents when they are off-world but still available by email/MSN/ICQ.

Some things - like projects - need a LOT of work and preparation outside SL, and the "longevity bonus" would not reward that work (agreed, the current system only rewards it indirectly). To give an example, Shadow, you took lots of time and pain to do all your calculations and present them in a detailed, organized form in the forums. Under the current system, I can at least rate you on Behaviour, since I feel that your efforts should be rewarded (even if I happen to disagree on them, but that's not the point - you have worked hard and contributed to this discussion in a valid way). With "longevity bonus", you would actually be unrewarded for your efforts. The hour or so you spend thinking about your post and writing it, is an hour less from "inworld game play", and so people don't caring about the community discussions here and just interested in getting more points would simply ignore all of this and jump straight in into Second Life's most trendy clubs

"Longevity bonus" sounds suspiciously like the several weirdo and artificial systems on many MMORPGs. They make sense on any "game" that rewards the time you spent there, because the more time you're online, the more you benefit the company doing the game. In SL, LL does "benefit more" with more content (and yes, forums are content as well). Since a large part of the content creation process is done off-world, this system of "longevity bonus" does not correctly reflect the amount of time you spend with SL.

(BTW, in any case, congrats on the time you spent on your post!!)

I would like more information on how the new system would work. How can LL prevent abuse of the new system? i.e; Rating parties.

Thanks

Cat

Ah I understand what your saying Gwyneth but let me ask you this. I spend from 3-7hrs daily in SL working on my platform making clothing/ships/toys and trinkets to sell. I put them in vendors people buy them and enjoy them.

Then for the most part never see me. Im not a club hound I stay out of drama and I work to provide content and on occasion I enjoy time with my close friends doing silly stuff.

However, after 2years in world and all that work and all the things I have provided as content. My ratings are much lower than someone that comes in goes to 15 clubs in two weeks and doesnt upload a texture one nor do they provide any qantifiable content to the world. Why is my ratings lower because I am a hermit for the most part. I dont get out in big parties I am not a "Crowd" person and I don't rate people just because they ask me to. But for the most part my sales are steady almost to a point of being predictable. But my sales doesn't reflect my skills either as they just measure what people like that I have made. But at the same time I dont get a rating for a sale. I mean a sale is in itself a rating is it not...but its not tied to our weekly Money other than they paid for it.

This is why I feel Rating should NEVER be tied to how much money you make weekly. I have an alternative to the actual Rating system itself which I briefly mentioned but the Idea is having Rates tied to your weekly earning encourages gaming the system and being a rate hound. I love SL and there are many things that are very unfair. Rating is the worst method to "Guage" how much money a person should make.

The current Rating system belittles creators such as myself/Catherine/lordfly/Chip/Mistress and startax just to mention a few. Because even though we get the occasional rate for ooooh that building is nice or oh those dollys are cute or wow that is a great sculpture none of them can hardly compair to the Newbie girl that acts free and loose in the clubs and flaunting her ***** as a tease.

I have seen it happen where someone like that walks in and in a months time has hit the top of ratings because they either begged for them or other ill means. The really sad part is they haven't contributed anything cept a few cyber thrills to a couple of lonely individuals.

People like that, that have no skills dishearten those of us that do and are trying to provide content for SL. You look at a person like that's rating and OMG They have 900points in Building....but ask them to rez a prim and they look at you like you shot their dog.

I still feel that rating should be a one time thing and not tied to your weekly money. The Longevity thing is an Idea but there could be others as well. But either way I feel that ratings being tied to your weekly earnings is weak. At best it doesnt measure the true ability of the person nor does it benifit those that are provding services.

Gwyneth previously you mentioned my time spent here writing that out...well I couldnt be in sl anyway because I am at work. Typing is not a hard effort and to be honest doesnt detract from what Im doing at work as I typicaly type a thought swap programs and continue mission.

Sorry Gwyneth I tend to disagree with you on the context of ratings as what your saying is basicaly promoting the Newbie Girl/boy I mentioned previously which in the end continues to belittle and degrade those of us that add actual content to sl for others to enjoy.


Sincerely, Shadow Weaver

P.S. Thank you for the previous compliment Gwyneth and nothing personal I just disagree with your point of view on the schematics of the Ratings scheme.

Edited one word as an afterthought