Vote on the Karma-meter

[humanitas]

There is a feature called karma, it's basically like a reputation meter.  Regular members post with each other quite a bit after a while and sometimes you read a post that's truly great or truly poor in its construction.  When you really like or think someone's contribution was helpful or insightful you give its author [good karma].  If you come across a post you think is either really lousy or does the opposite of being helpful, you give a [need practice] vote.  It was preferable over the original "applaud" and "smite" terms for the karma feature.   Eventually everyone will have a mix of both. 

IF a post does not speak to you at all, you do not have to do anything.  Karma awarding is a way to maybe give others the ability to give us feedback on whether what we have to give is recognized as useful to others.  We of course, trust you won't abuse this tool to put down your peers, that's why instead of a "smite", we have a "need practice."  We're working on an honor system here.

What do you the membership think of this feature?  Yay?  Nay?  We thought we'd give it a month trial and see if it is something you guys enjoy having.  It might also help motivate us to see the good before seeing the bad.  Give us your feedback on whether or not you like this feature.

The name is also something we can change.  It does not have to be karma, that is editable.
 
Ogyen.

[catmoon]

Well instead of karma points we could call 'em Oggies. Or maybe The Caz Namyaw Memorial Avici Hell Realms Score?

You know, I can see this working real well for those who get a lot of points, but for those who don't it could be pretty discouraging.

[humanitas]

catmoon, I see what you're saying.  Now, what if we didn't differentiate good and bad karma, there is a way to just show a total of votes, which could be good/bad.  But there is a way to show someone is voted for, but without disclosing which way the vote went, just that that person got karma.  So if you have a lot of votes it could be either.  But you just have a LOT of karma.  HAHA!

Without this showing, if you saw a lot of points, you wouldn't have the chance to really feel bad since you wouldn't know how much need practice or good karma votes any one member got, just that they got karma for being here.

HAHA!

What do you think of this?

[humanitas]

I just changed it so that the disclosure is actually private, so you JUST see a total.  We feel unsure about this feature too, that's why we're posing this to you the members and asking for your contribution and feedback on this feature.

Restrictions I also put in place: You can vote for a member only once every 24 hours, that way you don't vote for any given member more than twice a day.  Administrators have the same restrictions enforced on their votes as regular members.  

Also voting is anonymous and you need a minimum of 150 posts under you belt to give karma.  How do we feel about this?  Do we want more/less minimum required posts?  And guests can't karma.   

Thoughts?

[catmoon]

I would rather see the points awarded to postings, as opposed to the writers.

I've seen this done and it works quite well. Postings can be voted up or down, but each user can only vote on a post once.

one arrangement I've seen puts a colored background behind high rated posts, but very low rated ones (some go into negative numbers) only appear as a one line summary/title and have to be clicked on to be seen.

But it might be technically difficult to implement.

[Wonky Badger]

I would rather see the points awarded to postings, as opposed to the writers.

I've seen this done and it works quite well. Postings can be voted up or down, but each user can only vote on a post once.

one arrangement I've seen puts a colored background behind high rated posts, but very low rated ones (some go into negative numbers) only appear as a one line summary/title and have to be clicked on to be seen.

But it might be technically difficult to implement.

I remember that we planned to implement something similar earlier but that there were some problems with getting it to work. It might be that I could fix it now, when I'm a bit more used to the system. I'll look into it.

[Arya-Shraman]

I highly disapprove of this idea of Karma Index. I know its just supposed to be a fun thing.But still It doesnt make me very comfortable someone judging karma for someone else!

I dont see any incredible need for such Index either.May be reading a lot of Buddhist literature has rendered me very sensitive to word Karma Index.

I would be happy if moderators re consider the Idea.Instead you can use simple english terms like 'activity' or something.

Just a suggestion.

Metta.

[Caz]

I highly disapprove of this idea of Karma Index. I know its just supposed to be a fun thing.But still It doesnt make me very comfortable someone judging karma for someone else!

I dont see any incredible need for such Index either.May be reading a lot of Buddhist literature has rendered me very sensitive to word Karma Index.

I would be happy if moderators re consider the Idea.Instead you can use simple english terms like 'activity' or something.

Just a suggestion.

Metta.

Would it help if i gave you some good karma 

[Spiny le Norman]

How about we score threads?

Spiny

[zen-zen]

How about we score threads?

I think this is a good idea. It would encourage people to create great common discussions instead of hoarding fame for themselves.

[Pema Dorje]

I'm not sure if I like the idea at all, some people (like me) have a hard time wording things on the net, but yet my practice is great. If so maybe we should change the nomenclature   

[Bodhisatta2012]

My suggestion would be to try it with mods and admins first and then decide from the ego-carnage or the lack there-of what you want to do next.

[Kojip]

Can I have some good karma points please?   A big canvas just went out on approval, and I really want this sale to go through.      Thanks.     

[Bodhisatta2012]

Questions:

While testing the karma system (I) found that it allowed me to vote only once for any given individual in 24 hours.  But this was limited to the thread.  If (I) went to another thread, (I) was allowed to vote again for the same individual.

For another individual (I) was able to vote several times with no limitations on several threads.

Seems problematic to me.  ( Please don't shoot the messenger.)

[humanitas]

Ok, so far we have mixed reviews.  I'm hearing we'd like some kind of thread scoring, but we don't like the karma feature. 

Should I put up a poll?  Should I simply get rid of it?   This is an open ended feature. 

We can name it activity, or whatever and we can change the voting method, could be anything from agree/disagree, yay/nay, stars/brownies, etc.  We can have both be positive just different, they do not have to contrast, there does not even have to be a negative vote.  Could be anything.   

Do we hate the feature altogether, do we just want to change the name but let the votes into agree/disagree?  If we changed the name from Karma to Activity, like Arya suggested, would this make the feature more useful?

Thanks for all your input.
 
Ogyen.