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jpishgar

jpishgar

Splendid
Overlord Emeritus
Jan 5, 2010
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Greetings!

We're looking for feedback and input on the reputation system here on Tom's Hardware. What kind of improvements would you like to see in the future? What do you like about how we currently handle badges? What do you not like? What are some examples of great reputation/status systems you'd like to see brought to Tom's Hardware? Is there anything you miss about our previous system?

We're open to your thoughts and constructive input as we push forward with another round of development on the Tom's Hardware Community as it constantly evolves.

Here are a few thoughts we're exploring already:

• Exclusive signatures
• Private discussion areas for top tier posters
• Personalized system configurations
• Up to a dozen small badges displayed under user avatar, rather than one or two.

Your feedback and ideas are welcome in this thread. :)

-JP
 
Currently Best Answers are tied to the Badges and that's it, to encourage better participation and better answers if receiving a Best Answer did more than just apply to the Badges but also add to a members status. A person that has accumulated 100 Best Answers could receive a title and to use military ranking say that would be Lieutenant and then continue all the way up to 1000 being General and then adding stars after that, 1500 being 2 star General, 2000 being 3 star and so on. It doesn't have to be this way it can be any title that could be used to show an advancement and accumulation of Best Answers. This could also be tied in with the exclusive Signatures that could be awarded as the total BA accumulate.
This could be used as an additional encouragement to post better quality responses to questions to obtain the BA.

Many times in a thread there are several answers that can qualify as the BA but fall just short of the one chosen, so maybe there can be a Best Answer Assist, where one or two members get some credit for a quality answer and a number of assists can equal a Best Answer in that category. An example Member X receives 5 assists in the CPU section and those 5 assists are then counted as one Best Answer in the CPU section, the number of assists can be determined by the Admins to what they feel would be appropriate 2,3,4,5 or any number.

 
I like the idea of BA's accumulating in some way like that, but one thing I'd like to see is a "Quality Answer" category, similar in some ways to the "assist" mentioned above. This might be done using a thumbs-up/thumbs-down voting method. A "quality answer" may not directly answer the OP's question, but is one viewed by other[ thread participant]s as containing particularly useful information, likely indicating that its poster knows what he's talking about.
 
Instead of putting the badges where they are under the avatar, where the quotes used to be, why not put them in the name bar? E.g. to the right of the poster's pseudonym. Would work well with the smaller badges you are proposing. Then put the quotes back in - from what I can tell, the quote currently does nothing.

I'd like line breaks in signatures back - makes it easier to separate different sections.

And to be able to see posts people have made - getting a PM referring to a thread is irritating, because you can't find that thread. Only real way seems to be a well-written google search aimed at the forum.
 
A private discussion area for users who have 5000 posts or more would be a good idea.

Staff might be prepared to drop in to that area more often because they get treated well.

I'd like to sit and sip margueritas with Jane too.

Finally I'd like to be community manager for a day.

Also a super badge (one ring that rules them all) gained by mastering a number of areas sounds good to me.

If you owned the one ring I'd be prepared to be your genii for a day and ban anyone you wanted (just for an hour) ... heh heh ...

:)
 
I would venture to say that for the most part veteran members care a great deal about their reputation and ranking and it's only human nature to want to be recognized for your contrabutions , granted there are those that don't care about such things but the majority do. If a person spends a lot of time in the forum helping people and they are good at it then they should be recognized for their efforts.
Accumulated best answers seems to be the best way to identify those individuals, also total badges would be as well. Total posts not so much because I have seen many one word and up to one sentence posts which does not take much effort or offer a great deal of quality. It doesn't need to be an elaborate system and just a few levels that are easily recognizable to everyone.
Currently there are three badges that denote how long a person has been a member, perhaps that could be expanded to show more. Right now we have one, two and three years and we have many that have been here longer.
 
I still very much miss being able to tell when someone is online real time in a thread as it might mean the difference in me sticking around a few more minutes to continue helping someone. They way it was done in the old forums was perfect.

I also miss being able to have one click access to all of a users posts. There were many times that was helpful.

I would love a private discussion area for users over a certain number of posts. That way all of us with over 5000 posts or so who are not mods would have our own little area to talk about everyone else just like the mods use their private area to talk about the rest of us! :jap:

Also is it just me or in the experts billboards can you still not browse previous months?

I also agree with inzone about accumulated best answers needing to be recognized. The best answer to answer ratio seems to me to be the best way to identify these individuals. Not to jerk my own chain ( too much anyway! 😛 ) but there are very few of us with a 10% or better best answer to answer ratio. It would be nice to be recognized for that in some way.
 
I'm listening to you and responding because you have 8000 plus posts ... the BA system doesn't impress me ... its a tool (token economy) for new users.

I'd like a private lounge for those with plenty of posts ...
 
I also suggest putting a "search all posts by user" button. Plus the status under avatar should be bold and/or italic. Another thing would be small badges next to your name when you reach the highest ranking ( like master ) on something.
 
I am really glad to see an initiative like this. Not wishing to come across all melodramatic or anything but I was about a week away from deleting my bookmark shortcut for the site and stop visiting.

Many veteran posters like myself feel that the new badge/best answer system has given them very short shrift.
A reputation (measured in badges/posts and best answers)that took years to earn before, can now be accumulated in a matter of months.

I would suggest that we accumulate a few things so that you would need to have been an active member for X years or more and Have X best answers and X posts to qualify for the proposed discussion area and other possible benefits.

Would it be possible to grant veteran users like myself some form of default recognition on our Avatars ?
Similar to the way you guys have the Toms Team Star ?
I just feel that people like myself deserve some special recognition that new posters simply can not achieve.

Yes there are badges that are no longer issued that I could jazz up my profile with but I feel that that's a bit pretentious. I would rather have something issued by toms as a thank you that says we have not forgotten you guys and appreciate your years of input.
Dare I suggest a hammer of some description ? Do we still use those ? I have not seen a hammer on the forums for ages thinking about it.

Thanks
Mac :)
 


You would think so wouldn't you. It seems that people have not historically been very vigilant at selecting best answers, this was highlighted as an area that Toms wanted to see improved with this latest Forum update.
The decision to allow all and sundry to select best answers is aimed square at trying to achieve as high a question to best answer ratio as possible.
There are a lot of people that don't like it but that's the decision those in power have taken.

Mactronix :)

 
A member always has the option to report abuse if they feel that a best answer has been chosen irrationaly, we have had very few complaints from thread starters and a few from members that didn't like a person with no best answers choosing it. When abuse is reported it is taken care of, if more thread starters would follow through with selecting the best answer we wouldn't be in this predicament.
 
The decision to allow all and sundry to select best answers is aimed square at trying to achieve as high a question to best answer ratio as possible.
There are a lot of people that don't like it but that's the decision those in power have taken.

It's pure economics really - Tom's needs to survive financially and for that, we have to show up top in every search people make for their problem before even coming here. If what they see is a lot of posts which weren't satisfactorily answered, they'll go to another Forum so there's far more to BAs than just the posters' egos.

There's a lot to do. Yesterday I ran a search for a particular problem and found Tom's at the top of the list Google suggested. Sadly, though, the four posts in the suggested batch were totally useless but, in time and with a bit of work, they could all show BAs which are useful.
 
Such proper plan there, I see. Having seen Toms as the no1 hardware guru according to Google for the last 8 years ( and even longer maybe, since I only built my first PC 8 years ago ), I understand the need of this feature now. Glad to be apart of it ( recently moved away from the local tech forum in my country since it has became a battlefield with hardware distributors fighting each other to gain customers using dirty tricks ). It feels great to be an advisor and get rewarded here.
 


+1 to both those features, in the old forum I found both of these were pretty helpful.



A Best Answer to Answer ratio would be pretty good, for a while I think I was above 10% as well.
Though I think there would have to be a minimum on the number of posts before its activated, maybe 500? Just someone could make one post, get a BA and appear far more trustworthy at a glance than those with thousands of posts.

One thing I don't like about the current badge ranking system is that its kind of counter-intuitive about the rank descriptors.
- Expert
- Authority
- Master
To me at least Expert seems to indicate a higher rank than Authority.
Now we just need a Grand-Master rank for those with over 200 BA :lol:

More tag specific badges would be good, I'm pretty active at answering threads under the "Water-Cooling" tag, having some kind of recognition for more specialist knowledge would be good. Similar to how I have also earned an Nvidia badge, which I think works on the same principle.

If active and higher contributing users could unlock more signature text space that would be great.
As well as counting the number characters in the final displayed signature, not what is typed in during the signature creation. I have to use TinyURL to fit links into my sig without removing my rig specs entirely.



Something like this could be turned into an event, along the lines of a poster of the month type deal. If it wouldn't put too much stress on the mod team (or whichever body would be responsible) then having some kind of highlight placed on top posters would be great.

Speaking of mods, having a greater transparency on how to become one and their responsibilities would be good. Maybe a sticky in the Forum Feedback section.
Just I have been somewhat interested in becoming one for a while, yet I dont really know how this is achieved, or the commitment that would be expected if I were to become one.

Think I went a bit beyond what Jpishgar wanted with this, but thoughts just keep flowing as I type 😛.
 


Iv'e been as close as a minute away from deleting my account so you have got a long way to go before you out misery me buddy.

My advice is when you get upset walk away from the KB and try some "real life" ... I do ... and it helps.

Today I got caught in the rain twice ... had to go out for a 6 pin to molex connector and then to get some milk.

I sense people are laughing at me again ... keep it up I say !!

:)
 


Toms has as has been said top of search results for a good few years now so I see no rush to increase the selected best answer count on that score.
As the second part of your post illustrates we are at risk of turning users away by generating a reputation for bad answers. Fewer competent useful answers would to my mind do a better job of bolstering our reputation.
Quality over quantity has always been my standpoint on this.
As I said though the decision has been made.

Mac
 
mactronix said:
I would rather have something issued by toms as a thank you that says we have not forgotten you guys and appreciate your years of input.
Dare I suggest a hammer of some description ? Do we still use those ? I have not seen a hammer on the forums for ages thinking about it.



Something like this could be turned into an event, along the lines of a poster of the month type deal. If it wouldn't put too much stress on the mod team (or whichever body would be responsible) then having some kind of highlight placed on top posters would be great.
Click to expand...

That totally misses the point of the suggestion which was this part of my earlier post.
Would it be possible to grant veteran users like myself some form of default recognition on our Avatars ?
Similar to the way you guys have the Toms Team Star ?
I just feel that people like myself deserve some special recognition that new posters simply can not achieve.
Click to expand...

I'm not saying I am against your suggestion just didn't want my initial suggestion/request to get swallowed up with your extension of the idea.

Mac :)
 
my thoughts on the current reputation system and best answer selection process:

overall i think having best answers selected by veterans is a very good idea and i have definitely used this in cases where the op was being unreasonable and ignoring the only possible and highly relevant fix, in ideas where the op wasnt sure what was the best answer or in cases where the op abandoned the thread but no credit was given.

it does have some flaws though which i will list:

best answer and question threads.....

the vast majority of people seem to be creating "discussion" threads instead of "answer" threads which means that even if you were very helpful there are no best answers to be given. i've had numerous users want to give me a rating but they made a discussion thread by mistake.

my solution for this is to either default posts to answer status unless you click a box for discussion only (which works because most posts ARE questions), make senior members (veterans) able to modify the status of the post to a question type or make it blatantly obvious (and put the checkbox on the quick-create post area on the right) to the thread starter that they "want/need" to create an answer type post.

if done correctly the best answer system is brilliant.

the other problem which is brought up by mactronix is that some users with little or no experience may be selecting best answers. personally i havent seen any of this happening but i suppose we dwell in different parts of this forum.

i think that in order to select a best answer you should have a few minimums in place.
-you must be a member of the forum for a certain time limit. this would help you to get a good feel for the rules of the forum and also be around enough posts to know what you are doing and how things work.
-you must have a minimum amount of posts credited to you. this would weed out anyone who doesnt contribute.
-you must have a certain number of best answers in total.

all numbers should be reasonable... say 6 months, 250 posts and 30 best answers or so. that would make sense to me at least and would define "veteran" from "newbie". granted just because you are new here it doesnt mean you dont know what you are talking about but having some minimums would throw some "clout" and "reputation" behind the selection of best answers instead of just having it selected by someone who doesnt look legit.

i dont think that the best answers improve google rankings at all however i do agree that best answers make the forum much more appealing. if done properly.

so... some minor tweaks i think to make it more effective but overall i say its a great idea and should definitely stay.

----------

@mactronix

i agree that some sort of veteran hammer symbol or text under our avatars would be great. new users pick up on such things and it makes it easier for them to see that information is coming from a reputable source.

i do like the new badge system which displays a very big bright badge below our avatars which announces to everyone that we have just an inkling of experience in the matter. the trouble is that with not so many best answer posts going around its very hard to get a rating.

i will go out on a limb and say that 80% of the posts i answer arent best answer and i get zero credit. all of them should have been answer posts but the op didnt realize how to make one.

not saying i really care all that much about pretty pictures and reputation but it makes it obvious to the op about who knows what they are talking about and who doesnt know jack.

just some friendly suggestions!
 
@ssddx In the event you run into a discussion thread where the OP wants to give you credit for your answer you can tell the OP to PM a moderator to ask them to change the thread to a question. This can easily be done.

 
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