Non-motoring > Ratings - initial feedback Miscellaneous
Thread Author: car4play Replies: 18

 Ratings - initial feedback - car4play
Well that created a lot of interesting (cough) discussion didn't it.

As I said to the mods, we would have to simply run with it to see what it would do.
We do need some kind of way of measuring the most helpful posts, so some kind of system is needed. Thankfully we can make it what we want and it has to be seen as helpful to all.
It has to stay in some form I'm afraid. It is very important for us to know who is particularly good at answering technical issues, for example, if we are to have greater participation of users in this site in the future.
The problem is that we are all so resistant to change. I remember just about every change we made to the HJ site over the 10 years or so being greeted by complaints - be they about the color, sizing, layout etc. etc.

ok ok, so that wasn't all of you here. ;-) But you get my drift.

So the challenge we face is to carry forward with a vision for this site whilst trying to listen to the constructive feedback.
I do hear your sentiments and understand better some of the issues that could be problematic for what is an essentially very loyal set of individuals (to each other).
Don't worry. Part of the reason for not completely finishing the system and ironing out all the bugs is that we knew we would have to modify it. It shouldn't stop you reading, posting and enjoying yourselves as a community which is the main purpose of this site. It isn't core functionality. We will try to make things better for the people who insist on using IE as their browser. ;-)

On that note, clearly the sword hanging over people with the threat of negative rating has an adverse effect on this site and will almost certainly get chopped itself. It seems that many of you have the impression that somehow we want to ban overly negative rated posts or posters. This was never our intention. So to avoid the confusion we will probably get rid of the negative. We will leave offensive flagging as this is important for hiding posts like some of the malicious stuff that could appear if someone wanted to wreak havoc on this site, and do this hiding without mod intervention. (We all know the kind of thng I mean)
I don't believe we will lose much by doing this and it should get rid of most of the fear of posting.

The word "rate" doesn't seem to be an accurate enough description of what we are looking for either. "Helpful", "informative", "good point" seem better because these could encourage a plus even on posts that you might disagree with for example.

It will be easier for us to simply reset the databases on changes, so if it all gets cleared to zero you will know what has happened. Please don't take the current ratings too seriously as we reserve the right to restart them tomorrow.

Finally at the early hour, please note that your comments are always welcome and we try to take them in the spirit in which they are intended.
I did take a long look at one of the other sites mentioned that use rating systems and was encouraged that most of the ideas we had in mind or had already put in place here would go a long way to preventing some of the abuses that can happen.

Last edited by: car4play on Thu 8 Apr 10 at 01:29
 Ratings - initial feedback - devonite
Hmmm! well at least you`ve proved your willing to listen and act to allay some of our wariness!.....
so in that vein (bearing in mind you`ve hinted at further developments),
i`m prepared to give you breathing space to see how this fits in with the bigger plan! ;-)
 Ratings - initial feedback - Stuartli
>>I remember just about every change we made to the HJ site over the 10 years or so being greeted by complaints >>

I seem to remember posting the comment: "If it ain't broke, don't fix it" just before the disastrous outcome on HJ's website......
 Ratings - initial feedback - VxFan
>> I seem to remember posting the comment: "If it ain't broke don't fix it" just
>> before the disastrous outcome on HJ's website......

We're not trying to fix something that isn't broken though. Right at the start of C4P it was mentioned that it is to become much more than "just a forum".

The 'thank you' button (as opposed to the wrongly labelled 'rating' button) is to enable us to find out who the helpful contributors are and this in turn will unlock other parts of the site later on. I can't say too much about that now as we don't want other forums/sites to pinch our ideas before we've implemented them.

Vx.
 Ratings - initial feedback - devonite
now tis becoming clearer! we`ve to prove we`re good boys and girls before we get to dip our fingers in the virtual sweetie bag!

think i`ll probably be sitting on the naughty step sucking my thumb!

edit: yoicks! my ratings in all threads are now 4-4! anyone beat that?
Last edited by: devonite on Thu 8 Apr 10 at 13:52
 Ratings - initial feedback - Tooslow
"edit: yoicks! my ratings in all threads are now 4-4! anyone beat that?"

If you tell me where to find my rating I'll give you 4 stars :-)

JH
Last edited by: Tooslow on Thu 8 Apr 10 at 19:15
 Ratings - initial feedback - Mapmaker
Well for a start, stop logging us out every 20 minutes. Facebook, Hotmail, Yahoo stay logged on for ages. Even my bank leaves me logged on for almost as long as you do.

Having to log in to click red buttons isn't much fun...
 Ratings - initial feedback - Dog
>>>Well for a start, stop logging us out every 20 minutes <<<

Jeez! ... is that why it doesn't work - cheers :)
 Ratings - initial feedback - VxFan
>> Well for a start stop logging us out every 20 minutes.

You only get logged out if inactive. Why would you want to still be here after 20 mins of inactivity?
 Ratings - initial feedback - Crankcase
Open a tab, check what's happening, open another, do something else for a little while, come back to first tab - logged out. Bit of a nuisance.
 Ratings - initial feedback - Zero
yer - like he says PITA
 Ratings - initial feedback - VxFan
>> Open a tab check what's happening open another do something else for a little while
>> come back to first tab - logged out. Bit of a nuisance.

Log in to C4P. Check what's happening. Read all posts flagged as new. Log out and change to another site or close the web browser down. Do something else for a little while, then come back to C4P later on and log back in again.

Simples /
Last edited by: VxFan on Thu 8 Apr 10 at 20:57
 Ratings - initial feedback - smokie
DISSENT BETWEEN THE MODS... :-)

I'm with the others Vx - it's a pain. Especially with tabbed browsing - I have half a dozen tabs which open at start up and I switch between them, using a seventh and eighth tab for ad hoc browsing. So the second tab remains on c4play all teh time. It's inconvenient that it logs you out, and I don't really understand why (apart from the risk of someone else coming along and posting as you on your computer)
 Ratings - initial feedback - Zero
Its not as tho we are doing our internet banking on here.

 Ratings - initial feedback - rtj70
Can there not be an option? On my laptop I have my webmail client set to stay logged in for weeks. If I used a 'trusted' machine to browse my mail I'd not let it stay logged in.

What if I lost the laptop? It's fully encrypted.

What do I do at home? My home PC does not have a password for login and can access my mail etc. It cannot get access to anything important like online banking by remembering a password or any login details. Besides I need to use my chip and pin card and a reader to login to my online banking.
 Ratings - initial feedback - Stuartli
>>... It cannot get access to anything important like online banking by remembering a password or any login details>>

These are carried on the bank's server, not your computer...:-)
 Ratings - initial feedback - Crankcase

>> Log in to C4P. Check what's happening. Read all posts flagged as new.

I would try that if the "new" flags were working properly. Click the first one, read the message, return to list of topics and all the other new flags have gone.


Whinge whinge, never mind, it's still a fun place to be. I'm sure it will get sorted eventually.
 Ratings - initial feedback - Stuartli
>>..and all the other new flags have gone.>>

That's a feature that's particularly annoyed me.
 Ratings - initial feedback - Pat
And me, and looking at the lack of posts yesterday compared to some other days I think we're not the only ones Stuart.

If it affects the site traffic then it affects the stats and needs sorting out.
I expected it would be sorted this morning after the ratings system was changed but it's still the same.

Pat
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