Handling Downvotes
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Okay, kind of want to take a community poll and see what people think. Currently we have upvotes and downvotes for topics and posts. Having both is important because otherwise you get a "likes" system like Facebook has that is really a popularity contest and tells nothing of value to someone looking at a post, it's a "feel good" system meant to encourage readership and to discourage people getting upset and leaving. Good for traffic, bad for content.
Right now, we have visible upvotes (you can see who upvoted you) but invisible downvotes (you can't see who downvoted you.) This is the system default and not an intentional design. Obviously there is a certain value to being able to downvote someone without letting them know that it was you, it discourages downvoting if people can complain to you about it. But anything secret causes problems, too.
If downvotes are visible, then you can see when one person is just downvoting one post after another and gives someone viewing the votes more information about them. Transparency is generally the right choice. If you aren't willing to be known as the downvoter, maybe you shouldn't downvote.
So what do people think? There have been some requests to open down votes as public. Is this the move that we want?
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I see no issues with having this public, if people wish to down vote their opinion should be public.
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Yeah I agree, and I actually down voted to prove it.
downvotes should be same as upvotes, it wont make any issues ... I will just have to go back to all my topics and see everyone that down voted me...yeah payback time
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I agree that they should be public.
I'm curious what the UI looks like if one person upvotes and one person downvotes, doe it just display both names, or which one did which?
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@bnrstnr said in Handling Downvotes:
I'm curious what the UI looks like if one person upvotes and one person downvotes, doe it just display both names, or which one did which?
I think it shows it under the arrow for each item.
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My opinion, is yes.
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I'm cool with showing downvotes. It will give haters just one more thing to complain about - so and so downvoted me... no different than someone complaining about to much spam or something else here.
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Agreed. Make it public and encourage accountability.
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Vote: Public
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I don't care if downvotes are shown. I do think that this can create social problems and discourage people from downvoting which can negatively impact quality as stated. We'll see what happens.
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I don't care either. Make them public.
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Public is fine. Always good to know who downvotes the carpet cleaning ads!
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Aside from true feelings, which I don't care if people know I downvoted, I only usually downvote other things to annoy @DustinB3403 anyway.
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We're all grownups, so I'd say make it public.
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I think both upvotes and downvotes should be invisible.
By having both invisible all the potential drama is completely avoided. And the number of votes for or against will probably be more honest.It's also more informative if you go back and look at old threads. The number actually represents what most people agreed on at the time.
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@Pete-S said in Handling Downvotes:
By having both invisible all the potential drama is completely avoided.
It doesn't. The downvotes will have the same drama. The issue won't be addressed.
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I have no problem with having both upvotes and downvotes visible. The couple of times I've been downvoted, I've wanted to know "why" -- especially if I've made a mistake somewhere. I can't ask the source if I don't know who the source is.
I also have no problem with both being invisible, like Reddit.
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@scottalanmiller said in Handling Downvotes:
@Pete-S said in Handling Downvotes:
By having both invisible all the potential drama is completely avoided.
It doesn't. The downvotes will have the same drama. The issue won't be addressed.
Remove downvotes all together then. If you have personal downvotes the drama will increase for sure. If you have problems now, it will become worse.
The question is what the downvote actually means. Is it a thumbs down on you or a disagreement with what you said?
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It doesn't matter so much to me. But, my preference would be for them both to be invisible, and add a "Kudos" count for users to get recognition for contributions.
Also, I think the root of the problem is that the votes are not done for the right reasons.
Upvotes should be representative of things like "I learned something new", or "That saved me a lot of time", etc, etc, and downvotes should be for things like, "I asked you to address the error in your post and you refused", or "your answer does not answer the original poster's question", etc, etc.
Too many times, the votes are more representative of fleeting emotions or revenge. (In my opinion!)
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@brandon220 said in Handling Downvotes:
Public is fine. Always good to know who downvotes the carpet cleaning ads!
Exactly - don't downvote - that's just a waste - simply report them.
