We should be able to change our minds on issueing karma points. Thread

I find it annoying how we cant change our mind about the karma points or the mistake of pressing the wrong karma button, so i'd be nice if we cound change our minds.

You can, just press the other way.

I tried that, but it just says "You already issued a rating on this comment"

skylar15 wrote: I tried that, but it just says "You already issued a rating on this comment"

To my memory, I believe I've had the same issue. The fact is I rarely issue karma points without being sure about it.

How do you issue karma? I see no button for it.

The plus and Minus buttons next to a comment on somthing like a game.

Oh that.
For a moment I thought that they had implemented forum karma (something I really miss and think would benefit this community).

I'll dream on...

Edited by: Nightshade

Paradigmthefallen wrote:

skylar15 wrote: I tried that, but it just says "You already issued a rating on this comment"

To my memory, I believe I've had the same issue. The fact is I rarely issue karma points without being sure about it.

Oh right, for some reason I thought you were talking about the reviews.

Niteshade wrote: Oh that.
For a moment I thought that they had implemented forum karma (something I really miss and think would benefit this community).

I'll dream on...

I like the ideal of forum karma.

The reality however rarely turns out nearly as well, in my experience.

Perhaps forums should stay karma-free. Forum is a place for discussion, not most liked or disliked opinions. And debates and arguments here can be pretty heated.

feillyne wrote: Perhaps forums should stay karma-free. Forum is a place for discussion, not most liked or disliked opinions. And debates and arguments here can be pretty heated.

Why is everybody - including you - so negative?
Karma encourages people to write good posts, keep a clean debate and stay away from being asses on the forums. That's all positive.
And you could probably add a limit to how often you can issue karma points (say 5 per day or something) to prevent spamming.
Additionally you could add a restriction so that you have to have been a member for say, 2 months, before you can issue karma.

Edited by: Nightshade

Niteshade wrote: Karma encourages people to write good posts, keep a clean debate and stay away from being asses on the forums.

If you've ever visited the Steam Forums you'll realize that "Karma points" not necessarily come from good posting in general. Karma systems are a silly way to over-evaluate opinions due a pretty number that is mostly meaningless because some people agree here and there or just because the poster tends to be funny.

Attention whoring and e-peen measurement are usually all that come from a karma system. It does not influence in the quality of posts, even though it may sound like it.

feillyne wrote: Perhaps forums should stay karma-free. Forum is a place for discussion, not most liked or disliked opinions. And debates and arguments here can be pretty heated.

Why is everybody - including you - so negative?
Karma encourages people to write good posts, keep a clean debate and stay away from being asses on the forums. That's all positive.
And you could probably add a limit to how often you can issue karma points (say 5 per day or something).

You can imagine what would become of Cosmos subforum if we are to distribute karma points. Any critical or highly controversial posts could be easily buried. Some of such posts maybe would deserve that because of mild insults thrown at each other, but others would not.

Karma could encourage more work into posts. Though it could also encourage less work into posts, and more flame and karma havoc. Some basic limitations such as as you say 2 month ModDB membership would be required then, and that would make the system more difficult to implement.

Niteshade wrote:
Why is everybody - including you - so negative?
Karma encourages people to write good posts, keep a clean debate and stay away from being asses on the forums. That's all positive.
And you could probably add a limit to how often you can issue karma points (say 5 per day or something).

The line between realistic and cynical is thinner than a paper's edge when its something on the internet.

feillyne wrote: You can imagine what would become of Cosmos subforum if we are to distribute karma points. Any critical or highly controversial posts could be easily buried. Some of such posts maybe would deserve that because of mild insults thrown at each other, but others would not.

Karma could encourage more work into posts. Though it could also encourage less work into posts, and more flame and karma havoc. Some basic limitations such as as you say 2 month ModDB membership would be required then, and that would make the system more difficult to implement.

No system is without human flaw, unfortunately. The best solution to inclusion of a karma point system is the ability to disable it for a thread when you create it (and then, who besides people who wanted the Karma system will use it?) Or maybe just have it around so if, after a certain amount of time that a thread's been on the forum, that you can vote on it. And the results of the karma system's votes also are a bit iffy, unfortunately. What does someone get for lots of positive posts? Getting even more attention, or something else? It just is a lot of work that, at best, forms a blanket of political correctness that, lets be honest, might get tedious after a certain point.

I'm just making assumptions here, but the fact is that even the comment system's karma has been abused before. Think about Battlefield 3 when it said it wouldn't include mod tools. People, even ones who actually explained reasons they saw it as logical, were silenced without a second glance.

...and there is nothing that says that you can remove the forum karma system if it doesn't work out, now is it?
I say you should at least try it out.

Can't say much stops them from not adding it at all either.

Niteshade wrote: ...and there is nothing that says that you can remove the forum karma system if it doesn't work out, now is it?
I say you should at least try it out.

It's being available is very easy to handle. However any damage done to users cannot just be undone. The path of a karma system is a wary one.

Reqieumthefallen wrote:

It's being available is very easy to handle. However any damage done to users cannot just be undone. The path of a karma system is a wary one.

Removing such a system is just as easy as adding it - or even easier actually.
Or are you talking about possible PSYCHOLOGICAL TRAUMA that one might get from negative karma feed? Give me a break will you - that's silly. This is the internet.

Edited by: Nightshade

They should add pictures of cats in random pages just because it is easy to do. If people don't like it, remove it!

Stimor wrote: They should add pictures of cats in random pages just because it is easy to do. If people don't like it, remove it!

Comming from a person known to only post one-liners and silly posts of low quality. No wonder you are against the idea of karma.

Niteshade wrote:

Reqieumthefallen wrote:

It's being available is very easy to handle. However any damage done to users cannot just be undone. The path of a karma system is a wary one.

Removing such a system is just as easy as adding it - or even easier actually.
Or are you talking about possible PSYCHOLOGICAL TRAUMA that one might get from negative karma feed? Give me a break will you - that's silly. This is the internet.

Do you not at all find it ironic that you presently are making posts that probably would have negative karma? You're insulting people and claiming their feelings don't matter..... think before ye type.

Reqieumthefallen wrote: Do you not at all find it ironic that you presently are making posts that probably would have negative karma? You're insulting people and claiming their feelings don't matter..... think before ye type.

No I don't find it ironic at all. I want this community and this forum to become a better place - and I'm sure many people are here for the very same purpose. This is which why I advocate a karma system for the forums: to increase the overall quality of posts here. So I try my best to argue for my matter and what I get in return is nothing but negativism, arguments based on emotion (instead of logic) and silly one-liners instead of real arguments against my case - and you are surprised I respond with hostility?There is nothing ironic about advocating a karma system while sometimes posting messages here that probably would get negative karma because people "feel hurt". That's like saying it's ironic to advocate gay rights without being homosexual.

If you check my posting history you will see that I mostly post constructive and positive posts here on ModDB - but I'm no saint: I'm no diplomat and certainly not an ass-kisser. I would definetly get a few negative karma points every now and then, but overall I do not think that would have a large impact on my final "score" so to say.

Either way: I'm all ears if you have a proper, logical reason as to why we shouldn't even try out a karma system - I really am. But as long as you give me stuff like "people might get hurt" I will have a very hard time taking you seriously. We might as well remove the entire "rating system" for mods because people might get hurt from negative feedback. And while we are at it we can remove the commenting function as well as it makes it possible for others to post negative feedback on our creations (mods, blogs, images, videos - the list goes on) - don't you see the huge flaw in your emotion-based argument?

Edited by: Nightshade

Niteshade wrote: I want this community and this forum to become a better place

The hell have you been smoking in order to make you think that a stupid point system will improve the overall quality of this forum? It's bad system that pretty much exploits human nature to gather around as much as humanly possible at any cost, removing the common sense barrier that keeps people from going full retard before spouting out their malformed opinion or before sharing something. A "karma" system will only reward the incredibly stupid and easily influenced kind of people.

It makes attention-whoring a much greater deal, and the fact that anybody can increase a user's "reputation" it ends up being a broken, flawed and crappy system.

Niteshade wrote: There is nothing ironic about advocating a karma system while sometimes posting messages here that probably would get negative karma because people "feel hurt". That's like saying it's ironic to advocate gay rights without being homosexual. I try my best to argue for my matter and what I get in return is nothing but negativism, arguments based on emotion (instead of logic) and silly one-liners instead of real arguments against my case.

Are you a regular at Reddit or something? Because the amount of bullshit that you're spewing out in form of text is making your own ass jealous.
"Waah everyone won't think like I do! So much negativity! I wish I could downvote all of you! I'm a great member of this community, check my posts!".

The human mind can be really fragile both for compliments and insults. This system would affect in a worst-case scenario how people behave normally, because they would like to receive a bigger score than others in order to feel important, even if that means not voicing their own honest opinion.

Edit: Fixed a typo.

Edited by: macacos2