Good evening WME members! I am sure most of you, if not all, have noticed the new 5-star rating system located in forum view and topic view. This system is just like any of the rating system you see on the net. The only and the most important difference is the fact that it is possible to close a thread with this system. Allow me to explain. We come across a lot of useless threads in the WMMT section very often. They are usually started by newcomers who do not spend the time to read the pinned topics and rules. And as we know, the Moderators / Admins are not online all the time, members like you have no choice but to report a useless thread. Wouldn't it be nice that you have some partial power in determining the fate of a thread at times like that ?
This is where the new rating system comes in. By voting the thread down, the thread will be closed without any staff present on the forums. How would this work ? Currently, the algorithm will
only activates when the thread has more than 7 ratings, less than 25 posts, has less than 250 topic views, was started less than 24 hours ago and not a pinned thread. The algorithm
will change and adapt over time to prevent abuse. Now, I've been considering this for a long time before putting this system online due to its easily abused nature. But if this works, I will implement the same system to each member.
(so that each member will have a rating, and when it gets too low, the said member will be temporarily banned.)This is a major step toward having a self-regulated community. In a highly diverse community such as WME, self-regulation is very important because Moderators / Admins will not be able to help at times due to language barrier and other communicative obstacles. I hope this system will be in good hands and will not be abused by the members, namely you.
The rating system can also be used as a regular rating system. It can be served as an incentive for topic starters to create better threads in order to receive higher ratings. It can also be an indicator of how resourceful a thread is before you even click in it.
If you have any questions, please feel free to post them here. I'll try to answer them. Thanks for supporting WME.
This post has been edited by E86 on Jan 10 2009, 10:53 PM