tea for the tillerman
posted by max on April 15, 2007 at 05:15:39 PM
Lately I can't help but feel the content on YTMND is just lacking in general. I know that no matter how many nifty new features I add , this won't really improve.
As a lot of you know, the algorithms that define the front page content boxes are extremely simple and don't use most of the treasure trove that is the 180 million row YTMND database. I've been looking at white papers for “Item-based Collaborative Filtering Recommendation Algorithms”, and it's fairly obvious my complete lack of college-level math is beginning to catch up to me.
I'm looking for (as futile as it may be) some aspiring statisticians or economics majors that want to come up with some creative ways to highlight good content. Since the redesign of the front page, adding new content boxes is extremely easy and I've yet to really spend any time on coming up with new algorithms.
Anyone interested in the slightest, head on over to the wiki and add some comments or come up with your own ideas for new content box algorithms.
Another thing I've been thinking about lately is cleaning up the userbase. While the mod panel is still a ways off, I have been thinking about ways to make the site better by adding some exclusivity somehow.
Some variation of the following: making the site invite only, making it so only registered users can view ytmnd (huge reduction in hosting costs), plastering ads on YTMNDs for non-registered users, deleting all the sites and starting over, etc.
I'd say we should could have a conversation about this in the comments, but since most of the users never post anything in news comments except pure shit, I don't see the use.
*EDIT*: Also worth looking at: I finally got around to writing a Vote Weighting Algorithm
As a lot of you know, the algorithms that define the front page content boxes are extremely simple and don't use most of the treasure trove that is the 180 million row YTMND database. I've been looking at white papers for “Item-based Collaborative Filtering Recommendation Algorithms”, and it's fairly obvious my complete lack of college-level math is beginning to catch up to me.
I'm looking for (as futile as it may be) some aspiring statisticians or economics majors that want to come up with some creative ways to highlight good content. Since the redesign of the front page, adding new content boxes is extremely easy and I've yet to really spend any time on coming up with new algorithms.
Anyone interested in the slightest, head on over to the wiki and add some comments or come up with your own ideas for new content box algorithms.
Another thing I've been thinking about lately is cleaning up the userbase. While the mod panel is still a ways off, I have been thinking about ways to make the site better by adding some exclusivity somehow.
Some variation of the following: making the site invite only, making it so only registered users can view ytmnd (huge reduction in hosting costs), plastering ads on YTMNDs for non-registered users, deleting all the sites and starting over, etc.
I'd say we should could have a conversation about this in the comments, but since most of the users never post anything in news comments except pure shit, I don't see the use.
*EDIT*: Also worth looking at: I finally got around to writing a Vote Weighting Algorithm
Add a comment
Max, I think it is a little late for that kind of sentiment. After the layout change there was a long stretch of time where there seemed to be no activity from you or the mods in maintaining the site. IMO, less people would have gotten disinterested and left ytmnd if more was done about some of the problems such as mutliple alt/downvoters ruining the site. I'm not blaming anyone, but I think that has something to do with the level of activity and the current quality of sites.
Yeah it's easy to get disinterested in a site when you spend a couple months working on something only to have thousands of the people you were doing the work for tell you that they hate you. The fact is the new moderation system is MASSIVE, by far the largest amount of code and database work ever added to the site for a single area/feature. I think once it's finished the amount of garbage sites/users will go down substantially.
also, everything should be categorized under a select number of keywords, and picked from a list, and if its not on the list, there is a + option that would add on to the list (for new fads and such) so people that spell for example "ualuealuealeuale" wrong, would be able to pick "ualuealuealeuale" from the list.
The problem with ytmnd is too many new users that don't understand the history and culture, as has been stated before. There should be a time limit before users are allowed to create their ytmnd's. noobs shouldn't be aloud to vote, since most of them only do 1 or 5 anyways. users should have their accounts deleted if they're not active. A pay-per-month members area would cut out people that don't care about this site.
the problem with this sentiment is that every day that passes adds to the prerequisite of knowledge of the history of YTMND, at a certain point it's going to be impossible to get new users completely up to speed. I think the important part is purveying the sentiment that it isnt necessary to dig up 1000 old fads and make stupid fad compilations/beat the dead horse in order for new users to fit in.
As long as people realize that using fads that are years old is not helping move YTMND forward in a positive direction. Some people seem to think that Brian Peppers and the Mullet Man are somehow part of the very essence of YTMND, when in fact this icons were arbritray choices...they could have been anything. They were just there at the right place/right time. In reality, these 3 year old fads are no more valid than the newer ones. They just have the illusion of added weight because of being overused.
Max, I actually think that my YTMND FP (which has 20 of the Top Rated for Today), has been the freshest I've seen in months, maybe years. I know YTMND is your baby, which is why you care for it so, but don't make a mountain out of a molehill. Wait at least 2 weeks after the Mod system is implemented to make any drastic changes and make sure to run it by your expert users (Syncan, Mastersitsu, BTape, etc.) before you do anything you might regret. Anyway, thanks for giving us all such a great site, :P.
1.) I agree a lot with TaintMasterMitch. Before doing anything, remember the mod system is your current variable. Give it time.
2.) What if there was a link off the main page, like "About" or "Wiki" which had a timeline and significant YTMNDs? Like the Hall of Fame, but much more comprehensive. Every site which started a major fad, every major member, that kind of thing. It wouldn't be mandatory, but it would be a little interesting thing to click through and get a gist of the history and culture.
Adding exclusivity to the site just gives some of the already elitist members more illusions of grendeu and promotes too much of an island feeling. Now, we have advertisements in the YTMND banner or whatever ya call that for sites, but since most people who view a YTMND (like sh*t linked to WoW) have no freaking clue to click it, or care not to, these ads never reach them. Possibly could add the advertisement before reaching the content sorta thing many sites have now, but limit it to unregistered people
But ultimately it all depends on the balancing act max must try and do to get the site enough views, users willing to donate (and with the means to donate), and the right ads that pay to make the site something that won't kill his pocket book every month. Really, we should be supportive of whatever scheme we/max can come up with to maximize YTMND's moneymaking ability so that it can continue on and support our paranoid delusions of making some sort of f*cked up art.
I Still stand by my belief that anonymous voting and an fp that shows content of ALL ratings would be beneficial. Right now, voting is a tool to determine whether or not something is seen. The users are essentially playing the role of censor or quality assurance. I think the users should go back to being the users, and let machines and mods play censor/quality control/whatever.
i like the idea of the site being invite only. like btape said it would get rid of alot of wow people etc. but deleting all the sites is just a bad idea. and personally, i don't see anything wrong with the front page at all. popularity among the internet dosent matter. we have our own little family of people and its great. i wouldn't change it for anything.
I like the idea of a total delete+reboot
just to jumpstart everything again...however I would think it'd be good to allow people a grace period...announce the mass deletion, allow people to save sites that they really liked for their own personal archiving and then reboot
from there its a clean slate
ytmnd2.0
also invite only is a very good idea...it means that another perosn already in the community means they can bring something to the table as opposed to some wanker just showing up and making earrape sites
I think a paid membership per id per month is another good idea
we're in a america, lets face it, votes are bought all the time in our government...why not on ytmnd?
5 bucks or so per month, per ID
it means you commit some resources, therefor you care, therefor most of the content wont suck, hopefully
I recommended this awhile ago so I'll bring it up again. A something awful type arrangement might work where users can register and make sites, but still get ads, and any YTMND they make that isn't X+ views gets deleted after 30 days. Sponsor Users pay maybe $5/10 a year, get no ads, and their YTMNDs are not deleted.
Agreed, some way to keep people from joining the site just to vote up fads. Maybe not necessarily "Make a 2.00 site or NO VOTE FOR YOU" but some safeguard to keep non-contributors from bashing other people's YTMNDs. For one, I'm not the most creative or patient person, so i don't have many sites, and what i do have are uncreative, but I've been here long enough (one would assume long enough) to decide for myself what deserves an up/downvote.
add a "Hall of Lame" where sites like HTPAT and WoW sites go, make those sites have a sh*t ton of ads and redirect them to the main site after a couple of iterations of the wav or mp3. this way those sites can't be on top 15. also I agree that you should add an ad sidebar for people who are not registered.
I don't know. Though it does seem like a good idea and might encourage some users to rethink themselves when making sites in the future for the fear of being added to the "Hall of Lame," at the same time it has the potential to be badly abused. Yes some users will realize that they made a sh*tty site and will put more effort into it, however, the you've got the trolls on YTMND who would just love to have more exposure to their lemon party sites.
Anyway, I think new members should have to take a tutorial or maybe a test of ytmnd before they begin their life as a full priviledged user. If they fail the test, their membership remains limited. If they pass, they gain access to making sites, voting, etc. If we make this "initiation" a long arduous process maybe it would prevent the creation of so many alt accounts. Not to mention it would be a good way to guage the dedication of a ytmnd user.
Seems as though the consensus is that if it's crap that brings users who are unwilling or unable to understand the inherent culture of the community, then it is most definitely detrimental. But no culture can remain in stasis. Change is always inevitable. You're asking how best to shape that change.
That's hard. Because you have no real control over what other people will do. That said, an interesting model is the IMDb top 250. It is a list compiled from registered users in good standing and is a true Bayesian Estimate. They explain their methodology on the site. You only have to delineate registered users in good standing. Alright, I'm done.
I'm glad that this problem is getting some attention. I consider myself a level headed voter, but I the past few weeks I have been on a downvoting spree due to all the crap being made. I have great hopes for the mod panel, I think a dedicated team of people that hold the core values of YTMND can really make a huge difference. I do offer one suggestion, allow users to vote for a site to be deleted, once it reaches a certain threshold it gets put in the queue for mod review before it gets the final axe.
Be careful that you don't choke this site to death. It's where it is now because it's available and popular. I'd rather see YTMND die from lack of funding than from being tightened down to "paying members only", and then losing its allure completely.
There's plenty of history in the best sites, even of most of them are crap taking up disk space. Perhaps a delete from sites where rating < 3?
A while back, JoshCube was given an ultimatum... create a site above 4.0, or die. Most of the bad gimmics and f*gs have only poorly rated sites... could a system be created that singles out the users with numerous poorly rated sites and puts the user up for review... or just deletes them entirely? Also, pure sh*t
in my humble opinion - a system such as newground's would be beneficial to an extent - i am speaking, ofcourse, about the "blamming" of sites after a certain period of time with a score below a certain amount (around 3 stars would be good - as in my experiance 3 tends to denote a very average ytmnd). however, this would probably cause a HUGE rise in upvoters and downvoters and all this crap - so... liek, may b we cud ban teh nubs l - o - l.
On a much more serious note, my Dell 2405FPW LCD is unaffected by the two speakers I put right below it (and I don't mean the media bar or what-have-you, they're speakers I had before). I urge anyone who has "OMG THIS YTMND TOO BIG FOR MY CRAP MINOTAUR LOL" and/or speaker-interference problems to get a 2405 or something better. With luck, even eBay will find the serious visual connoisseur(sp?) a low-price monitor worthy of the Internets.
BTape I'm a fan, but take a step back man, you're kind of dominating this discussion. Save some room for the rest of us. Wanna know the real problem with ytmnd? The voting is completely f*cked. I have made dozens of sites, some pretty good, some not, and 7/8ths of them end up getting DV'd by kids who have never made a site, and if they have, have a 1.5 rating on all three attempts. These users are a leech and nuisance on the community.
Why is it that I along with hundreds of other users post quality material only to be at the mercy of a kid that signed up for the site 15 minutes ago under the name "pedodver" or "Mr.1447" or "ionlyvote1." To be honest these guys ruin the overall experience for everyone. Downvoting is a necessary part of YTMND, but garbage users with gimmicks or just downright stubborn people who vote 1 to be different hurt alot of good quality sites.
This is why We can't have nice things. "Good" material these days has not been good whatsoever. I used to look at the up and coming every few hours. Now I almost can't stand it because of the sh*t people are passing off. I wonder how many sites per day average 3-3.7 and never get any recognition, because one kid decided to be funny and vote one with a comment saying "you used google images: so 1"
A bit off topic but I noticed something. In my message box, there were some unread messages (spam) and I blocked the user without reading the messages. Ever since, my envelope icon has remained "filled" I can't seem to undo this because those unread messages disappeared when I blocked the user. I unblocked the user but it is still broken. Anyone else getting this bug?
MAX, what you could do is implement some time/posting delay before you can make a site after being registered. Most forums do this - i.e. you can't start a thread until you've amassed a certain number of posts and/or have been a member for enough time. So what you could do is enforce a minimum # of comments and/or minimum # of of days before a newly joined member can create a site. This would get rid of a lot of people with low attention spans (the 10 year olds) and no desire to wait for ytmnd bliss.
Some decent ideas here but some just would't work. I like the idea of auto delete every month for low rated sites but that presents problems as well. Just because a site is low rated dosn't mean it sucks. It just means it A. Got in at the wrong time B. Isnt' the fad of the moment or NEDM or Brain Peppers or a stupid fad comp site. Anything that has to do with user/voting comment restriction*Sic* wouldn't work either because it will just make poeple not want to register in the first place.
Voting restrictions *Site rating, having to pass some kinda test etc* I still wouldn't be voting and I think I got a pretty good grasp on voting. If what megatron meant by stop all the downloading was stopping people from dling content to use for their sh*t fad sites would be the best idea of all. If you can't make it you can't use it. That would totally cut down on the no talent fad spam around here.
I think that wiping everything out would be the worst possible thing for YTMND. First, it will be a huge slap in the face for the honestly creative people on the site and the people who have sponsored sites. Second, when the site starts up again, you are going to have a flood of retarded crap as all the losers try to repost fads and just plain flood the site with more sh*t than ever before. It's the *ssh*les that are going to stick around while the people who actually give a crap about this site will...
I do agree that there needs to be a bit more variety on the front page. I don't know how the worthwhile YTMNDs are chosen, but if it just grabs random sites with ratings between X and Y, then X-Y needs to be expanded. I feel like some sites hit like 4.2 or 3.8 and never see the light of day again, which is crap for them. Also, I think it's hilarious that when you say "most users never post anything in news comments except pure sh*t", we all turn into Einsteins.
i'm a math major, and this stuff is actually starting to turn me on a bit.
my ultimate list of things i want to see would be organized like
(1/DAYS SINCE CREATION)^.2 * (RATING)^2.5 * (TOTAL VOTES)^1.2 * (1+.01*NUMBER OF UNIQUE-USER COMMENTS) * (1+.0000001*USER VIEWS^2) * (1+.0000001*NON-USER VIEWS^1.3)
this will be unique to everyone, but it would be cool if we could type a formula like this in. each term reflects a certain preference. i can explain more details as to how i got those numbers, if you want
you would need to take the derivative of that with respect to each of the variables when you want to recompute the score with respect to a certain change to avoid astronomical amounts of computation being done. also, this would need to be done rather frequently, which would owe itself to using 10 or so "classic" formulas.
When I first started YTMND around 2 years ago, I would click on a site and see a funny concept combined with a single image and clever background music.
As time passed, I began to see more and more .gif images showing animations or movie clips with little Sean Connery or Picard heads edited in. Then, when Syncan (I belive) created the pre-loader that enabled the audio clip to line up with the image, there was a major outbreak of animated .gif images. Although I believe some of these to have been good...
To cut down on some of the sh*t going around, a "mark for deletion" option or something could be made available to registered users. This would go into a queue for the mods where they would review it, and decide whether it should or should not be deleted. A way to keep this system from being abused is by keeping track of how many deletion marks are accepted for deletion from each user. If a user has placed a sh*tload of marks and only a few of those actually get deleted, you could suspend his account.
...many were absolutely horrible. I think this caused YTMND community to drift away from the single, creative, unanimated image which had been (and still are) the roots of YTMND. What I propose is a limit on the number of YTMND sites per user that are made up of an animated .gif image. I have no idea how this could be done or how it would work because I'm not too knowledgable with coding, and I doubt it could even work. But it may be worth a try =)
I'll be completely honest with you, making YTMND a small interface wouldn't really bother me at all. I too have become very tired of the useless bullsh*t and users on the site itsself. While othere beg to disagree with me, YTMND is mostly just a blood fest. We all submit pages and pick and nag at others we see. The reality is that YTMND hasnt just become out of hand it has become politically incorrect, harsh, and somewhat dangerous. Some of the images posted are very... 0_0 and I believe that you could...
be held responsible for some of the things that occur on the site. The very beginning of NEDM couldve gotten you arrested for all we know. Every once and a while tehre is edited porn into child faces and its just..gruesome. I would love the site deletion act but I would see that many of your users would be outraged and furious. Then again this COULD be the same group of people who are causing the problem. I say make it invite only, AND delete all the sites... maybe even a cleaner look? no offense but...
"I too have become very tired of the useless bullsh*t and users on the site itsself." Yeah, me too. Brian Peppers sites, people disobeying the "pictures of your friends" rule, Gay Fuel sites with near-direct GIF rips from Cartoon Network, "lol, cellphone"--you know, stuff like that that badly need speedy deletion.
I agree on some of these points. It's disappointing to say the least to see people continually making the same obvious distasteful jokes over and over again. While I think jokes based on religion or race can sometimes be hilarious, I think in a lot of cases people just try to go for the easiest way to what they think is humorous, which ends up in YTMND being flooded with unfunny stereotypical racism that brings nothing to the site except further putting it in a bad light.
invite only won't prevent morons from getting on to the site. gmail was (is?) invite only, same with high school facebook. Invite-only ensures a user base with a high social status, not creativity.
the idea of only registered users being able to see sites is really clever, and would be effective. It means ytmnd has a much lower profile. I think it would attract a more creative demographic, and not a demographic that just wants to be entertained and occasionally masturbates in ytmnd format.
if non-users can't see the sites... then I think the main people who would sign up for something like ytmnd would be creative types, people who see the opportunity to express themselves. they have no idea of fads or anything, they only know about the format, and it's the format, not the fads or currents sites, that draws them to it. That's partially why ytmnd was so interesting in its earliest days- because people had their own ideas and looked for ways to push them to the limit within the format.
letting only users see sites is a HORRIBLE, HORRIBLE idea. JUST AWFUL. every great ytmnder was once a nonmember, and the ytmnd community will go very stale, very fast. forcing people to become members gives less of a dedication to the site. but if a nonmember sees a link on a forum, checks out the site, says "hey i can make some of these that are even funnier", the community evolves. that's the beauty of ytmnd.
i disagree because- nonmembers will only join ytmnd because they want to be creative. people who join ytmnd right now usually do so because they want to vote. eventually they try making sites. people who join ytmnd with the intention of site creation will make better sites, and be more qualified voters.
the community does not evolve now because primarily morons are joining the site. it's devolving. that's the point. it will evolve when creative people tell their creative friends, and its a creative culture
Deleting everything would be interesting. However, there are too many gems I believe that would be lost. Ergo it would be more beneficial than anything else to delete sites that do not accumulate several thousand views in a week or so period, as most sites which garner attention tend to do so rather quickly, rather than months down the road when whichever current popular trend for which they were created has passed on.
Don't even think about deleting all sites and starting over...the only thing YTMND needs is a super strict moderation system that ACTUALLY DOES SOMETHING. Let people BAN the dumbasses who always downvote, or the asshats who only upvote, or spam. Make it so that if you get X amount of - votes on comments, you get IP bannd from YTMND. This is a serious problem, people can spam all they want, and no one does sh*t. Ban the spammers, ban the downvoters, and ban the idiots. That is all.
Try something along the lines of Newgrounds: people that vote more often get a vote worth more than one. Maybe calculate how many votes someone has given, how many sites they have made (and the quality of those sites), registering date, etc. High scoring and highly voted YTMND sites could carry the most weight towards an authors "Voting" score, followed by registering date, followed by number of votes the author has given, etc.
Aye aye. People don't put enough thought into voting, they just vote 'good' or 'bad' and not 'how good?' Even most of the users' who I respect and whose sites are infinitely better than mine seem to be way too generous with the 5s. More sensible voting needs to be encouraged. Perhaps a nationwide print/TV/radio campaign?
Deleting all the sites would also be a bad idea. No matter how many you saved, there would always be a favorite that wouldnt be and much crying would ensue. Plus, the minute any large amount of content is deleted people will leave. Kind of like resetting a huge ranking system: people that worked hard over the years now are back to step zero. Instead, perhaps make it so any site that doesnt meet a certain criteria gets automatically deleted.
For example, many ytmnds have viewcounts less than 500 and have been there more than a month (sometimes even longer). Make it so any ytmnd that doesnt meet the criteria of 200 views at the end of one month automatically gets deleted. Then a second criteria that any ytmnd that doesnt meet 1000 views at the end of 6 months gets deleted. This way, a lot of crap that no one watches will get purged.
Suggestions for Make Benefit Great Nation of YTMND (in order of preference):
1. Invite only - GMail and others use this "sponsor" system, and thus far it seems to have worked well; (an indirect but valid example) as it is, you recieve spam or anything undesirable (i.e. users/trolls) much less often from such sites. Possibly also make it so the user's "sponsor" can delete their account at the behest of a predefined number of votes from non-alt'ing accounts (something definitely needs to be done about alts).
2. Pay to Play - Small fee ($3-5) would help offset costs of hosting/server upgrades; also, less junior high-aged children without money and maturity clogging up the tubes
3. Registration only - marginally more effective than now
4. Deleting all sites - Should only be done with sites and users (with an average vote less than 3 and greater than or equal to zero) created one month before and all those after HTPAT.
he's just joking, besides Rocky was pointing to his chest as he was talking about the "basement". To those people I say, look at the scene again, it may appear that he is pointing to his chest, but in reality he is pointing north west to the old Balboa Estate.
Rocky was telling Paulie, they need to go back to the Balboa estate to free the Robot who he hid before the place was sold for auction. Rocky had a grand plan to eventually come out of retirement and have Paulie reprogram the robot to train him to
fight again. I know what you are saying, Paulie, cmon hes a drunk he can't reprogram a sophisticated robot. To you folk I laugh for you do not recall Paulie reprogramming the robot in Rocky IV to act like a female robot as opposed to the robot's original male state.
Paulie was too drunk to realize what rocky was telling him. Rocky gave up on him and decided to train without the robot and thus lost the fight. Rocky was unable to find the ROBOT in the basement.
fin
ytmnd should be open to everyone. that is the beauty of it despite the treasure trove of sh*t produced. erasing all the old sites would be TRAGEDY! there should always be the sh*t soup of past creations. i may not be the most valued contributer but i am a daily viewer, and despite the amount of crap, i deeply appreciate the beauty of the occasional jem (no pun intended).
there are so many beautiful ytmnds that have very few views as well. i suggest an expansion of the "worthwhile" content. keep on truckn
Hey max, I've got a real idea. You could have some kind of bandwidth cap on sites, like 30mb/day, and after that cap is hit by non registered users they can't see the site anymore, but registered users could, maybe redirect non-registered to the reg or main site page. That would encourage people to sign up and discourage social sites from linking, but still allow people to show their friends a ytmnd they made.
Make it so you have to make a *FREE* account to view YTMNDs. Non registered users will only be able to view the Wiki and forums and view the Hall of Fame YTMNDs
Then delete all YTMNDs that only have a handfull of views or votes. You could also make some kind of NG blam system, where YTMNDs that don't get a certain number of votes/views in X ammount of time are deleted
Finally, a lifetime payment of $1 to make YTMNDs. This could also add an "authors" table to the database, and you can do featured authors
As far as front page boxes go, I'd like to see "Random" make a comeback. I also would favor a "Never Voted On" box, which would show YTMND's with a rating of 0, sorted in prefence to older ones. I have to believe some YTMND's slip throught he cracks, but if you discover there just aren't any 0-rated sites less than a few minutes old, ignore this idea. As far as cleaning up the joint goes, how about randomly deleting every 20th YTMND? This would delete 5% of YTMND's, thus leaving most of the good stuff.
Even though I'll never view even a fraction of the thousands of crappy of old YTMNDs I'd be sad to see them (and especially all the fantastic old YTMNDs) deleted. The Random YTMND generator you posted the other week (there needs to be a front-page button for it) uses all the old images, audio and text to great effect, proving it has some worth. I've had about as many laughs watching randomly generated YTMNDs as the front page sites since you created the generator.
Featured Artists
Users that have an average site rating of 4.0 (or whatever you determine) with a minimum of 20 sites (again can be changed) are featured in this main page tab. Sites that have been created in the past 3 days by these users will cycle thru this tab, randomly showing any 5 eligible sites on each refresh. How often do the "Ytmnd superstars" produce a crappy site?
This section could also require other users to "vote in" Featured Artists. Each account could have X ammount of "Artist Fav
Also, in order to make sure that a lot of sites get more exposure (because there are real front page material sites out there but were made at obscure times when few people were around to vote so they floated off into the abyss) you can make it so YTMNDers have to stay active by voting on X number of sites a day. If they don't they risk their own account being deleted due to inactivity. With the loss of their account goes the loss of all their YTMNDs which will make incentive.
well for one thing, we can limit the users on the site by having it where if you haven't been logged in three months your account gets deleted, it would help cut costs also to remind people to compress their sound/audio clips to save bandwidth, and the making registered users only can see ytmnd would help limit view hacking.
the HoF isnt the definitive YTMNDs, not now not ever. some are, but others were just moved there to get them off the front page back when things would stay on the top 5 long past the healthy point for the overall site. I have a HoF site and yet if the HoF was completely eliminated the way YTMND is set up now it wouldnt really make much a difference to me or the site.
I REALLY think that when you get a team of mods, or maybe put together a team of "veteran users" that are respectful even of movements or fads that they dont like, that they should be given the power to delete all of a users sites (by committee) The way they would do this is to decide if something is good or not, and if good, no problem (HoF and oldies with dead accounts would be great), and if it sucks, the user would be given 3 days to log on and stop deletion. This would add a HUGE new perspective to
what most people don't understand is that HoF was solely created to get sites I (and other users) were tired of seeing off the front page. It has absolutely nothing to do with the quality of the site and everything to do with getting rid of stale content without thousands of users crying about me hiding "YTMND THE POKEMON GAME LOL" sites.
I can't say I read through the 3 pages of comments, but would it be a good idea for a separate, invite-based, "elite" YTMND? I.e. leave today's YTMND for the masses to be filled with fads and WoW, but let the BTapes and Sitsus flourish in a separate, exclusive YTMNDElite utopia? You could even tell people that YTMNDE doesn't exist.. it's just an urban legend.. but then one day, after giving thousands of honest votes and publishing several high quality sites, Joe YTMNDer gets an invite to be an elite..
A lot of people seem to be ignoring the fact that this is about the users themselves. Face it there is a huge split between most users. Upvoters, downvoters, fad lovers, fad haters and the few that vote fairly. Some users think "f*ggy short films" aren't funny for all the wrong reasons, others won't vote fairly on a "classic" style site because it didn't require 2 hours worth of editing. And that can hold back a user from exploring one of several different avenues. What a f*cking pickle.
And reading the comments again I can see another problem with the users. Yes, a lot of you want your t-shirts and you comment every time max makes a news post. But contributing some input that might help him figure out how to make YTMND a better place for everyone including yourself seems to be less important to you than t-shirts? Good luck getting a YTMND t-shirt when YTMND's front page reads "f*ck it I give up."
Its honestly the same with most things that get popular. YTMND has had some insane surges of popularity and exposure over the past year and due to that we've had volumes of new users who don't understand why we love YTMND and basically pulled down their pants and sh*t all over the site. As time goes on its only going to get worse. IT IS TIME TO DELETE.....YTMND.
The idea of anyone paying for anything really sucks. I like ytmnd but if I had to pay for any of my sites I would hate it. I make ytmnds for fun and that is what I want from ytmnd. I want the lolz. I want to show my friends the sh*t I made and I want to make sweet remixes. I don't want ytmnd to turn into a business. If google could make their f*cking money off ads then I'm sure as hell ytmnd could to. I understand that there are some users who do intentionally post disgusting things that aren't funny in
the least but there are alternatives for dealing with these people. For instance you can delete all sites with a 1 and over 10 votes. That way no "little treasures will be deleted" unless hit by a lot of alts. I don't think people would work hard enough for 10 alts though and if they would they have no life. The thing is anyone voting over one could upturn the balance causing a site to survive. I see people making alts to let their sites live but I think it would eliminate a modest amount of people from
Like any artistic community, YTMND will go through phases, dry spells, exploration. You have to trust what is being created here. I would focus less on "lack of teh funny" and try to make things better and more efficient. A better algorithim for voting/weight/what gets on front page is a good start.
A Handful of Notions: YTMND "Unsung Heroes" - Sites with relatively high average ratings (say, at least 3 stars) and a low number of views. YTMND "Crate Diggers" - Sites with low rankings and low views, hand picked by moderators as worthy of attention. YTMND "Gallery of Fine Arts" - Mod-chosen artistic or non-comedic sites of merit, without consideration to star ranking as good stuff that's not funny frequently gets downvoted. YTMND "Freeze Frame" - Best new sites without animation.