the sun is still
posted by max on January 09, 2008 at 11:46:11 AM
In an attempt to keep you all up-to-date with the inner workings of YTMND,
I'm going to try and update a little more often. Rather than trying to
convince you that I'm working, I'll just publish my results, regardless of
how boring they may be to you.
I want to thank everyone who provided feedback on the TODO. I really enjoy reading constructive criticisms and ideas, even if I'm not directly responding to all of it. I want to open a discussion on a couple of topics with this news post, so read more if you are inclined.
So first off:
I've migrated all of the database servers over to the latest version of MySQL, which seems to have not only gone pretty smoothly, but also removed a lot of the headaches. Hopefully they should have less hiccups, which means you should see "vote lag" issues less often. While I was at it, I did a good deal of database cleanup, but there are some more major structural changes that require large modifications to the site that I'm doing on a test setup first.
I've also spent the last week migrating the hundreds of files that compose YTMND into SVN (from 3 old CVS repositories). This was a lot of work, because it involved figuring out how I renamed and moved files around for the last 4 years. I found some gems from the past in there too!
Now that everything is in SVN I am beginning the large refactoring that I've wanted to do for a long time. This is a pretty lengthy list of things I need to do in order to get the site's structure and codebase the way I want it. One of the major benefits of this is it will make the site much easier to work on, meaning adding little features and fixes will happen much more often. It also means I can start thinking about opening up the code base to developers that want to add patches or really work on YTMND.
The refactoring is extensive and effects almost every page on the site, as such, I'm going to take the time to split out theme specific stuff to external templates where I haven't in the past. Since I'm doing this, I've sent out a request for new YTMND designs/layouts to a bunch of designers, I've given them 2 weeks at which point I'm going to post them here and let you guys decide which you like best. I haven't figured out how much work the templating will be, but it's possible that the refactoring will include choosable "themes", it might even be possible to get the old design in if someone is willing to do the grunt work. If any of you are serious designers and want to take a shot at it, send me a private message. It is (poorly) paid work.
It is likely while I'm in there I'll make a lot of little fixes and feature enhancements, as well as introducing a plethora of new bugs. Hopefully a few of you will step up and be willing to test everything when it needs it. Anyway, you know how much I like pretty graphs so here is one for you:
You'll notice that I very rarely committed code in the past (and there was a ton of code that wasn't even in the repository until now). With SVN, it means I can update much more frequently without messing up the site, so I am pleased to finally stop "shitting where I eat" as it were. That all being said, due to the significant back end changes required, the site is currently on a semi-lockdown for new features/fixes until I move the production servers over to be mirrors of the SVN repositories. So don't expect much to change in that department for a couple weeks.
As most of you know the hall of fame (even pre-neomatrix additions) was filled with a lot of undeserving sites and didn't really make much sense. I've been mulling over how to actually repopulate it with proper sites that really deserve attention, but I keep coming back to the community nature of this site. On one hand, most of the site is governed by "majority vote", top rated, top viewed, top etc etc. On the other hand, the site is more than just "mine", so picking the hall of fame entries should be a task for more than just myself.
I've thought about various schemes where you could get one Hall of Fame vote for each 3 month period you've been a member or something like that, but I wanted to hear from you guys how you think the Hall of Fame should be populated. I want it to be filled with not only the best sites, but the most significant, historical, and most importantly, the most creative sites out there. This is the page that most newcomers will look at, so it is really important that we show them not only the best and the brightest, but a summary of what YTMND is.
So how do you think we should do this? Should I just sit down for a few days and go through as much as I can and pick them and then write a little blurb about each? Should I let the super moderators pick as well? Featured users? Everybody? Possibly allow everyone to vote as a suggestion mechanism only, just so I don't miss anything? Your feedback would be greatly appreciated!
As I mentioned in the last news post, a moderation system is built on rules, and without clearly defined rules the moderation system is bound to fail. I know the whole TODO is a lot for most of you to process, and some of you focused on that bit, but this is necessary to discuss before I proceed. We, as a community, have to come up with a concise and clear list of rules that the community as a whole have to abide by. So:
This is something that must have community backing and support and it requires serious discussion. As I said before, I can't (and refuse) to do this alone, so I will keep posting it until I either get the feedback I'm looking for or get sick of the site and go get a real job.
I want to thank everyone who provided feedback on the TODO. I really enjoy reading constructive criticisms and ideas, even if I'm not directly responding to all of it. I want to open a discussion on a couple of topics with this news post, so read more if you are inclined.
So first off:
<technical junk/what I've been up to>
I've migrated all of the database servers over to the latest version of MySQL, which seems to have not only gone pretty smoothly, but also removed a lot of the headaches. Hopefully they should have less hiccups, which means you should see "vote lag" issues less often. While I was at it, I did a good deal of database cleanup, but there are some more major structural changes that require large modifications to the site that I'm doing on a test setup first.
I've also spent the last week migrating the hundreds of files that compose YTMND into SVN (from 3 old CVS repositories). This was a lot of work, because it involved figuring out how I renamed and moved files around for the last 4 years. I found some gems from the past in there too!
Now that everything is in SVN I am beginning the large refactoring that I've wanted to do for a long time. This is a pretty lengthy list of things I need to do in order to get the site's structure and codebase the way I want it. One of the major benefits of this is it will make the site much easier to work on, meaning adding little features and fixes will happen much more often. It also means I can start thinking about opening up the code base to developers that want to add patches or really work on YTMND.
The refactoring is extensive and effects almost every page on the site, as such, I'm going to take the time to split out theme specific stuff to external templates where I haven't in the past. Since I'm doing this, I've sent out a request for new YTMND designs/layouts to a bunch of designers, I've given them 2 weeks at which point I'm going to post them here and let you guys decide which you like best. I haven't figured out how much work the templating will be, but it's possible that the refactoring will include choosable "themes", it might even be possible to get the old design in if someone is willing to do the grunt work. If any of you are serious designers and want to take a shot at it, send me a private message. It is (poorly) paid work.
It is likely while I'm in there I'll make a lot of little fixes and feature enhancements, as well as introducing a plethora of new bugs. Hopefully a few of you will step up and be willing to test everything when it needs it. Anyway, you know how much I like pretty graphs so here is one for you:
You'll notice that I very rarely committed code in the past (and there was a ton of code that wasn't even in the repository until now). With SVN, it means I can update much more frequently without messing up the site, so I am pleased to finally stop "shitting where I eat" as it were. That all being said, due to the significant back end changes required, the site is currently on a semi-lockdown for new features/fixes until I move the production servers over to be mirrors of the SVN repositories. So don't expect much to change in that department for a couple weeks.
<end of technical junk/what I've been up to>
Stuff you should care about but won't: (i.e. feedback needed)
The hall of fame
As most of you know the hall of fame (even pre-neomatrix additions) was filled with a lot of undeserving sites and didn't really make much sense. I've been mulling over how to actually repopulate it with proper sites that really deserve attention, but I keep coming back to the community nature of this site. On one hand, most of the site is governed by "majority vote", top rated, top viewed, top etc etc. On the other hand, the site is more than just "mine", so picking the hall of fame entries should be a task for more than just myself.
I've thought about various schemes where you could get one Hall of Fame vote for each 3 month period you've been a member or something like that, but I wanted to hear from you guys how you think the Hall of Fame should be populated. I want it to be filled with not only the best sites, but the most significant, historical, and most importantly, the most creative sites out there. This is the page that most newcomers will look at, so it is really important that we show them not only the best and the brightest, but a summary of what YTMND is.
So how do you think we should do this? Should I just sit down for a few days and go through as much as I can and pick them and then write a little blurb about each? Should I let the super moderators pick as well? Featured users? Everybody? Possibly allow everyone to vote as a suggestion mechanism only, just so I don't miss anything? Your feedback would be greatly appreciated!
Rules and Moderation
As I mentioned in the last news post, a moderation system is built on rules, and without clearly defined rules the moderation system is bound to fail. I know the whole TODO is a lot for most of you to process, and some of you focused on that bit, but this is necessary to discuss before I proceed. We, as a community, have to come up with a concise and clear list of rules that the community as a whole have to abide by. So:
-
Reading material:
- Rules / Moderation Guidelines / Global Policy
- Global Permissions (a foundation for possible punishments)
- Add to the list of behaviors that should be considered as "bad"
- Discuss the "pros" and "cons" of certain behaviors and if they should be considered "bad"
- Discuss possible punishments for each behavior
- Discuss what the overall focus of user moderation should be, or which areas should be the most important
- Discuss what to do about repeat offenders/trolls, at what point do we delete people?
- Come up with a full list of behaviors and consequential punishments for each.
- Write a community guidelines document that can be shown to new users.
- Fucking participate for once
What you can do to help:
What you can do to help if you (are an over-achiever/love the site/are trying to brown-nose):
This is something that must have community backing and support and it requires serious discussion. As I said before, I can't (and refuse) to do this alone, so I will keep posting it until I either get the feedback I'm looking for or get sick of the site and go get a real job.
Add a comment
ear rape is fine, just nsfw. downvoting is fine, gives a balance to ytmnd. however, constantly talking trash in comments needs to be controlled, due to the fact that it does piss users off and makes everyone sound like little children. so, something better than just a +/-, which does very little, that can eliminate this type of flaming.
As for the "acceptable behavior" and moderation system. The votes should be the only decider on what is and isn't acceptable, and I think it's crucial that moderation is as automated and user driven as possible. It should only be a build up of enough system red flags and user show of hands before a moderator has the ability to make a decision.
The hall of fame shouldn't be voted on by the regular users. The limbo system seems okay but it would kind of will exclude a lot of the old classics. Basically, every new site that becomes decently popular is going to be nominated for the hall of fame. I'd say the limbo system would work, but only if the featured users are the only ones able to vote. They [as a whole] have my trust.
Also, a possible way to stop trolling is if someone amasses a certain net number of -'s in a day they lose the priveledge to comment for a week, or something. What I mean is their net minus score for the day is like -2000. So if you had 100+'s and 100-'s in a day, you'd break even at 0. So if you comment a lot you're not in any danger unless you just generally being an *ssh*le to everyone, in which case a week without commenting is pretty justified. Maybe even a reward for + comments...
Ok, How about a list of recently created sites is all their is. People sign in and view these. if the site sucks f*cking *ss and gets bombed then the files and the site will be deleted. The sites that people vote high, comment on, or view the most get to stay and move on to the next section. Like a viewed/Commented/Rating section. Then from there they can be voted out of these sections. When people are tired of them but could still be favorited for later. Also have a cycling section of sites above 4 and
highly viewed sites where users can give "hall of fame" votes. Then at the end of a month period the 5 or so sites with the highest amount of votes get inducted. Also maybe have some sites suggested by yourself or other veteran members you appoint.
And as far as trolling, downvoting etc.. Use IP restrictions like You get one account that has the ability to vote per ip. Other accounts can be made but can only be used for comments or making sites (themed users).
Original Art, Original Shops, ytmnds made from a certain movie, song, or video. Also you could have donation levels for voting on sites. If you donate so and so only people whos account is a year or older can vote on you. Then so and so more only people who have created at least 5 sites. Then only people who have created a site that is rated above a 4 with more than 300 views. This isn't a really good place for a discussion because I am not really discussing this with anyone. I am just babbling out ideas :)
I think people invest too much emotion into this site. If everyone voted based on the site rather than the creator, we would see a slight change in things. For instance, lots of people associate mattdh12 with ear rape, and don't watch his site but rather vote 1 as soon as the preloader begins and that's bullsh*t because most of what matt makes is hilarious.
As for the nasty comments part, just make a certain limit to the amount of negative votes a comment can have (probably -10) and once it hits that mark the comment is hidden or just deleted altogether. As for bad sites, any site 2.9 (below average basically) and waorse is deleted after 12 (maybe 10?) hours to prevent lots of crap site flooding the site. As for a hall of fame entry process, make it a 3 tier system where the popular vote is 1 vote (legislative) the mods/super mods (judiciary) is 1...
...vote, and finally Max or maybe even a VERY highly respected member of the community is chosen as the final (executive) vote. Note, that people might think well if Max and the super mods like it, the majority is screwed, but the super mods are super mods for a reason becuase they know exactly what is good material and what is not. That's just the most fair and simple system in my opinion.
KHAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAN for Hall of Fame. VOAT%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%. 3500HZ squarewav 4 lyf. DarthWang is King of all internets. Fourget and HE WHO SHALL NOT BE NAMED (BTAPE) are Jon Carries who forgot Polend and don't know good YTMND if it bit them in the ass. Terninate Mcfly BYAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH
I think there should be a list of hall of fame canidates every month by number of votes the two highest voted sites become the top two contenders and then we use the 3 vote rule where its the people, mods/super mods, Max all get one vote system. If one site has 3,000 more votes it gets the popular vote if 6 more mods like the other site more that gets one vote, and if Max liked the first site more that gets two votes now and is put in the hall of fame. Questions or ideas to make it better?
I like your HoF idea of trusted users allowed to pick or vote on one per week or month. Users who at least try to vote fair most of the time. The equation could be Users with 5,000 (or 10,000) Votes or more with a Mode NOT equal to 1 or 5. On another matter, I think allowing auto Sigs for comments is a bad idea. It will look cluttered even when filled with positive info. For example:
------------------
Make money the non-Nigerian way @ www.panaceamedia.org/MoneyBiatches.rtf
Thanks, but what are your opinions on the 3 tier voting system I have come up with after we narrow the choices down to two? So far no one has commented on thier opinions about it. I really think its fair that for the final two, the popular vote of av. users counts as 1 the moderators choice is 1 and Max's choice is 1. Someone please give input on this!!!!
"Every month whatver Top 10-15 sites the "trusted" users nominate for HoF status gets the position." The problem with that is that it continues to empower all of the little "good ole boys" clubs that dominate YTMND right now, such as the whole Father Mckenzie and Darth Wang thing in which they make awful sites on purpose and yell "f*ggot!!" at everyone, and all of their friends upvote it.
And the stupid "alt" posts. Alot of the big users don't use alts because they have been cracked down on. But who have they been cracked down upon???????? The big users who were using the alts to counteract the no name pieces of sh*t who never contributed anyhting to this site and have 20 alts downvoting anyone who actually cares about what they contribute here. Run on sentence FTW. But yopu get the point.
So bascially "People who care about YTMND -1 and Idiots +1" Tell me I am wro
And just so I can beat the people who will argue with me to the punch. Why did you intially come here> Because you saw something that made you lol from people who took time to make something that made you lol. Then you got here and you realized" Wow I am f*cking dull and everything I make noone likes" and then u make 20 alts and downvote people who are quote stars unquote it's pretty much life in a nutshell.
What I've heard other people say? Are you some kind of moron? This is my opinion, pay attention. I'd agree 99% of YTMND wants Noise gone, but then again, 99% of YTMND is retarded. You idiots constantly upvote unfunny sites because they have Nintendo or Transformers or any other kind of nostalgia in them, or you take a kid's show and add adult themes. It just isn't funny. LazyTown sites were never funny. Muppets/Grover sites were never funny.
Also, if everyone hates Noise so much, how come a noise site is at the top of the U&C at the time of writing? Also, most noise sites to take little effort, but the good ones are to behold, and do take some effort (certainly more effort than thinking up an unfunny joke involving Alice in Wonderland, a Martin Scorsese film and a straight rip), for example Kassius' awesome noise remixes and much of DarthWang's sites, especially the greatness that is KHANTMND.
Ok Herald, you're right. I'm a moron for my observation. Nobody has ever tried to say noise sites are satire. Do you know what satire is? Satire tends to expose faults in things. For instance, when bush says something like "Listen to me closely terrorists" and then you dub in a famous idiotic Bushism at 900% volume <~THATS SATIRE! Inverting the colors on a picture then turning the entire sound bite up by 900%, that's spam, and the sh*t I'm sick of.
I'm not gonna sit here and lie to you and say I hate every noise site I've ever seen. I've seen plenty that I saw as very funny, and a standing model for what all noise sites should be (in moderation.) I remember at one point laughing extremely hard at a noise site, long before I created my account here. In other words, I can remember a time when I found it hilarious. People like you have ruined that. Its like telling the same joke over and over and then bitching at everyone when they've grown tired of
People like me? I hardly make any of the traditional 'noise-sites', that is, f*ck up (and by that I mean improve) the image and sound, remix, turn up volume and beg for fives, at least I don't spam them. I constantly get chided for not noising enough. I leave noise to the pros. As for satire, I have no idea what angle you're going for there. I just like noise because it's stupid funny fun. I'm just defending it because I don't want it banned. If noise was banned, YTMND would just become a sh*tstorm of
Also make it to where you have to voat ont he ten recently created sites to get into the site. That way alot of the bullsh*t that gets to slide by with 0 voats will be deleted. Unless you have no accounts of course then you would go straight to the top rated, top viewed, top whatever of the day page.
P.S.
Something needs to happen really fast though. I come to the site every day and am done looking at it after viewing probably 4 new sites.
Then when I come back 4 hours later everything is greyed out because I have already seen it/voted on it.
Besides the recently created because 9 times out of 10 that is just some idiot contributing nothing but a huge can of fail.
POS, you can thank unfair downvoters for that one. I was checking sites that were made back in 05 that had scores of around 3.9 - 3.95, and honestly, if they were posted today they would get hit by a ton of 1's and assholish sarcastic comments that make no sense. Looking back at old sites is like looking back at layers of the earth and finding a cleaner climate I wish I experienced. YTMND has become a meeting place for the unhappy angry teenager who wants to spread his sadness through senseless hate. lol
Something I respoded to one of the idiots bringing ytmnd down "Ok... that being said. Until you come up with a better way for this site to stay alive... that is what is keeping it alive. Not you're stupid f*cking random bullsh*t "Oh I think it is the funnay0z" site that 10 people will understand. What are you gonna do when ytmnd falls? When max decides he is tired of pieces of sh*t (like you pun intended) who contribute nothing to the site, besides their hate and envy of users who earned thier spot? You gon
Do you idiots actaully think that fourest is the only ytmnd'r who has used alts? Are you really that f*cking stupid? This is just like any other social community in the world (shiity of a world as it is) but if you know this person who knows this person you can use 10000000 alts if u want to to become what you want to become. Seriously use you're f*cking head. Does "In the loop" and "out of the loop" mean anyhting to you? This is a method of competition.....
Funny comment thread. "NOISE SITES AREN'T SATIRE!" Did you see that? I put what you said in all caps. Most noise sites are spoofs (much like Meet The Spartans), some are farces, and some are actual quality parody. Many are certainly satirical, and many are certainly awful and unimaginative. As for '05 sites being poorly rated if submitted today... that's because they've already been done. Originality keeps people from getting bored, keeps people from making Meet The Spartans, try it out sometime.
LEAVES, you're putting words in my mouth. I never said resubmit the sites, I said if those sites had been released today (meaning brand new.) It would get 1'd by the kids who get angry at their sh*tty lives and come here to spread their angst. What's most frustrating is they are absolutely convinced of their righteousness in their actions. These morons are like open books for a psych major. Poor little depressed timmy going through puberty, hates everything that brings happiness to anyone else.
I sense a healthy amount of skepticism in your previous comment. I said "if submitted today" which is essentially the same as "if those sites had been released today", yet you said that I said "re-submitted", and I'm putting words in YOUR mouth? Then you go on a tirade about self-righteous angst-ridden kids who downvote sites and are easy reads for a psych major, but they still teach superiority complexes and paranoid delusions, not to mention false generalizations and unsubstantiated inferences, right?
it seems as though if you vote less than 5 on somebody's site, no matter how crappy it is, they will always downvote yours, so maybe make it that you need to give a reason to downvote, and not just a vendetta, otherwise people will continue to downvote for the sole reason that they didnt like the fact you voted 3 on one of theirs.
I think if you could come up with a way where the users could regulate how often other users post sites that would clean out a lot of garbage. The coding of it is very straight forward and be fairly easy to implement. However it of course would no doubt be able to get enough users to actively participate in such a system and it would mostly be used as a way for people to abuse fourest and vice versa. Bad behaviors: personal sites, I don't give a sh*t of John 15 year old Doe loves Jane 14 year old puts out
That's an interesting idea. some flexible system that limits other users based on the community's reaction to their behavior. The problem in designing the technical side of a system like that is making it hard/impossible to "game". A self-moderating system like that would be great, if it weren't constantly abused.
How about a full on class system for YTMND. Now you have your bourgeois (featured users)and proletariat (everyone else.) Maybe create several levels of use... starting with the top, like some of the current featured users, on down to the JoshCubes and those sort of f*ggots. Each level gets certain privileges. Lower levels can maybe post up to one site per day. Everyone starts at that lower level and earns rank. Write a code that automatically deletes a users redundant comments as they are posted.
Also, I'm suggesting more of a democracy than a communism. However, as recent history has showed us even those who should be fully capable of making mature responsible decisions will reelect a mentally challenged person. Now just imagine if you put that power into the hands of the average aged YTMND user who has a lot of spite towards other users. Yes I think it's a good idea, but it certainly needs more thought to actually work around here.
Say you earn 1 pt every hour, and it takes 24 pts to post a site. Maybe a 5star adds .5 pts, a 4star will add .25, a 2 star will take away .25 pts, and a 1 will take away .5 pts. Perhaps each subsequent post within 24hrs will require more pts. And you can always adjust the values or put a cap on the total.
i like the google way... take all the humans out of the equation. or you could lean to the wikipedia way... only humans. but i dont really like that because there is always going to be someone with power that can be an *ss (im still banned from the ytmndwiki) . i think we should keep our focus on thinking of ways to get the computer to do the work for us. BUT for the hall of fame i think that needs a purely human touch. i think it would be interesting the have a supreme court type deal that deliberates it.
Also for the Hall of Fame sites idea. I propose that you include a Hall of Fame vote button or checkbox in the site profile of high rated/most viewed/most fav'd/most commented sites, and create a Hall of Fame staging area section that includes a number of sites that have aforementioned criteria and then people can vote on them.
Or maybe even changing Hall of Fame to something like YTMND of the Month. You've stated before HoF was pretty much created to keep stale sites of the frontpage. Maybe have users vote on the topviewed/voted site of 4 weeks of that month and place that site in the YTMND of the Month. Actually use it as a positive reward as opposed to saying "we got tired of this site a long time ago." Another way to encourage users to try to raise the bar and better themselves and the content they produce.
Here's how I think the HoF voting system should go. Except I have to post it in parts since the box won't let me do a wall of text-
-Once you first put in the new HoF system, everyone gets X votes to use. The number each person gets is based on how long they've been around, for example you said one vote for every three months.
-Users should have to earn more votes. When I say earn I mean they should only get additional votes if they've "behaved" themselves. For instance, a user should get a vote at the end of every month if they haven't made any infractions based on the moderation rules (which you haven't made). Are you a troll? Annoying spammer? Part of your punishment could be for you to lose your monthly vote.
You could do the limbo thing, but have a hall of fame ceremony one month out of the year. Then when that month rolls around the sites in limbo are put on a poll list. Then say a user gets so many votes based on how long they have been registered with the site. Say, 1 vote for every 6 months past. Then when the poll is done, the sites with the greater majority of the % of votes gets inducted into the HOF.
-Each site's profile (not the actual site) should have a HoF Vote box/button. Once a site hits a certain number of HoF votes (which you choose), it goes into that HoF "limbo" someone mentioned. Once there, you (Max) choose some random users to make a voting committee to decide if it gets in. These random users shouldn't be just any old goons, so it's up to you if you want to draft moderators, featured users, people with clean mod records, whoever for the matter.
-If the site makes it, hooray. Maybe only do inductions once a month like a few people have mentioned. If the site DOESN'T make it, then all (or some part) of those votes get thrown out and the site has to build them back up. In my view this discourages people from voting on whatever site strikes their fancy at the moment, since their vote could be meaningless if it's not approved.
how about adding a checkbox in every sites profile used to "nominate" the site for the Hall of Fame. User's only get X number of nominations per month and then at the end of every month the top 20 or so sites with the most nominations are listed on a voting page. Users get one vote and whichever site gets the most votes gets put into the Hall of Fame. All the site nominations get reset the next month and the process starts over again.
I'd say the featured user box is fundamentally flawed, in the way that 90% of users with featured status don't make sites anymore. I say replace it either with Worthwhile or a "favorite user" box (perhaps have both "recent sites from favorite users" and "random sites from favorite users" options, in case someone's favorite users aren't active anymore).
Not only that have a system that automatically reports to an admin or mod if a user receives several negatives on their comments per day. Example: Max number of negatives a user can reach before being reported = X, user reaches that total, system automatically reports to an admin or mod so they can determine if action should be taken on that user. Punishments might include, muting, account suspension, and maybe banning.
I don't know about a maximum. What if there was someone that had absolutely no life and spent all of their time on YTMND. If I happened to be that person, which I'm not, I would be pissed if I ran out of votes for the day. Sometimes I actually refresh random.ytmnd.com over and over for an hour just to put more votes out there. But this idea could be a good one if it was based on votes per minute. If someone made 20 votes in one minute, obviously they were just blind upvoting or downvoting a site.
And you really can't go by -'s. A lot of times, there are certain users that have their comments -'d just because everyone hates them, not because of what they commented. People shouldn't be punished for comments unless they are always posting massive spam (remember genstar and the whole deedeedeer.ytmnd.com over and over again).
why not delete USERS who post useless and unhelpful comments? but beyond that, as regards the hall of fame, there should be some method of nominating potentially worthy sites, but the ultimate decision should come down to max or super-mods. maybe featured users or those with hall of fame sites could have a say as well.
The voting system is flawed, but it is too late to turn back on it because if you change the system, all the currently cast votes will be either deleted or weighed out of proportion with what the voter intended. At the moment, for your site to be on the front page due to vote alone (i.e. U&C or Top Rated) you need a score of at least 4.1. This means that 5 is the only vote that matters. A 4 vote is a good vote but it still damages a YTMND's chances of staying on the front page. So basically there are only
two votes: 5 or lesser degrees of downvote, from 4 to 1. When a person sees a site, they usually either like it and want to keep it on the FP or hate it and want it off. 5 is the best way of keeping it on. 1 is the best way of kicking it off. The people who vote 2-4 who think they're being critical or use 2-4 of a way of saying 'This site is ok, I don't like or dislike it so I'll sit on the middle of the fence' are lying to themselves. 2-4 stars are effectively downvotes, they just carry less weight in
terms of balancing the average out. Furthermore, the Featured Users has to go. It basically creates an aristocracy and as soon as someone hits the Featured Users list, 9 out of 10 of those users suddenly cease to put any effort into their sites because they know they don't need to. I ignore most sites on the Featured Users list unless they're already on the U&C or Top Rated. Even if they are reputed for making good sites, make them work to be on the top page. I know I do.
Maybe when they're already on the front page and have a strong score i.e. above 4.25 after 100 votes, in which case your individual vote doesn't really mean anything, but face it, when a site hits the Recently Created, 4 of its first 5 votes need to be 5 to stand a chance on the U&C, and then say out of the next 15 votes it gets, 10 of those need to be a 5 to stand a chance. A 4 just brings its average down and you really need to get higher than 4.1 to survive.
I am against Weighted Voting as a whole. I've always thought YTMND is as much a site for site creators as it is for site viewers, so making it so those who make higher-rated sites have more weight is counter-intuitive to that. Weighting votes so that upvoters or downvoters have less weight is also pointless - it will just lead to them upvoting or downvoting sites that they wouldn't normally vote on just to balance their score average out, and they most likely won't be honest with their voting either
e.g. an upvoter will downvote random sites just to get his weight back and vice versa. I also dislike giving older members more weight - I dislike creating aristocracies on websites and there are many idiotic long-term voters and just as many right-minded newcomers and to discriminate just because one signed up first is pretty stupid. As is the idea that people who donate ought to get more weighted votes. The system we have isn't perfect, but it is better than weighted voting.
I know many people hate the idea of a Yay or Nay system, but at the moment, it is more or less 5 = Yay, and 4-1 equalling differing degrees of 'Nay'. Instead, to promote younger, decent sites that might have been killed by a few early downvotes, we should take inspiration from Newgrounds' Portal. Whereas most of YTMND's FP is dedicated to sites that are days or weeks old, with only 20 slots for recent sites (10 on Recently, 10 on U&C), Newgrounds dedicates nearly 100 slots to recent sites, and highlights
the good ones and...well I probably don't have to tell you, since it is one of the more visited sites on the internet, go look at it yourself. Basically, downvoters would have much less power if their votes didn't mean as much in getting a site off the FP in the early stages. Basically, Recently Created should be at least 25 slots and U&C should be around 20-25 too. Likewise, I think moderators ought to be able to pick daily favourites to underdog sites to give them extra exposure.
Newgrounds also helps highlight why a weighted voting system would not work at YTMND. Newgrounds assumes there is such as thing as a good flash, and most people can agree whether a flash is good or not. However, YTMND is different. There is no general consensus on what constitutes a good YTMND e.g. some people prefer fad comps, others prefer pop culture references and DVD rips with slight edits, some prefer noise, some prefer original content. Since there is no consensus on what a good YTMND is, a weighted
I don't feel that the current system is "broken" at all. It just so happens that a 5 is required to make the front page, but I also feel that its intended. Of the hundreds of sites that are made per day, (lately) only a few hug the front page. BECAUSE they are of abnormally good quality. No one lawls then votes a 4. 5 means "I fully endorse this product". At least that is how I view the stars
After giving this much thought, I developed an idea of a ytmnd with two forms of voting. (1) Calculated weighted voting. At first, I liked the idea of rep points that would affect the strength of ones vote. I then realized we represent ourselves by the many aspects of our behavior and accomplishments as users. We should therefore have the weight of our votes determined by the community through their votes/favs on our top rated sites, the mathematical fairness of our voting record and the contributions we have made to the community (i.e. the wiki). For example, we all start with a weight of 4 out of 7 and it can improve or regress on that based on our actions and how the community views our sites.
The second form of voting would be designed to weed out the nuisance users. For example, I would see to it that spamming users such as farkle are punished. The inherent formulae alluded to in my previous post would determine a users vote weight and would also bring them to the attention of the community. A user whose site quality, site number and vote history are indicative of being that of a troll/spammer etc would render their vote weight to be far lower than the starting mean. It would also grant them a place in a section (like featured users) where they could be analyzed and rated by the community for a period just as sites are rated. Are they misunderstood or are they just a burden on the community worthy of removal? Such users may see their sites or even account deleted depending on the voice of the community.
max: I think a 'bad behaivor' is the account used strictly for downvoting/upvoting. We've seen hundreds come and go over the years, but I can't help but think you could leverage the new prediction model to categorize these outliers (i.e. 100's of votes all 1 or all 5) to be non-votes, in other words, a vote made from this type of account would not change the overall rating of a site.
get rid of fad compilations in hall of fame. i was going to say let every user have a vote to decide the sites that should enter in their place, but groups of users would no doubt hijack that system and waste it. maybe more experienced or successful users could come up with a list of deserving sites and let everyone have a vote on that, perhaps?
I posted this on top and I think it was one of my better ideas... a possible way to stop trolling is if someone amasses a certain number of -'s in a day they lose the privilege to comment for a week, or something. What I mean is their NET minus score for the day. So if you had 100+'s and 100-'s in a day, you'd break even at 0. So if you comment a lot you're not in any danger unless you just generally being an *ssh*le to everyone, in which case a week without commenting is pretty justified