No more downvotes on content

Twig

Twig

Administrator
Staff member
Just to let you know that, after a ton of requests for this from members, we’ve just pushed out an experiment which takes away downvotes on all content items on the site. It's definitely only an experiment at this stage, but we think it is an excellent idea to try. You’ll still have the ability to downvote a comment or forum post into oblivion, but we’ve run the math and it seems like they weren’t being used correctly on Media Items.

In addition, we hope it will encourage more people to post and hope this will help new members get a more comfortable start to contributing to NS. Anyway, would love to hear what you guys think - but give it a chance for a few weeks and lets see how it goes!”
 
Long overdue... the downvote mostly just incentivized content uploaders to downvote other videos that were posted simultaneously in order to get more shine for their video Glad its gone
 
Big move in the right direction. I've been on the wrong side of history a couple times on NS, but I think this is a solid move.
 
I am very interesting in seeing how this system works. My initial thoughts are as follows. 1st example is my interpretation of how downvotes play a role(in theory). 2nd example is a potential flaw? Maybe a potential strength? Not really sure.

For example #1 - I see a video with tons of upvotes but I genuinely dislike said video. It's bad sking, music, offensive, whatever the reason. Your only choice is to not vote which doesn't have a negative impact on the video. Now, of course a bad video won't get as much attention and thus will not be as promoted as a good video. However, you as the downvoter/disliker have no way to really vote. With downvotes, they hurt the video in terms of its rankings and what not which is reflective of the person who downvotes's honest opinion.

#2 an actually shitty piece of media getting only upvotes with no way to downvote. A bad edit obviously won't attract the same attention as a good edit but there is the possibility of upvotes. I'll use 5 upvotes as an example - you could get 5 genuine upvotes from friends without breaking rules or abusing the system. This scenario has the potential to equate to an edit that "gets lost" in the mix - maybe uploaded at a weird time or a ton of other edits are uploaded at the same time and it gets over looked. That "good" edit gets 5 genuine upvotes for being good content, but still it is "equal" to the shitty edit with friends' upvotes and there is no way to really rank them. At least with downvotes, you could actually determine that people don't like this vs. people haven't seen in/voted. If that makes sense?
 
13953429:Mingg said:
I am very interesting in seeing how this system works. My initial thoughts are as follows. 1st example is my interpretation of how downvotes play a role(in theory). 2nd example is a potential flaw? Maybe a potential strength? Not really sure.

For example #1 - I see a video with tons of upvotes but I genuinely dislike said video. It's bad sking, music, offensive, whatever the reason. Your only choice is to not vote which doesn't have a negative impact on the video. Now, of course a bad video won't get as much attention and thus will not be as promoted as a good video. However, you as the downvoter/disliker have no way to really vote. With downvotes, they hurt the video in terms of its rankings and what not which is reflective of the person who downvotes's honest opinion.

#2 an actually shitty piece of media getting only upvotes with no way to downvote. A bad edit obviously won't attract the same attention as a good edit but there is the possibility of upvotes. I'll use 5 upvotes as an example - you could get 5 genuine upvotes from friends without breaking rules or abusing the system. This scenario has the potential to equate to an edit that "gets lost" in the mix - maybe uploaded at a weird time or a ton of other edits are uploaded at the same time and it gets over looked. That "good" edit gets 5 genuine upvotes for being good content, but still it is "equal" to the shitty edit with friends' upvotes and there is no way to really rank them. At least with downvotes, you could actually determine that people don't like this vs. people haven't seen in/voted. If that makes sense?
Click to expand...

So the algorithms which run against this are quite advanced. Really, in all instances it takes into account what the opinion of site visitors are, and actually casts out the outliers of downvotes. Same with your scenario - it corrects for small amounts of upvotes and ranks things with confidence above others.

However - even though I've explained this fact a bazillion times over, people still upload a piece of media and go and downvote all the other really good stuff to benefit themselves. This makes media contributors mad, and they go and upload to Instagram and ditch Newschoolers.

In the end of the day, the algorithms take care of this and what you actually want will happen. Good stuff will rise up, bad stuff will fall away. If you really want to hate on a piece of media, leave a comment. :)
 
13953429:Mingg said:
I am very interesting in seeing how this system works. My initial thoughts are as follows. 1st example is my interpretation of how downvotes play a role(in theory). 2nd example is a potential flaw? Maybe a potential strength? Not really sure.

For example #1 - I see a video with tons of upvotes but I genuinely dislike said video. It's bad sking, music, offensive, whatever the reason. Your only choice is to not vote which doesn't have a negative impact on the video. Now, of course a bad video won't get as much attention and thus will not be as promoted as a good video. However, you as the downvoter/disliker have no way to really vote. With downvotes, they hurt the video in terms of its rankings and what not which is reflective of the person who downvotes's honest opinion.

#2 an actually shitty piece of media getting only upvotes with no way to downvote. A bad edit obviously won't attract the same attention as a good edit but there is the possibility of upvotes. I'll use 5 upvotes as an example - you could get 5 genuine upvotes from friends without breaking rules or abusing the system. This scenario has the potential to equate to an edit that "gets lost" in the mix - maybe uploaded at a weird time or a ton of other edits are uploaded at the same time and it gets over looked. That "good" edit gets 5 genuine upvotes for being good content, but still it is "equal" to the shitty edit with friends' upvotes and there is no way to really rank them. At least with downvotes, you could actually determine that people don't like this vs. people haven't seen in/voted. If that makes sense?
Click to expand...

I think both of these comments can be countered with one simple idea: Instagram. It's the world everyone is used to, might as well hop aboard, right?
 
13953429:Mingg said:
I am very interesting in seeing how this system works. My initial thoughts are as follows. 1st example is my interpretation of how downvotes play a role(in theory). 2nd example is a potential flaw? Maybe a potential strength? Not really sure.

For example #1 - I see a video with tons of upvotes but I genuinely dislike said video. It's bad sking, music, offensive, whatever the reason. Your only choice is to not vote which doesn't have a negative impact on the video. Now, of course a bad video won't get as much attention and thus will not be as promoted as a good video. However, you as the downvoter/disliker have no way to really vote. With downvotes, they hurt the video in terms of its rankings and what not which is reflective of the person who downvotes's honest opinion.

#2 an actually shitty piece of media getting only upvotes with no way to downvote. A bad edit obviously won't attract the same attention as a good edit but there is the possibility of upvotes. I'll use 5 upvotes as an example - you could get 5 genuine upvotes from friends without breaking rules or abusing the system. This scenario has the potential to equate to an edit that "gets lost" in the mix - maybe uploaded at a weird time or a ton of other edits are uploaded at the same time and it gets over looked. That "good" edit gets 5 genuine upvotes for being good content, but still it is "equal" to the shitty edit with friends' upvotes and there is no way to really rank them. At least with downvotes, you could actually determine that people don't like this vs. people haven't seen in/voted. If that makes sense?
Click to expand...

Pros outweigh the cons here I think - facebook, instagram, linkedin, etc. alll don't have a downvote function (reddit does, but that's a different story). I'm not entirely sure how the algorithm works here, but I have a hunch that by not upvoting the edit you watched, you're effectively voting.
 
topic:Twig said:
Just to let you know that, after a ton of requests for this from members, we’ve just pushed out an experiment which takes away downvotes on all content items on the site. It's definitely only an experiment at this stage, but we think it is an excellent idea to try. You’ll still have the ability to downvote a comment or forum post into oblivion, but we’ve run the math and it seems like they weren’t being used correctly on Media Items.

In addition, we hope it will encourage more people to post and hope this will help new members get a more comfortable start to contributing to NS. Anyway, would love to hear what you guys think - but give it a chance for a few weeks and lets see how it goes!”
Click to expand...

I think it's a good idea on videos. Thumb up, or no thumb at all.

Like if you don't have anything nice to say, don't say anything at all. That's what my mother said anyway. ;-)
 
13953924:Mr.Bishop said:
So the algorithms which run against this are quite advanced. Really, in all instances it takes into account what the opinion of site visitors are, and actually casts out the outliers of downvotes. Same with your scenario - it corrects for small amounts of upvotes and ranks things with confidence above others.

However - even though I've explained this fact a bazillion times over, people still upload a piece of media and go and downvote all the other really good stuff to benefit themselves. This makes media contributors mad, and they go and upload to Instagram and ditch Newschoolers.

In the end of the day, the algorithms take care of this and what you actually want will happen. Good stuff will rise up, bad stuff will fall away. If you really want to hate on a piece of media, leave a comment. :)
Click to expand...

Nice I agree. If you don't like it, just comment about why, or just say something stupid and bad about it. Then it will be public as to who is saying whatever.
 
13954297:nutz. said:
Pros outweigh the cons here I think - facebook, instagram, linkedin, etc. alll don't have a downvote function (reddit does, but that's a different story). I'm not entirely sure how the algorithm works here, but I have a hunch that by not upvoting the edit you watched, you're effectively voting.
Click to expand...

There it is. Truth.
 
13954297:nutz. said:
Pros outweigh the cons here I think - facebook, instagram, linkedin, etc. alll don't have a downvote function (reddit does, but that's a different story). I'm not entirely sure how the algorithm works here, but I have a hunch that by not upvoting the edit you watched, you're effectively voting.
Click to expand...

If you also examine Reddit closely (which we just did) you'll see that they are doing everything possible to obfuscate the display of downvotes on Original Content. It is there in the comments still, but for the most part how much you are downvoted is now hidden.
 
a little late to the convo but i'm stoked on this change, we're newer here bc the last two years or so we've been trying to build some credibility outside of NS so that way we dont just show up and are nobodies that disappear into the oblivion, we want to be active and long lasting. the site has gotten so much less aggressive over the years with the help of good modding and its really nice, the team here is great. i think this change will encourage everyone to share more edits or pictures on here and not only just post to instagram. this is a great change and i hope to see it have positive reactions.
 
I like the change but I will miss seeing all the videos with like 50 ups and 0 downs. It always made me stoked to see how overwhelmingly positive most of the community is.
 
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