Reading Rating Complaints

I'm not here to reply about the topic. As you can all tell, by my activation date, I am a "newbie" to this site. What concerns me is that 4 people gave this post a 64% rating. Which doesn't make any sense to me. The author was just stating a fact, and an example, how can this be ranked so crucially? Like on other post when someone makes a reply to a reply. The answer doesn't need to drone on at a paragraphs speed. All that it needs to be is what it is, a short quick answer. Yet I notice some people rate these postings. It just doesn't make much sense to me. Then again I am new.

Now for the humor, look at this post's rating.

This post was edited by Ifulenary on Jan 26, 2005.

This post used to be a reply to this post.

The reason the score is 64% is that the ratings it received were "nice", not "excellent". It was the opinion of the raters (myself included) that while the post had no problems, it was not of "excellent" quality. It is an average post, and as such receives an average rating. I hope this answers your question.

As per the rules, I follow the following thumb-rules while rating any post:

• Excellent is reserved for extremely good contributions.

• Rate a post as Nice if you believe it is good reading, just not something very special.

• Rate a post as Mediocre if you believe that people short of time may as well skip this post because it is not really worth reading.

• abusive or extremely impolite and aggressive posts.

Now, ratings and rankings are two separate things, yet related to each other. Based on different ratings, the user's rank will be pushed up or down by a certain percentage. Hence, for the above post, the reason why people rated it as good (not excellent) is not because they intended the author's ranks to be raised, but so that others know that this is a post which is good reading, and not something special, and it is a suggestion to others to have a look at it if they have time. If it had received more mediocre ratings, then it would have been a subtle suggestion to others to just skip it if they don't have that much time.

I guess, you understand the excellent and the spam part. The mediocre and the nice ratings are the ones that confuse people more, even the old-timers sometimes rate not based on the content, but on the fact whether they agree to a post or not, if it's a controversial subject, so don't worry, you will get used to it.

Now for the humor, look at this post's rating.

Your question was not an idiotic one, it's a common question, and people still have doubts in understanding the concept of ratings and rankings, so it's okay to ask. We are not sadistic people who pounce on the newbies on every chance we get. The more we get a chance to know a newbie, the more we embrace him/her. So, don't fret too much on the rankings, as long as you feel at home.

Love is blind, but marriage is a real eye opener.

This post was edited by ReallyCoolDude on Jan 27, 2005.

The idea is that every post is subject to being rated. Short replies are being weighed lower internally.

'Yeah, That's what Jesus would do. Jesus would bomb Afghanistan. Yeah.' - snowlion