Please disable thread ratings for modifications
 

Hi,

Thread ratings do not reflect the quality of modifications. One can often see great modifications rated low by idiots who had a minor problem and decided that it's the author's fault. So, please disable thread ratings in modification forums, I think it would be best for everyone.

Thank you for taking your time to read this.

I agree :)

I agree as well.

Me too.
Btw., I never use thread ratings on any forums, and none of my boards have this feature enabled.

Agreed. I've seen a few hacks (One in particular comes to mind) where the installs are triple digits -- yet the Rating is 3 Stars.

Yes, but do install counts represent the "greatness" of a modification? Just because people use the modification to mean it is great, just like having a poor thread rating doesn't mean it is horrible.

Everyone has different judgements. I don't think disabling thread ratings would affect anything.

Well if people have installed the hack -- and have bothered to click the Install button; one would imagine that they liked it.

Yes, they certainly do. When people like a modification, they click install. When they decide they dont like it, they click uninstall. There are 50+ installs on most modifications. On the contrary, it's hard to find a modification that has more than 5 ratings, and most of those ratings are negative, because (mostly) only highly irritable people who like to give headache to the authors even bother clicking it, and they rarely click anything different than "1". Therefore, unlike install counter, it serves no good purpose ;)

The only reasons I've ever clicked install is to track a modification, on that note, just because I installed it doesn't mean I liked it that much. Some people don't always click uninstall ;)

But you wouldn't want to track a bad modification, would ya now? ;)

As opposed to "most normal people don't use rating". ;)

I've seen modifications with extremely high post counts, that I feel are poorly written. On the other hand, some one might think it is a great modification. We all have different judgements. The thread rating allows people to input those judgements. I don't think someone sees a thread rating of a modification and decides whether to use or not immediately on that.

Try paying some attention to what's going on and you'll see that the first rating in any thread is usually a 1, placed by someone who attempted to install the hack but wasn't successful, and they didn't have a uninstall button to click so they clicked low rating instead. =)

Thread ratings are flawed by design, possibly because it takes three clicks and a refresh.

From what I've seen on all but the biggest forums, only one or two people use the rating, and generally people who are unhappy use them more than people who are happy. Because so few do use them they aren't even close to a representation of what people really think.

Therefore I agree they should be disabled for hacks. Alternativey put (x votes) under the stars so people have an idea if it's a single voter or a good range.

*rates this thread a 1*


:D

We need a hack rating system, but I agree that it needs be customized a little rather than using the thread rating. Maybe have some sort of review form that they fill out explaining the rating.

So.. they had problems with something and chose to NOT rate it highly?

Seems fairly logical to me. ;)

I have also seen many MANY mods that are not rated at all.

When I see these, do I think "OMG! 0 stars! It must be crap!"? No. :p

Not when you take into account that a large majority of the people who do have problems installing have them because they didn't follow the instructions correctly or made a mistake; something outside of the Author's control.

Actually I think that allowing thread ratings decreases the professionalism of a board. Therefore they should be discontinued on the boards of both vbulletin.com and vbulletin.org.

kall brought up a good point, though, it also signifies that the current rating system is not needed in modification threads. What means more to me is the support given; how the author handles issues and PR. Many issues seem to be client-side but if the author answers without belittling the person, even to the redundant questions, that earns more respect than 5 stars.

if some one does not feel the thread went his/her way then i feel they should have the choice to rate the thread to let others know the quality of the thread, i.e. how it has helped them, I feel its needed more so on the hack database...

We have no plans to turn off the thread rating system for modifications at this, but we will keep the suggestion in mind on future changes to the board.

I don't really see a problem with having them turned on. If you feel that you have a positive or negative opinion to share: feel free to do so by rating the thread or posting comments.

If you feel the thread rating is not a good indicator: don't look at them.

Everyone has their own responsibility to look at information given, and decide upon that what that information is worth to them.

maybe, you could add the rating option in the quick/reply area, so they can rate it when replying?

Do thread ratings matter that much to you..*rates this thread one star)

Don't you wonder how many people use Thread Rating to rate the thread instead of the modification? That was always my assumption about what it was for, given that:

a) It's labelled Thread Rating, bit of a hint there.
b) The rating system is available regardless of whether it's a modification thread or not.

There's nothing anywhere that implies you should use Thread Rating for Mod Ratings in the Mod Forums and Thread Ratings outside of it and even if it did it would be a confusing way of doing it. You could at least rename it to Modification Rating for the appropriate forums so people would adequately understand what it's for and would work fine. Or better yet do something proper for Mod ratings.

Logically I'm sure people do guess it should be used for Mod Ratings but that's a bit of an assumption to say the least.

Shazz,
ForumDog,

It appears that you haven't read the thread. Please do so before posting, thanks...

Marco van Herwaarden,

Even though you are right about the responsibility, please also keep in mind that novice users who just came to this forum and do not know what is used for what might see a low thread rating on some hack and they might think that the hack is bad and not even take a look at it, even though in most cases it wouldn't be. That would hurt novice users (as it does now), don't you think?

I think it does not matter.
My whole experience from noob to lesser-noob now is Ive never looked at the thread rating, as its peoples opinions. Everyone has different opinions and therefore is entitled to there choice of the rating. So some people can complain or nag to get rid of it or change it, but theres nothing wrong with the system.

Ok from a non coder. I wouldn't negatively rate a thread if I didn't understand it, or I couldn't get it to work. But I would give it a good rating if I asked a question and got some kind of non-patronising help from the author. OR give it a good rating if it was an excellent mod (in that it was useful for my site) gave the "works in 3.5/3.6 only" or similar, and/or it gave straightforward instructions where appropriate.
Ratings are subjective though, but I must admit to being drawn to the higher rated threads

A question to PV and the general community:

Why do you view a thread with a 1-star rating to be *less* valued than one with no rating at all?

Cos 1 star is something someone has made a conscious effort to put in. No rating means no one has been bothered and it could be still be anything.

1 > 0

'nuff said. :)

No rating doesn't mean 0 -- it means it hasn't been rated.

So far this thread is rated 2.5 with 6 votes. My guess is 3 for 1 and 3 for 5.

So it all evens out in the end.

There's a huge difference between something being rated poor and unrated. So just because something is new, does that mean it is worse than poor? No. It means that nobody has taken the time (or had the time) to rate it yet. There is the chance that it could be poor, but that doesn't immediately make it poor. It could also be excellent...

I think the best solution is just to show how many votes a thread/modification has, and either show the number, or combine them into a score.

These rating systems only work if the people using them understand how everything works... and it seems they don't.

Anyway, back to the topic: hopefully the promised hack database will have more than one field for ratings (stability, features, efficiency, etc). I don't really think this is a problem with modifications being labelled, but just a problem with the rating system in general: it is not clear. I think it should be clarified what they are rating - the thread or the modification. Someone with good intentions could rate it 1, because of some spam or goofing off in the thread of a great modification.

I personally don't think it's a big deal, but that's probably because I don't release hacks here. I would really like to see how many people rated it right beside the stars (everywhere they are shown).

I find it disturbing that the moderators and admins of a community who are trying to encourage coders to be active and help the community, are actively going against a suggestion which clearly doesnt matter much to most people, but seemingly affects the coders greatly.

Not all coders agree with the premise of the thread so your statement is not accurate.

It certainly looks like the majority would be for it. You can never please everybody, but have to try your best.

Precisely.

You might want to remember that almost all those moderators and admins are also coders. :cool:

Ratings are there for anyone who wants to use them, and have been for five (+) years without any ill effects. There is no compelling reason to suddenly remove them. Personally I don't pay any attention to the thread ratings of mine or anyone elses threads - but that doesn't mean I agree we should just turn them off. I don't pay much attention to any of the style/graphics forums here either, but I'm not about to suggest we should remove all of them. :)

It's just that you guys failed to notice the ill effects. They've always been there...

I agree, I don't see much point in removing them... but here's a thought:

The people who will see a rating of one star and walk away are probably the same ones who will have troubles installing it and rate it 1*...