when you want to have a forum like this, don't expect a lot of quality from it or an influx of newcomers. People can't get conversations going. In a quick way to say it more people tend to downvote things rather than to upvote. And that is what the main root cause is of this downfall that has been going on for quite some time.

You can't say this is forum voting is functioning for the off-topic. Maybe it is for other forum categories, but maybe you already have clearly noticed that the off-topic page is just a bunch of hidden threads and a couple (average 3?) visible threads. The page certainly looks awful in my browser as well as is the content, as you possibly can question yourself. Why do these 2 threads in the image qualify as upvoted threads while the remaining 48 invisible other does not? Heck. I'm struggling to know it myself.

Unaware of other people knowing this, but I'm just gonna say it: Off-topic discussions most of the time start out with someone writing a couple of phrases (a short text) followed by people talking about the issue that is presented. If you read a new thread of which the first comment is a one liner, an inlined image or a link to an article, you don't have to necessarily downvote these posts because of lack of quality because the quality is going to be added as soon as other people respond. I'm just repeating this for a second time: DO NOT downvote new threads that have 1 comment with one line of text simply because they lack content. This happens way too often and I'm mildly angry about it. Besides feel inclined to respond to the post rather than to ignore it completely. remember you're the one adding content.

After that you also have the jerks who downvote every single thread just to see everything nicely burried away. Which just spoils it all completely. It ruins the fun for others, and it's not just that rare. It's common. They're doing it for no reason or sometimes for their own egos. Such dicks do not even get to be banned as no one can ultimately show them that they do it. If you were to ask me if these jerks play a huge factor in the voting systems not functioning I'd say absolutely yes.

Solution?
Perhaps we can redefine the upvoting and downvoting mechanics as told in previous threads before.

would you be more happy by having more hidden threads? I don't think so

Hold off the downvoting,
for a second time
until the people will get a brain

trying to keep this thing alive... by upvoting everything



would only result in the same situation as before. I think it's futile. If I'm the guy who upvotes everything and the number of hidden threads is still above 45 then who are the guys downvoting everything? It's shameful.

I agree. I don't really use off-topic, but that image looks bad.

I think it is also being misused in the other sub-forums. Posts(on contentious issues) from certain individuals are always upvoted based on my experience.

I completely agree that this is an issue. I wouldn't describe it as a problem with the system, but rather the users.

1. Stop forcing discussion. Here's an example of forced discussion:

https://www.warlight.net/Forum/253400-attention-please

Here's an example of unforced dicussion:

https://www.warlight.net/Forum/253515-forum-voting-system-working

Nobody wants to reply to the forced discussion threads, and they are numerous.

There are so many threads about this topic that are just full of junk. I would have to disagree that there are no cases where a down-vote doesn't work:

https://www.warlight.net/Forum/253422-9-unhidden-threads-busy-downvote-trolls

What's even the point of replying to this?

2. Cancerous (or even inappropriate content)

https://www.warlight.net/Forum/252864-thicc-

When I saw that thread a few days ago and I clicked the links I just moved it to strategy and hid it because the content is inappropriate but not worth reporting.

https://www.warlight.net/Forum/252469-jews-columbine

This isn't the daily stormer, take your conversation over there.

3. Unfunny content

https://www.warlight.net/Forum/253238-player-wally-balls-embarassing-things (and the rest of the player embarrassing things threads)

It's like lying about someone who has such a bad reputation that you can barely tell they are lying. I'm definitely not the judge of unfunny or not, but I think that since it is down-voted that's a clear indicator.

Basically the off-topic forum is a big inside joke that nobody really understands. I up-voted some decent threads including this one and we are up to 7.

Edited 3/30/2017 23:33:19

when you want to have a forum like this, don't expect a lot of quality from it or an influx of newcomers.

this is just annoying repetitive meming, unfunny trolling, and posts, I agree that most of it should be downvoted since All Forums shouldn't get cluttered again like it used to. The 7 not downvoted OT threads are thoughtful talks or somewhat funny short-lived joke that are good. The hidden threads are fully in-jokes, bad trolling, karlposting, and tabbyposting.

+1 Benjamin

Edited 3/30/2017 23:57:25

Who has 6 alts (4 with memberships and lvl 58+) and downvotes everything in the off topic forum every 3 days? This guy

It seems you have only inspired more downvoting on the off-topic forum.
Currently, 49/50 threads are hidden.

DO NOT downvote new threads that have 1 comment with one line of text simply because they lack content.

Why not? I typically downvote these as well. If the creator of a thread can't even provide something of value, why does the thread deserve to be seen by others?

You can't say this is forum voting is functioning for the off-topic.

I agree it looks bad when only two posts are visible. This is a technical limitation that I'd like to fix -- it should show a fixed number of non-downvoted posts.

After that you also have the jerks who downvote every single thread just to see everything nicely burried away.

I actually don't think this is an issue. People who downvote everything tend to lose their voting privileges (I do sometimes check who voted on stuff and take voting privileges away from people who are voting irresponsibly, such as downvoting every thread.) So this isn't actually an issue.

What this post is missing are examples. Show me an example of a good well thought-out high-quality thread that got downvoted. When I look through downvoted threads, I see a whole bunch of stuff that I agree should be hidden.

I also see a whole bunch that i don't mind being hidden. But for example,
https://www.warlight.net/Forum/253143-discord-chat
https://www.warlight.net/Forum/252438-oldest-active-forumer
https://www.warlight.net/Forum/4307-question-
https://www.warlight.net/Forum/52649-person-last-reply
are hidden right now. (Those post's are threads I upvoted, and therefore I picked them.)

I would argue that off-topic kinda suffers from spamming of bad threads, so whenever ppl see an off-topic thread they downvote it. It has become a habit to many. The spamming issue is then "hidden", which results in the spammer(s) making new threads. (Hiding a thread, generates a new thread hypothesis here)

Edited 3/31/2017 01:17:46

https://www.warlight.net/Forum/f8-topic

@Fizzer tables have turned since you posted. Some troll(s) down-voted everything so you got some privileged to take away!

I mean this post wasn't thought out but it has some quality posts (including one from yourself)

https://www.warlight.net/Forum/252438-oldest-active-forumer


As of now 49 down-voted posts. Why not after a week of being hidden they are just deleted?

Adding an "All (Excluding Off-Topic)" link to the bottom of the forum list might reduce OT downvoting. I'd guess that a significant portion of the downvoters would rather not see OT at all.

But for example,
https://www.warlight.net/Forum/253143-discord-chat
https://www.warlight.net/Forum/252438-oldest-active-forumer
https://www.warlight.net/Forum/4307-question-
https://www.warlight.net/Forum/52649-person-last-reply
are hidden right now. (Those post's are threads I upvoted, and therefore I picked them.)

"Oldest active forumer" isn't downvoted, unless it just got upvoted in the last few minutes?

"so the question is" and "person last reply" threads are kind of nonsense. They may be fun little games but I can understand why some people downvote them since they have no substance.

Discord chat I'm not sure if belongs or not. Only two non-alts upvoted it, while 9 downvoted it. I don't see you as having voted on it at all.

Adding an "All (Excluding Off-Topic)" link to the bottom of the forum list might reduce OT downvoting. I'd guess that a significant portion of the downvoters would rather not see OT at all.

I agree, that would probably help.

Why not after a week of being hidden they are just deleted?

that doesn't make any sense. Even if most of the community sees it as trash someone still cares about it. and they will just remake it.

Who has 6 alts (4 with memberships and lvl 58+) and downvotes everything in the off topic forum every 3 days? This guy

aye screw you too FK

Edited 3/31/2017 02:34:29

I think it's Nauz, not FK.

Fizzer, is there a way for you to set the thresholds dynamically when a page is loaded? I tend to downvote OT posts far more often than other posts when I'm viewing all forums at once, simply because OT posts tend to be pretty weak on the quality front (since pretty much everything is allowed, seems like that discourages effort)... and I don't think I'm the only one, given this thread. So it seems like people would prefer to not see OT-style posts when they're viewing the forums in general, but obviously if you're heading to OT you probably want to see at least half the posts on each page.

Maybe set some percentile- so you'll have to make two passes through the posts on a given page, first to get their scores to find the value at some percentile (say 20th, 30th, or 50th? I don't know what would work best)- and if a post is either above the absolute threshold you already have or above the percentile threshold for the page being viewed, it gets displayed. Would that be viable/implementable given the current technical setup?

I think one issue with the voting system is that- in the context of other voting systems we're already familiar with (reddit, YouTube, Netflix, Facebook, etc.), it seems incomplete without all that fancy recommendation system machine learning going on. Absolute thresholds have their limitations, especially when your output is just the posts with some subset marked hidden (instead of say, 25 non-hidden posts)- I guess voting systems just have this connotation of customization and that could get confusing for users since here they're instead being used purely as distributed moderation. But I don't know if it's viable to rebuild that infrastructure, since it seems like you're mainly held back here by the way the existing forum setup works (or maybe not- I'm just going off assumptions based on the way browser requests are formatted).

80% of tabby or the usual racist threads i downvote without clicking on them. And i think these are probably over 50% of the off topic forum. I should probably open all of them at least, but that seems like too much effort for their bad trolling.

same here, if the title already implies nonsense, i don't bother to even open and straightforward downvote it

Same here.
Whenever I see Tabby posts or Wally bitching about Trump, I downvote without opening.

F***

"Oldest active forumer" isn't downvoted, unless it just got upvoted in the last few minutes?

"so the question is" and "person last reply" threads are kind of nonsense. They may be fun little games but I can understand why some people downvote them since they have no substance"


The Oldest active forum thread was indeed hidden for a long time. (until I made my post, and it got voted up)

While "so the question is" and "person last reply" threads are not super 'intelligent' threads, they are forum games, and in my view, this is what off-topic threads are for. Games like Mafia, counting, political discussions and random batter etc. Just the fact that they have accumulated several thousands posts each means that they clearly have a rightful place on the forum. I would not make them notable, but hiding the threads is just not right.

"Adding an "All (Excluding Off-Topic)" link to the bottom of the forum list might reduce OT downvoting. I'd guess that a significant portion of the downvoters would rather not see OT at all."

It does indeed appear to be needed.

Clicking the "all" forums should exclude off-topic. I come to the forums to see warlight content, not random ramblings of the off-topic people. I also downvote the off-topic sections when viewing the "all forums", just like knyte. This should solve the problem.

Or create another link "All except off-topic" that knyte, myself, and others can use.