Suggestion for improving the forums

[threni]

It's great that we can ignore people but it's a bit of a blunt tool. It spoils the flow of the thread; you get "you're ignoring someone" messages etc.
Similarly there are some high quality posters here and sometimes they can get kind of lost in all the drool.

Wouldn't it be good if you could "mark" a user with, say, a thumbs up or down; a mark which would be invisible for everyone else but which would have the effect of making the post/avatar stand out in some way (border, bold text, whatever).
Likewise, maybe grey-out a little all comments from thumb-downed users.

Similarly, it would be good if perhaps the number of likes a post gets could, beyond some threshold, highlight the post similar to how I'm suggesting a thumbs-upped poster would look.

A criticism of this approach might be that it encourages a hive-mind of like-minded people; that people might game the system. Well, it's not like you can cash in the likes for cookies or anything, and I'm basically here for the hive-mind so that's ok with me. It's good that everyone's posts are treated equally, but the downside of this is that everyone's posts are treated equally.

 

[Katji]

Wouldn't it be good if you could "mark" a user with, say, a thumbs up or down; a mark which would be invisible for everyone else but which would have the effect of making the post/avatar stand out in some way (border, bold text, whatever).
Likewise, maybe grey-out a little all comments from thumb-downed users.

Do-able [although by the forum software itself], with a list like the Ignore list, considering that it would not be much more processing than it does with the ignore list.
On the other hand, Block [like Fb and Reddit] requires much more processing.

 

[Slayer]

@threni What you are suggesting i believe is unnecessary. Many times there will post's or posters you don't agree with, but that doesn't mean at some point, they won't post something you do agree with. It's on each free thinking individual to either read or ignore what someone has posted. No need for extra work to be handed out to the admin dept. Besides, sometimes things posted that you disagree with can be quite amuzing.

 

[threni]

@threni What you are suggesting i believe is unnecessary. Many times there will post's or posters you don't agree with, but that doesn't mean at some point, they won't post something you do agree with. It's on each free thinking individual to either read or ignore what someone has posted. No need for extra work to be handed out to the admin dept. Besides, sometimes things posted that you disagree with can be quite amuzing.

I'm not sure that you've understood my suggestion. I'm saying that I DON'T want to ignore/block people. Because there's already an ignore feature, yes? I'd just like very slight highlighting on posts by people I like, and very slight toning down of the text of comments by people I find tiresome or subjective. I'd still be able to read them. It would be a simple css tweak using data either provided by the server or from a local cache (I don't suspect there'll be very many names/ids on the list; tens/hundreds perhaps for people who go to town rating people - they'd easily fit in a cookie).

 

[Slayer]

I'm not sure that you've understood my suggestion. I'm saying that I DON'T want to ignore/block people. Because there's already an ignore feature, yes? I'd just like very slight highlighting on posts by people I like, and very slight toning down of the text of comments by people I find tiresome or subjective. I'd still be able to read them. It would be a simple css tweak using data either provided by the server or from a local cache (I don't suspect there'll be very many names/ids on the list; tens/hundreds perhaps for people who go to town rating people - they'd easily fit in a cookie).

I understood your original post, maybe i wasn't too clear in my response. Very understandable, been one of those days if you know what i mean.
If it's something than be created on the user's end, i see no issue with. But if it something that requires work from admin, then personally I see no need. But if you can create doing what you suggest, all the more power to you,then I say go for it.

 

[threni]

I understood your original post, maybe i wasn't too clear in my response. Very understandable, been one of those days if you know what i mean.
If it's something than be created on the user's end, i see no issue with. But if it something that requires work from admin, then personally I see no need. But if you can create doing what you suggest, all the more power to you,then I say go for it.

Well, I'm suggesting a change, so implementing it would require development work - a tweak to the forum software. But once implemented it wouldn't require any work from an admin; the change would be limited to the user making the value judgement about other users and would only affect what they saw.

 

[Chrispy]

I think the number of likes is already partially along those lines. If your suggestion would be implemented, be nice to see who voted thumbs up/down (and perhaps the specific situation that caused such), so you could judge whether it was justified or not....

 

[Doodski]

I think you guys are over analyzing things. Keep it/the forum software simple and not full of silly features.

 

[threni]

I think the number of likes is already partially along those lines. If your suggestion would be implemented, be nice to see who voted thumbs up/down (and perhaps the specific situation that caused such), so you could judge whether it was justified or not....

Well, I was thinking of adding like an average weighting - composed of other users' votes - into the mix, but I don't want to anger scary mr dinosaur with the 5 digit likes over there, so...