Votes on showroom models?

[scoobs]

Ok, an idea for discussion - many sites have polls and ratings for forum posts and so on:- I'm wondering what the concensus is on having a quick rating system on people's showroom entries? In addition to comments, you could also (say) rate on a scale of 1 to 5, with the total value being a function of all the ratings for that model.

This rating could also be carried through in the model lists where you could sort by rating - and maybe the top rated showroom entries could be featured on the main page for that particular model.

The ratings could also be used to identify great members - for example, someone like Moosey with loads of great cars would probably have a high user rating as a result - this rewards people for contributing models, pics & movies. You could therefore also sort the showroom list by ratings.

Thoughts on whether this would be useful or desirable? Chris..?

[Stefan(2)]

I think that is a good idea,

got my vote (a 5 )

But it could take some time before it takes off,

with that many models around it is safe to say

that some great cars are "hidden" .

Stefan

[MonkeyFooty11]

Yeah, I think a 'Rate my Ride' function would be great.

Gets my vote. []

[netsmithUK]

I'll look into it.

We do sort of do it occasionally with the 'members awards' we arranged, also for things like our current "win a WW2" competition.

To be honest I've steered clear of doing other than on this adhoc basis because its the sort of thing that leads to people spamming unfortunately. Suddenly you'll see large images appearing in the forums, lots more links to items in showrooms in every post even when its not that relevent etc etc all in an attempt to try and get more exposure for their models and boost their scores. It seems chldish I know, but it does happen, and this annoys a lot of people.

I might do it initially in a similar way to how we handle model views, ie let the owners see the ratings but not make them public - that way you get to see what people think without it becoming a site wide competition.

But it won't be this month, I don't think got too much on with other 'stuff' []

[scoobs]

Originally posted by netsmithUK

> We do sort of do it occasionally with the 'members awards'

> we arranged, also for things like our current "win a WW2"

> competition.

Yes, I've seen that before...

> To be honest I've steered clear of doing other than on this

> adhoc basis because its the sort of thing that leads to people

> spamming unfortunately.

There's always going to be people that try and abuse the facilities that they have, and I take your point. I guess it comes down to community policing in some cases. But in general the community here is fairly nice and supportive, I'm delighted with some of my feedback...

> I might do it initially in a similar way to how we handle

> model views, ie let the owners see the ratings but not

> make them public - that way you get to see what people

> think without it becoming a site wide competition.

Hmm, I'm not sure I see the value in this - will people vote if they can never see the results?

One of the nice things about a user rating system is that it automatically promotes the good site content for visitors and owners, and gives them a reason to support the community but trying to improve what they contribute. For example, i really like the comment feature, and it's probably this more than anything else that encourage me to upload pics and so on. And I comment on other peoples' models as a way to give props to the models I really like.

And the rating scheme could be fairly inoffensive, let's say something like:

* Not really my thang but a good example

** Nothing spectacular, but well done

*** Nice - me likee!!

**** Outstanding

***** Top of the class superb

There are plenty of other sites that use a rating system, and I've not personally seen any that get abused (not that that necessarily means anything . More typically it either gets ignored, or people only rate the odd amazing thing.

> But it won't be this month, I don't think got too much on with other 'stuff'

Sure, no problem, i wasn't expecting that you would, as I'm sure you realise!

[netsmithUK]

its not the rating of a model in particular thats a problem, if you just want people to rate your models 1 - 5 or whatever thats easy enough. Its when you start adding the scores together and making it a 'league' og highest rated that it starts the competition and thats when things start going a bit odd. You also then tend to get models at the top and because they are at the top, they get more views, therefore get more vote and stay at the top. So the top 20 becomes a bit stale after a while. What happens is if visitors come to the site and have 10 mins to spend they go through the top 10 listed and vote for them, increasing their lead. This is just why I do not publish the 'most viewed items' Its this sort of thing that breeds the spamming aspect as people struggle to get their models notice and try and break into the top listings.

I thought the idea of keeping it private means the owner gets to see it, and possible the voter as the time of voting.

I much prefer more random systems that keep a nice turn over and spread the visitors around.

Maybe another approach is to allow the commentator to leave a score with the comment, which is displayed but not totalled or compared with others anywhere. I talking out like and will take on all suggestions

chris

I'm up for suggestions though

[tarznatz]

I like it. 1-5 or maybe even 1-10 scale...

[MonkeyFooty11]

I can see the problem with a top 10 or most viewed as described. Perhaps you could allow ratings for your showroom items if you like, then have your showroom organised in most popular order. That way you'll get feedback from other users but your not competing against other members.

What do you think[?]

Pete

[Scorchio]

quote:Originally posted by netsmithUK

Its when you start adding the scores together and making it a 'league' og highest rated that it starts the competition and thats when things start going a bit odd. You also then tend to get models at the top and because they are at the top, they get more views, therefore get more vote and stay at the top. So the top 20 becomes a bit stale after a while.

---

id="quote">id="quote">

How about monthly / quarterly ratings, that gives a regular clean slate. Hope I did't add pain to the logististics there [].

[jozza]

I think that ratings would be a good idea. I understand that you have to be careful how they are applied in case people start to try to fix the ratings to get their models higher in a league, but it would be good to see which models/action shots/videos are the most popular with other TC members.

[netsmithUK]

to the tell the truth I'd forgot all about this one - I'll give it somethought, I think the idea of highest rated in the last 7 days is quite a good one but again see a problem that all this would mean is one new one would make the chart (at the bottom) every 7 days as the one at the top dropped off.

Lol, this site is turning me into a real negative person. Can't help myself these days just see problems with every thing based on previous experiences. I try and put that behind me and give one of these ideas a go.

Chris

[Matt2000]

quote:Originally posted by netsmithUK

Suddenly you'll see large images appearing in the forums, lots more links to items in showrooms in every post even when its not that relevent etc etc all in an attempt to try and get more exposure for their models and boost their scores.

---

id="quote">id="quote">

we're not like that are we?[:0][:I][]

[netsmithUK]

Not everyone, but it only takes a few. You'd be surprised, once a couple start doing it, then the threads start about them monopolising the home page, then others start think "if they can do it, then so will I, as my model are better" etc etc. You then start seeing lots more "What do you think of my new paint job" and "Look at my latest build" type threads. Not that I'm knocking it, at the moment we get the balence about right, with people highlighting interesting projects, but you get straight posts about out of box build kits and the XB range filling the forums is that really what we want to see? Perhaps it is - what I'm getting at is as moderators we cannot examine every picture and link in the forum for "relevence" or "interest".

Chris

[Matt2000]

good point. i try to get people's interest with my pics, movies and my sig on the forums, but i wouldn't go crazy. but that's me. my signatures not too big, is it [?]

[Stefan(2)]

Can't say that won't happen (boosting ect) , it is human nature i guess

I (hope) about everybody is taking pride in making a nice model to there best

capebibelities. And , in the process wanting to know if others also think

-you did a good job on it-

Controlling this seems to me a impossible task, unless you are 24/24 on this forum

moderating it.

I'll bet all the moderaters have something more/better to do in there lives.

At this moment, the only disadvantage i find in the current system, IF you have changed something to a model you would like to show, (and don't want to re-enter the car in the showroom) ,

you -have- to make post in the forum.

And, admitting, it is the most easy way, to direct-link to the showroom page, instead of

uploading pictures to a webspace, check the uRL, and then post it with IMG tags.

MAYBE figuring out a other way how to do this, next to the latest showroom entery, movie entery, comment(s) , "highlighted" cars , would be a good thing i think.

Also realising, the more you put on the front page, the less easy it gets to -see- it all.

But, hey, i am no webdesigner lol Thinking it up & writing it down is one thing,

doing it is proberly something else.

Stefan

[Matt2000]

couldn't you just change the pics in that model? if you get higher ratings it shows. if you did whatever you did to it earlier, you get more votes??!!

just to let you know, i'm not argueing my point here[][][:I]

[netsmithUK]

Yes I feel bad, that we currently tell people to update posts rather than re-enter them, but at the same time we don't really have away to highlight them. Think this will be the firs thing I change.

Chris

[Stefan(2)]

Matt2000, what i try to point out,

let say i have fully modified a flatbad trailer to some super jet propelled demo rig.

(i say "SURPOSE!")

If i change the pictures in the showroom, ok.. "done"

But, what i want, is letting tc members know i have changed my flatbad into a flaming hotrod.

There are at this moment only 2 ways of doing that:

1) make a new entery in my showroom , result "false counts/statistics" of the webpage

2) post it into the forum "look guys, what i have done now"

A 3e option would be nice

now i'll step off my chair and eat a pizza (salami for who is intrested )

Stefan

[jozza]

Chris, perhaps the best way to attack this would be to split it up into gathering/displaying ratings for the models, and then look at Top 20 etc charts at a later date?

If a showroom entry had a method for members to rate it, and that could be displayed in the showroom, that could form a starting point. And then, once that has been in place for a month or 3, you could take a statistical look at the way ratings have gone in order to decide the best way to do some sort of chart?

I think that looking at it that way might be helpful. There are various different ratings on sites I look at, mainly for techie stuff, and they seem to work well. If you could mimic one of those it would form a good starting point. I'm thinking of a simple form where you can rate a model from say 1-10 stars with a single click. Once rated, you should be able to change the rating, in case the model has been updated for some reason. If the ratings/ratees (is that a real word?) could be stored somewhere, including the date of the rating, then it should be possible to do more or less anything in the way of reporting on them.

I'm currently working on a generic rating system for my site engine, so I understand the myriad issues that you have to consider when applying this sort of system, but the gathering of rates/votes should hopefully be fairly straightforward.

If you need any assistance on getting this going let me know and I'll try my best to help out (code, spec, words of encouragement, whatever []).

[technical.burP]

I like such a rating system. I don't see any of the problems like spamming etc. because that is really childish. If I would do a manipulation, then only for fun and only occasionally, but not to eagerly win a price or any other advantage.

Afraid of integrating weak elements into tamiyaclub.com? Why don't you set up a test site for us to experiment called e.g. tamiayclub-advanced.com or Tamiyaclub-beta.com?

Push things forward or walk on one point.

[netsmithUK]

Hi Jozza,

Thanks for the offer, if you've got any ideas or pseudocode then please send it through.

As for integrating weak features I have no problems with that, who can remember Tamiyaclub Countdown Auctions - lol!

[DJTheo]

I don't see a big problem when you have changed a showroom item alot to delete the old one and make a new entry or put the new version like a new "extra info" showroom item, actually many members do already so.

A rating though of showroom items would be a nice feature, it would be good though that each members rating on another members item counts only once, that is if he rates it again, the old rating is removed from the stats, so no one can cheat the stats by multiple ratings. Of course also you shouldn't be able to rate your own items and enable or disable rating like for comments.

Cheers

[supergreg]

I don't like the idea of rating systems at this point. I do work as website manager for a big entertainment company for couple of years now and gathered loads of experience with implementing rating/voting systems into existing communities. From my experience none of them led to a overall positive effect to the community (making it bigger or healthier). The risk that the system is being abused is very high, no matter how many saftety precautions you install. Even if not abused (in a technical way), rating systems WILL lead to conflicts between members accusing others of scamming, arguing against their work or simply posting flame threads in the forums.

This seems like a very negative view to things, but believe me: The less voting/rating systems, the healthier the community! We all did see to what childish accusations the current competition led. Even the most respectable persons, who are part of the website for a long long time, got into dispute and lost control of their countenance. This just being caused by a (in their option) favouritism of other gyus entries in a competition, which was intended to do nothing else than bringing people to take outside photos to win a XB Scooby (not the most valuable price at all, but even this almost led to a disaster).

Having this in mind, I suggest being very cautious with inventing new long-life rating systems, which *could* lead to constant displeasure between members. It's one of the most difficult things for admins (from a social point of view) to create new interesting features for their target group, without running the risk of just creating a new central contentious issue.

What benefit does it bring to people to have their model rated maximum points? In my opinion there is no need to know how others do rate my models, not knowing what their intention is. With a rating system I would get a very little significant additional number, which does not bring any benefit to me besides having to option to show off with it in the forum. The existing features 'showrooms views' and 'model comments' do give enough information about the 'success' of my models to ME (which is the crucial point), even having the option to block negative comments (or blocking comments at all).

If you would like to have an overview of the models you like the most and want to share it with other, use the favourites system. What's the point with having a overall ranking of 'top members'?? There is no 'top' member in here, just a bunch of guys sharing the same hobby. Why do we always need to match with others and crown the king?

I'm with Ben on the initial idea to have something to call peoples attention to 'the lost showroom entires'. What's the project status of your 'random entry viewer'?

I say it again, I suggest to discard that idea of a rating system or we will see Chris suffer from heart attack in the near future. Please let's concentrate on open tasks before and maybe on waterproofing the rules of the existing competition system (did anyone already send a waterproof rule type to Chris?).

[1proteus1]

i think a rating system wold adversly affect the site to behonest as some popular people would always get in the top 10 or 20 the ideas are getting away from the key issues i assumed this club was equal opertunities for all and basically it was to help like minded people to show an discuss there models i think a rating system would create a seriousness to the club that would intimidate new members not encorage as if they didnt get a good rating it would be discourging.

as weve all seen what the photo comps been like this would be on a much larger scale basically if someone likes something they will comment on it an i think thats good enough , and personally i dont think great members are made just by there showrooms and vids i think its the way they conduct themselves as well how helpful how approachable cause lets face it this is supposed to be a friendly enviroment , i like to see the amounts of viewing mine has had mind i would be interested to know the max viewings any item has ever had but that would be curiosity to see how mine compare lol , my highest 1 is 1486 to date but then on the other end is 64 lol