Additionally, even with no votes currently cast, it can make it somewhat less friendly to vote no, because then the author might take it personally and have it influence their opinion of you in future, et cetera.
No. I hope it doesn't influence your opinion of me in future.
... Seriously though, if you're not willing to stand by an opinion, why should you state it? And if you're an author who can't take an honest opinion without establishing a vendetta, please do grow up. There's enough pettiness in the world :) Frankly, a no vote can't even be trusted to BE a valid opinion -- for all we know it's just someone who's messing around or hates the author or...
The first no vote on the new OoT came along with a well thought out and constructed post. Not an anonymous random vote.
Baxter wrote:
so even though the votes might not be that important for judging the movie, I still think it's nice to know what the votes are, and they might indeed (like I thought their purpose was) be of some small assistence of the judges decision.
stickyman05 wrote:
just to make the judge's job easier when trying to figure out how many yeses and nos have aquired for run X
I would be curious to hear from a judge... has the poll ever tipped the scales for a movie? It seems that watching the movie, reading the submission text and discussion should be more than enough.
And while I do see the point that it can be a "fun" statistic, I feel that it mostly feeds the ego of the author and colors the opinion of viewers before watching the movie (well, discussion could do that as well but discussion is easier to avoid).
I would be curious to hear from a judge... has the poll ever tipped the scales for a movie? It seems that watching the movie, reading the submission text and discussion should be more than enough.
And while I do see the point that it can be a "fun" statistic, I feel that it mostly feeds the ego of the author and colors the opinion of viewers before watching the movie (well, discussion could do that as well but discussion is easier to avoid).
You already heard from Bisqwit. The polls were added when there were over 100 submissions in queue; in order help judges pick a popular movie without having to read through all the submissions.
As a judge you are suppose to read through the whole thread before accepting or rejecting a movie, so when there are 10 movies in queue the poll is not really any help. I know it's been said 100 times, but a post saying "Yes" doesn't mean very much, while a post full of quality questions suggesting why it is, is.
Joined: 11/18/2006
Posts: 2426
Location: Back where I belong
I personally think it's a bad idea to remove the votes, for many reasons.
1) It makes things harder for the judges. Now, instead of having to not only watch a 3+ hour movie, I have to read through 10+ pages of responses, and then try to assimilate all those into one opinion that would best describe the thoughts of the group as a whole? Sorry, that just makes it harder for me to want to watch a long movie that I know probably won't be entertaining to me in the least, but should probably be published anyway.
2) It makes it harder for judges to see which runs are nearly guaranteed publication status (15 yes votes, 1 meh, 1 no), versus which runs I may need to get more opinions on (8 yes, 2 meh, 2 no). Removing the voting system takes away a lot of the ease of keeping the submission queue under control.
Bisqwit wrote:
since the number of submissions compared to the number of judges is so much more manageable now than it used to be, the numbers are not really needed now.
This would be true, if all the judges were active. I have been the most active judge in the past couple of months (which is no problem), but before that, adelikat and Truncated were the only judges who actively kept the queue to manageable levels. Removing the votes will certainly not make our jobs any easier, and people already piss and moan about runs staying unaccepted when they've been on the workbench less than one month. I'm looking at you, OoT.
3) It removes yet another "fun factor" from the site. First the stars were removed because Bisqwit didn't want to offend anyone (please, bring them back in some form), and now we have the voting removed, which I think was one of the more fun things about the site. People got excited when they could finally vote and authors like to see a lot of yes votes for their movies. Who cares if it's an ego boost? This site is meant to be fun, not to be all for the greater good (comrade).
4) We lose the opinion of many people who may not be fluent in English. If they are embarrassed to write out a response because they know it may not convey their actual thoughts, they now have no other way to show their approval/disapproval of the run. As much as I like to encourage people to provide reasons for their votes, I do no think it should be a mandatory requirement.
5) The voting system was removed because BoltR suggested it. I heavily disagree with this, not because it was BoltR to suggest it, but because it was done without asking for the opinion of anyone else. Experimentation is good, but removing a major part of the site due to one person's suggestion smacks of favoritism (and if it doesn't, I strongly suggest to replace the voting system).
6) Whether you scoff at it or not, peer pressure on the internet does exist, because it is human nature to be liked, and providing an opinion that clearly differs from the majority can lead to ridicule (looking at you again, OoT). Yes, when someone votes, they should provide their reasoning. But when a no vote already gets ostracized because it's different than the crowd, can you really expect people to become even more active? I have a feeling that, instead of increasing the commentary, this will simply act as a catalyst to decrease negative commentary on all but the most horrible runs. So what we'll be left with is a handful of people who say they somewhat like a run, and then get pissed when it gets rejected for being a crap-tastic game (although this already happens anyway). In any case, I think it will reduce the amount of negative criticism of all runs.
I will probably think of a few more reasons, but this is my list of arguments against removing the voting system.
Technically you are suppose to be doing that already, maybe that wasn't made clear. Even so, it takes less than a minute to get an idea if the movie is good or not by skimming through posts. No difference in getting 0 yes and 20 no votes than two pages full of "This movie was very unoptimized" posts.
mmbossman wrote:
2) It makes it harder...
Yeah not everyone is active as they were at their peak, but it doesn't change the fact that we have two-to-three times the amount judges, and a tenth the amount of movies to go through.
mmbossman wrote:
3) It removes yet...
They can still get their ego boost by comments made. If you mean 'the person can't brag that they got 50 yes votes more than any other movie' that is no different that having 5 pages more of nice comments than every other movie.
mmbossman wrote:
4) We lose the opinion...
If they REALLY can't speak english, they could just copy paste "Yes" into a reply if they really want to. Sure it might not be of the most help, but it's no worse than just voting yes without saying anything.
mmbossman wrote:
5) The voting system...
I didn't suggest it be removed permanently, but as a test to see if it would be viable. Plus, if you want to play the favoritism card, it might have even been me that suggested adding in the first place. I at least remember discussing it with Bisqwit in a private message. As Bisqwit has said in the past, this site is not a democracy. This definitely isn't the first time i've made a proposal to him, and there is nothing stopping you from doing it. If it's an idea that he agrees with, he might act on it.
mmbossman wrote:
6) Whether you scoff...
The fact that you seem to forget is there have always been random unexplained no votes. Even on the most popular movies. If there was no post to go along with the no vote in the Zelda thread it would have been ignored. Coming back to the original problem, the votes don't really mean anything without context. Beyond that, how many submission threads have been taken over with arguments about the voting system, and people's opinion on what it means. It's become a huge pattern.
You already heard from Bisqwit. The polls were added when there were over 100 submissions in queue; in order help judges pick a popular movie without having to read through all the submissions.
As a judge you are suppose to read through the whole thread before accepting or rejecting a movie, so when there are 10 movies in queue the poll is not really any help.
That being said, I publicly apologize for going ahead with this plan without consulting with the other judges first -- especially to Adelikat, since he was the first one to complain to me about it.
But, in the same breath, I stand by my opinion, which is that the best way to get useful feedback in a situation like this is simply to go ahead with the plan. Had it been discussed aforehand, nothing would have happened, because people are generally quite change-phobic, and because it usually happens that before any useful decision is reached, I've long forgot to follow the discussion.
I don't think I've ever agreed with BoltR as much as on this very page before.
On topic of peer pressure and such, people should not be afraid of voicing their opinion. If anything, it's bullies who must be smacked, not the watchers giving feedback.
Warp wrote:
Edit: I think I understand now: It's my avatar, isn't it? It makes me look angry.
Joined: 6/13/2006
Posts: 3300
Location: Massachussetts, USA
I'm not so hot about the new system. Most con reasons stated previously I agree with, and suddenly it may be hard to get a very quick statistical number of the % of yes/meh/no votes. Having to read through the entire thread just to get a sense of the viewer's reactions is not cool.
Let's compare with politics. The entire system is, for the most part anomynous voting; in that you don't need to write an essay on why you vote for your politician. However, many people do dedicate themselves to politics and write, talk, and discuss why they like so and so. When the polls are taken, you have the stats to look at, and you also have the huge multitude of people who talked about the politician through the media. However, if you force everyone to give a "why are you voting for this politician" essay on every voting ballot, there would be a huge drop of voting, because the majority of people who go out to vote probably don't want to waste time explaining why they voted what they did; they just want to remain a number among the statistics.
Whatever happens with keeping or removing the system, I think being able to change what you vote needs to be implemented. Pressing the wrong button by mistake or changing your opinion does happen, and should be made possible.
Another idea: Re-enable voting, but make poll results viewable only to judges.
Plus:
-- Avoids the witch hunt issue; no particular vote is going to catch attention.
-- Judges get useful numbers.
Minus:
-- People WANT to see poll results in order to be motivated at voting.
-- Authors still need to see positive feedback to get gratification from their work.
----
[Edit by Bisqwit]: Added the issue Baxter pointed out.
Bisqwit: What about the fact that TASers might feel their work being appreciated a bit more by good voting results? I somehow doubt there will be significantly more posts this way...
Joined: 6/11/2006
Posts: 818
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Bisqwit wrote:
Another idea: Re-enable voting, but make poll results viewable only to judges.
Plus:
-- Avoids the witch hunt issue; no particular vote is going to catch attention.
-- Judges get useful numbers.
Minus:
-- People WANT to see poll results in order to be motivated at voting.
Best suggestion in this topic this far, apart from "Go back to the way it was", which might or might not have been suggested!
Warp wrote:
omg lol this is so fake!!!1 the nes cant produce music like this!
Joined: 11/18/2006
Posts: 2426
Location: Back where I belong
Bisqwit wrote:
Another idea: Re-enable voting, but make poll results viewable only to judges.
Plus:
-- Avoids the witch hunt issue; no particular vote is going to catch attention.
-- Judges get useful numbers.
Minus:
-- People WANT to see poll results in order to be motivated at voting.
-- Authors still need to see positive feedback to get gratification from their work.
----
[Edit by Bisqwit]: Added the issue Baxter pointed out.
I agree with this idea, and would suggest that the votes could be made known after a decision has been reached (either publication or rejection).
Joined: 10/27/2004
Posts: 1977
Location: Making an escape
Indeed, the submission system is a little wonky due to how uptight people are about it. The odd thing is it's usually not the authors who get offended by the no vote, but the viewers. How many times have you seen people who weren't the author state, "Alright, who voted no on this amazing submission?" Yeah, people may want an explanation for it, but people will still flip out about it. Again, the Zelda submission: When people started expressing discontent with the movie, they ended up being bombarded with, "You just don't get it, do you?" Kinda like Dennis Dyack's reaction to Too Human's negative reviews (except in that case it WAS the author who was offended).
That being said, I cast my vote for the proposed voting system. At least people won't get uppity until AFTER the no vote is explained.
A hundred years from now, they will gaze upon my work and marvel at my skills but never know my name. And that will be good enough for me.
I personally think it's a bad idea to remove the votes, for many reasons.
1) It makes things harder for the judges. Now, instead of having to not only watch a 3+ hour movie, I have to read through 10+ pages of responses, and then try to assimilate all those into one opinion that would best describe the thoughts of the group as a whole? Sorry, that just makes it harder for me to want to watch a long movie that I know probably won't be entertaining to me in the least, but should probably be published anyway.
Thats what you signed up for. Thats pretty much the reason I don't want to be a judge. Even though I personally think I would make a good judge. I've literally fallen asleep while watching some long, boring ass RPGs.
2) It makes it harder for judges to see which runs are nearly guaranteed publication status (15 yes votes, 1 meh, 1 no), versus which runs I may need to get more opinions on (8 yes, 2 meh, 2 no). Removing the voting system takes away a lot of the ease of keeping the submission queue under control.
If you're an avid gamer you should be able to cope with this difficulty.
3) It removes yet another "fun factor" from the site. First the stars were removed because Bisqwit didn't want to offend anyone (please, bring them back in some form), and now we have the voting removed.
I'll defend this point since I suggested removing stars. The main reason was because it wasn't be updated like it was to begin with, and the movies being recommended did not generally follow the guidelines that were initially set out. A star list should generally try to favour newer movies. Removing things (at least for a while) can often be a good idea because it was obviously being taken for granted despite it's apparent flaws being displayed in the long term.
4) We lose the opinion of many people who may not be fluent in English. If they are embarrassed to write out a response
Completely disagree with this, it will encourage more opinions instead of silent yes voting.
5) The voting system was removed because BoltR suggested it. I heavily disagree with this, not because it was BoltR to suggest it, but because it was done without asking for the opinion of anyone else. Experimentation is good, but removing a major part of the site due to one person's suggestion smacks of favoritism.
I don't see how it implys favouritism. In 95% of cases when someone suggests removing something it will nearly always be met with fierce opposition, mainly because it was taken for granted before hand. Even if it seems like a natural progression, which is why politics tends to move very slowly in free and fair democracies.
While polictics involves a group of people who make decisions, it does not imply democracy. A lot of the time it can just be one person who makes the decisions which is heavily influenced by others a.k.a advisors.
I suspect that if people were forced to justify their decisions when voting in political elections it would force people to actually think through their decisions more... (ignoring the whole disenfranchisement of the illiterate and functionally illiterate, which makes this untenable)
But I like the compromise of hidden voting too :)
Another idea: Re-enable voting, but make poll results viewable only to judges.
I believe that this would be better than what we had before, and what we had before was better than this.
Perhaps poll results could become visible once the submission has been accepted or rejected, though.
How fleeting are all human passions compared with the massive continuity of ducks.
Joined: 11/11/2006
Posts: 1235
Location: United Kingdom
Bisqwit wrote:
Maybe I should add "post a YES reply" / "post a NO reply" / "post a MEH reply" buttons to where the poll was, and those would simply start composing a reply to the thread with "Yes vote" etc. prefilled automatically in the post :)
I vote yes
<adelikat> I am annoyed at my irc statements ending up in forums & sigs
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Joined: 11/3/2004
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Bisqwit wrote:
Another idea: Re-enable voting, but make poll results viewable only to judges.
This is my 2nd favorite solution (Going back = my favorite).
Bisqwit wrote:
Maybe I should add "post a YES reply" / "post a NO reply" / "post a MEH reply" buttons to where the poll was, and those would simply start composing a reply to the thread with "Yes vote" etc. prefilled automatically in the post :)
Another idea: Re-enable voting, but make poll results viewable only to judges.
That sounds like it would be easier for the judges.
While it seems justifiable to ask judges to read through an entire thread, most Mario/Zelda/Metroid runs draw 10 or more pages of comments, and a lot of bitter debate. I can't stand reading page after page of people sniping at each other, even if I had the time to read through that many responses.
The concern I have about not having polls, or hiding poll results from non-judges, is this. If a run is obviously exceptional, the first page may be all that you have to read to get a sense for how the run is regarded. Likewise, a video that clearly doesn't meet our standards will immediately be obvious when it receives comments like, "way too many mistakes", or "it looks like you just played the game in slow motion instead of using re-records to make everything perfect." But when a run's merits require debate, it's impossible to tell if there are more Yes votes or No votes without actually reading every post. Runs that are clearly exceptional, or clearly crap, don't truly require debate: any judge could instantly accept for being an obvious improvement, or instantly reject for not being a proper TAS. The runs that require feedback are runs of games that have never been published before, where there's the possibility that time-saving strategies have been overlooked, or where there is no clear consensus on whether a run meets all of the requirements for entertainment and perfection. Those are the runs that people need to be encouraged to watch, but the lack of a running poll may discourage people from watching. My time is limited, and I like to know what people think of a movie before I watch it. The poll results gave me instant insight into how a movie is regarded, but now the only way to know is to read the discussion thread, and if the thread has several pages of responses, lazy... I mean, busy people like me may not bother.
TASing or playing back a DOS game? Make sure your files match the archive at RGB Classic Games.
While it seems justifiable to ask judges to read through an entire thread, most Mario/Zelda/Metroid runs draw 10 or more pages of comments, and a lot of bitter debate. I can't stand reading page after page of people sniping at each other, even if I had the time to read through that many responses.
Yes, but how much of those 10 pages are people bickering about voting rather than the actual movie?
Plus it's not like you read all 10 pages at once how many judges do you really think ignore such threads up until they decide they want to publish it?
Having to sift through garbage is part of the job description of being a judge.
hopper wrote:
The concern I have about not having polls, or hiding poll results from non-judges, is this. If a run is obviously exceptional, the first page may be all that you have to read to get a sense for how the run is regarded.
This is exactly why you aren't suppose to use the votes to decide if you are going to publish it or not. What happens when someone posts on page 3 a huge easily fixable mistake in the run after everyone else has already voted yes? It's still going to look like a really good movie from the votes and first page of comments, even though it should probably be rejected pending a fix.
Joined: 2/28/2006
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hopper wrote:
(...)most Mario/Zelda/Metroid runs draw 10 or more pages of comments, and a lot of bitter debate. I can't stand reading page after page of people sniping at each other(...)
What?? But that's the best thing! It's most of the time much more interesting than the run itself.
And I VOTE for the first idea Bisqwit had:
Bisqwit wrote:
Maybe I should add "post a YES reply" / "post a NO reply" / "post a MEH reply" buttons to where the poll was, and those would simply start composing a reply to the thread with "Yes vote" etc. prefilled automatically in the post :)
It would look clean and also would allow us to have a quick idea of the post without reading it, like youtube's "marked as spam".
Allow only judges to view the votes? Drop that bullshit now.
It would greatly discourage the players... it feels like playing a freaking lottery.
"Genuine self-esteem, however, consists not of causeless feelings, but of certain knowledge about yourself.
It rests on the conviction that you — by your choices, effort and actions — have made yourself into the
kind of person able to deal with reality. It is the conviction — based on the evidence of your own volitional
functioning — that you are fundamentally able to succeed in life and, therefore, are deserving of that success."
- Onkar Ghate
Bisqwit wrote:
<BoltR> I'd rather the user have to type a three letter word in themselves. That way they won't be as encouraged to just write a template post
<BoltR> which is just "voted YES !"
<BoltR> If you are too lazy to spend less than [an extra] second to voice an opinion after spending 30 minutes watching a video, why bother commenting at all
I'd rather have half the posts disappear if it meant a much leaner forum. The signal to noise ratio on this site has gone way way down over the years. "Voting yes because <author> is cool!" posts are of no help at all.
As for "players being discouraged", or "players not being motivated".
What?
You do realize this site existed before the voting system right? People were still motivated back then. People got encouragement from constructive posts stating what people liked about their movie.
Popularity was visible through the amount of posts, rather than an arbitrary number which tended to get skewed by people randomly voting.
If you want an example of this go read the Banjo Kazooie thread where Sami is making his run. He is getting encouragement through posts. It doesn't matter how many votes he gets, it's already been shown people love the run. People are posting their gripes and he responds to them, making a better finished product in the end.
