Dont read, Dont reply, Just Downvote.

blacknerdtaku·Apr 12, 2015·11 votes·799 views

Anybody else find it strange that there is literally a thing called post a Discussion, and often these discussions only get down voted with no user feedback?

listen, We post on these boards for or opinions to be heard and discussed. and it felt a lot like the older forums captured that. Every Idea had an equal chance to be seen, and those that resonated with players stayed relevant for a bit longer solely by being able to find the thing easily (with pages instead of infinite scrolling). This is a popularity board, when it shouldnt be. God forbid you make a post that starts with down votes from trolls only to be up voted later by others. The system just seems backwards.

Yet for some reason Joe Schmoe posts the exact same topic a week later, and gets a million up-votes.

from: aaronautumn

i don't like how it's possible to upvote/downvote from the main page (where all you see is the title), it makes no >sense

Even worse is getting downvoted into oblivion with NO comments on why it's a bad idea. Isn't this supposed to be an open discussion? because that's the equivalent of just saying "no you're wrong, shut up". at the very least you should have to comment before up and down voting the topic...

This Isn't supposed to be a popularity contest. It's supposed to be an open market place of Ideas for balance and skins and the like. the bad posts should get just as much light as the good ones, and should only be removed once they get enough reports to warrant checking out. in that regards these boards were a bad step in the wrong direction. We shouldn't need 4 filters. Only 2: "Best" (300+ upvotes) and "Current" (everything else).

one more thing... please bring back GD's paging. Infinite scrolling just leads to things getting lost.

19 Comments

usul1202Apr 12, 20156 votes

We downvote because thats our expression of opinion. many topics on this board are not logical, or are not presented in a logical way. As such, a logical reply or debate can be viewed as futile, so we express our opinions on that opinion through downvotes. If there is rhyme or reason to the post, then it warrants a response, but many (not all) are not as such.

blacknerdtakuApr 12, 20152 votes

As futile as it is, dont you still think an open discussion is better?

often times people dont even try to discuss.

if the OP of a post shows a clear lack in logic via responses and the like, then give up, but otherwise at least try. remember we still post here to get into discussions about how the game should be handled. Unless you're in Misc, This shouldnt be some popularity contest.

and this still doesnt address the other thing i mentioned which is post inequality. Often the same thing gets posted (to a myriad of upvotes) because the previous post on the topic went ignored... this has happened to me. and may others.

have you ever heard somebody say "but i post the exact same thing and get downvoted"... this proves that our posts arent being given equal opportunity to be fully discussed. they get 2 downvotes from people who dont bother to reply, and get ignored. Considering how much work alot of these posts take to make, it's infuriating.

This leads to the circle-jerk effect. The only way to get your ideas out, is to post something thats super popular and has been posted and upvoted on a bajillion times. other opinions find a more difficult time making it out past the "new" segment of the board.

I may have a lot of down votes atm, but im glad people are actually discussing, and really that's all we ask for.

usul1202Apr 12, 20151 votes

Okay, so I'll address the points in sequence:

I do not think discussion is always better. opinions and the 'logic' of people on tilt are not worth discussing, because nothing is going to come from it. It feeds their anger/entrenches people in their opinions.

The boards are exactly a popularity contest. thats what this format is for. It is designed to show what the community as a whole agrees on and disagrees on.

In order to get post equality you would have to make every single person read every single post. Ain't no body got time fo that. So people comment and vote where they have an opinion worth the clicks.

Posting the same thing is frequently different in wording. Also, post times. There are studies about when to post on forums to get more views and whatnot. if you're serious, then you'll post at proper times, and you'll use wording that appeals to your case. I've seen several posts on the same topic, same day, that i have given opposite votes because of just how they worded their post, and their attitude.

The 'circle jerk' effect is exactly what these boards are for. WE SHOW WHAT WE LIKE AS A COMMUNITY. Which happens to be pretty normative.

blacknerdtakuApr 13, 20151 votes

I do not think discussion is always better. opinions and the 'logic' of people on tilt are not worth discussing, because nothing is going to come from it. It feeds their anger/entrenches people in their opinions.

disagreed. this still doesnt address the posts that get downvoted just by title alone. if you're going to post a Discussion whats the point in being able to do things like downvote from title and 1 line of text alone? that just means that people dont need to bother taking time to even read what they're downvoting.... and again it leads to posts that may resonate well some more than others no chance to be seen by those other people.

The boards are exactly a popularity contest. thats what this format is for. It is designed to show what the community as a whole agrees on and disagrees on.

But they shouldn't be. the issue isn't whether or not you get popular, its whether or not what you post resonates with the community. again. why should a post go almost completely unseen because 2 people didnt like it at first? this isnt Reddit, where you upvote stupid shit. this is Lol Boards where most discussions are on game balance, and other things of relevance to this game leading to your next point.

In order to get post equality you would have to make every single person read every single post. Ain't no body got time fo that.

no you wouldnt. when i reference post equality im referencing merely the ability to be seen. the current structure of the boards does not allow this. Old GD did. even if a post wasnt exactly popular, it still had a fair bit of time on the front page. it had an equal chance to be seen and thus discussed upon by everyone. these boards are not like that at all. and having 4 catergories of relevance just means that posting may as well be futile. it was only when i was FORCED to use these boards that a lot of my posts went unnoticed. before they were noticed and relatively well liked.

Posting the same thing is frequently different in wording. Also, post times. There are studies about when to post on forums to get more views and whatnot. if you're serious, then you'll post at proper times, and you'll use wording that appeals to your case.

as "ideal" as that sounds im going to again call bullshit on it. wording be damned, a message should still get across. and having people post 2 extremes of the same topic is not what im referencing. I'm referencing a literal missor post of something you did. What the hell is a "proper time" for the lol boards? and why should something that was so much easier and more interactive before become such an arduous task?

The 'circle jerk' effect is exactly what these boards are for. WE SHOW WHAT WE LIKE AS A COMMUNITY. Which happens to be pretty normative.

So in other words you want this to be a place for like minded people to post likeminded things and agree with the likemindeness of others ( LeeSin nerfs anybody)? You want an echo chamber? I already stated before but all this means is different ideas being presented get down voted into obscurity. People are never being forced to think about anything different, which is a full detriment to boards like these. it works for randomness but not for a board where the primary objective is Making an everchanging product better for consumers. and the inability for you to placekeep these discussions via paging is sickening.

The old forums werent made to be a popularity contest, they were made to be functional, and they worked... WELL. they stood the test of time. these boards are just a wannabee Reddit clone and that is not the best approach for a forum of this nature. Traditional forum layout works fine for these.

usul1202Apr 13, 20151 votes

Titles are designed to explain your point. Make a title that is intriguing and you'll get more views. make a BS title that explains nothing and looks like a complaint, and it becomes unlikely that someone will view that post as worth their time. Titles are incredibly important because they decide how much time your post is worth to someone. There's a reason they show up before anything else.

What exactly do you want other than a popularity contest? like............... really, I'm wondering what you'd replace it with. no voting? how would something gain approval, or have people show that the community as a whole agrees on an idea. the boards would be filled with "daily reminder that" from a few people, and you wouldn't be able to see that no one else cares, because these people have the time to post every single day.

Every post does have the ability to be seen. quite a few of us sit on the 'new' boards and look at more or less every post that goes by. Thats why almost no post goes by without upvotes or downvotes. This format simply allows those that care to read them all do so, and those who just wanna see whats trending not.

Wording be damned just condemned all of politics over all of history. Wording is a part of every single interaction involving an exchange of ideas, and if you think wording shouldn't have an effect on popularity, then I would put money on that being why you think that 2 posts that are the exact same get different votes. The "proper times" are when people are awake and on the boards, 9-12ish from either coast's time. posting on NA boards when NA people are sleeping/at work/school would obviously be less effective.

Look at the popular boards now. and then look at it again in a week. this community is incredibly fickle, and our opinions change on a dime. Very few circlejerks hold attention for long enough to become relevant, and therefore it says something when they do. that would be why riot doesn't comment on many of those threads, they understand the nature of this community.

I'm really unsure how having a different board system would stop mob mentality. people would just make the 'daily reminder' posts that would get more comments because there are more of them. Mob mentality is a human nature issue, good luck removing it. (By the way, i've been on the old forums. Popular ideas kept themselves going just as well. don't romanticize it. What happens now is just that the same thread stays visible for longer instead of a bunch of small ones, showing people's continuing opinions)

SEKAIApr 12, 20152 votes

one more thing... please bring back GD's paging. Infinite scrolling just leads to things getting lost.

This is the truest thing ever. The board really needs paging.

There are Hot, Best, New and Recent sorting so I wouldn't say the Board is that bad in terms of managing publicity of ideas. The main problem is just as you said, the lack of paging.

Also other issues are the lack of proper transition between the Chronological view and the Discussion view, and the fact a giant debate in Discussion view is just a giant orgy with no rhyme or rhythm and is just painful to read.

Fix these issues, Board is then complete.

GaleWinUnleashedApr 12, 20153 votes

I personally find Chronological View to be extremely difficult to read. That's why both exist, so that every person can use whichever one feels better to them.

They definitely need to be more smoothly integrated, though; reply quotes need to be automatically inserted into Discussion comments when they are viewed in Chronological, and removed again when viewed in Discussion.

SEKAIApr 12, 20152 votes

{quoted} reply quotes need to be automatically inserted into Discussion comments when they are viewed in Chronological, and removed again when viewed in Discussion.

That's totally a good idea. The reason I don't view things in Chronological often because there is no way to tell who is talking to who unless the poster himself realises the problem and go out of his way to quote when he replies.

GaleWinUnleashedApr 12, 20152 votes

I don't downvote because I disagree with something. I downvote when a post is poorly thought out or just downright rude, when I think the post needs to be removed entirely or at least updated to be more coherent and thought-provoking.

The problem is that the upvote/downvote system is often used as a way to express agreement, when the intent for the Boards was to have productive discussions upvoted, not just one-liner jokes or popular opinions.

blacknerdtakuApr 12, 20151 votes

this is fine... but the bulk of the issue comes in with ignoring the discussion part altogether just to downvote.

i mention it in a comment below, but these things take time to write... to see something you put time into go unseen is beyond annoying. espically when it does resonate with people.

this post had 8 downvotes first 2 hours after posting http://boards.na.leagueoflegends.com/en/c/skin-champion-concepts/H9FmEHEA-joke-champ-concept-viewtiful-joe-the-hero-of-movie-land

the next day it had just 1. and then flooded into obscurity... it clearly resonated with a lot of people, but by the time it gained popularity it was already left behind. and again with no discussion on it.

doesnt that seem...... backwards?

aaronautumnApr 12, 20152 votes

i don't like how it's possible to upvote/downvote from the main page (where all you see is the title), it makes no sense

redniwediSApr 12, 20152 votes

Hover over the title and you can see a fair amount of text from the actual post.

aaronautumnApr 12, 20152 votes

but you don't see the whole post (unless it's short) and you don't see the discussion

redniwediSApr 12, 20151 votes

For long posts that actually have a discussion, no you don't see it all.

That said it can be a good way to see if you're wasting your time before you give them a view. There are more short, ragey troll posts than there are constructive ones after all.

blacknerdtakuApr 12, 20151 votes

thank you for reminding me of that... ill place it in the OP.

DaenApr 12, 20151 votes

Votes are really complicated in a scenario where you want to have effective dialogue. A vote can mean anything within a spectrum of "meh I don't disagree so I'll upvote" or "this is the best thing I have ever read", and that's completely ignoring more subtle factors like context, post history, etc.

Something interesting to consider, why does it work for reddit but it seems problematic on the Boards?

JorenciceApr 13, 20151 votes

{quoted}

Anybody else find it strange that there is literally a thing called post a Discussion, and often these discussions only get down voted with no user feedback?

listen, We post on these boards for or opinions to be heard and discussed. and it felt a lot like the older forums captured that. Every Idea had an equal chance to be seen, and those that resonated with players stayed relevant for a bit longer solely by being able to find the thing easily (with pages instead of infinite scrolling). This is a popularity board, when it shouldnt be. God forbid you make a post that starts with down votes from trolls only to be up voted later by others. The system just seems backwards.

Yet for some reason Joe Schmoe posts the exact same topic a week later, and gets a million up-votes.

from: aaronautumn

Even worse is getting downvoted into oblivion with NO comments on why it's a bad idea. Isn't this supposed to be an open discussion? because that's the equivalent of just saying "no you're wrong, shut up". at the very least you should have to comment before up and down voting the topic...

This Isn't supposed to be a popularity contest. It's supposed to be an open market place of Ideas for balance and skins and the like. the bad posts should get just as much light as the good ones, and should only be removed once they get enough reports to warrant checking out. in that regards these boards were a bad step in the wrong direction. We shouldn't need 4 filters. Only 2: "Best" (300+ upvotes) and "Current" (everything else).

one more thing... please bring back GD's paging. Infinite scrolling just leads to things getting lost.

Saying "no your wrong shut up" IS a discussion. I determined you were wrong and told you so.

LQ9tcXETvNApr 14, 20151 votes

Take in this is being said by all the people who are currently having an open discussion.

rtbf221651412Apr 19, 20151 votes

Some things a hidden agenda (not all are bad but I'm sure you know what I mean) that deserve a down vote. Other things have logic that seems to go in one ear and out the other for this community.