Boards›Boards Feedback

[Mockup] Starred - A new type of vote

Hyrum Graff·11/17/2014, 7:52:40 AM·7 votes·973 views

Have you ever disagreed with a thread, but wanted to give it visibility, because it was thoughtful, well-written and fostered good discussion? Or felt that a thread deserved more than just an upvote?

Well, no longer! Enter the Star vote. You star posts that are thoughtful and promote good discussion, whether or not you agree with them. The kind of awesome discussion you want to read when you jump into a rework thread. The post that opened your eyes.

You'll notice that there's no number associated with a star vote. That's because, rather than being placed on a spectrum, star votes are designed to quickly and easily highlight thoughtful posts and comments. So, if a post/comment reaches a certain threshold, it'll get a star displayed next to it, allowing it to be easily picked out in a discussion. The poster will be able to see how many stars they've gotten, but not how many they need until their post gets a public star. It's like the way honor badges work.

This would be a new way to showcase thoughtful posts, even those that aren't popular (but also those that are popular). One cool things I thought of we could do with a star idea is to create a page like the red tracker, which shows posts that attained star status.

Here's an idea for what it could look like when you're voting to star a post:

http://i.imgur.com/ccMWgVg.png Not voted

http://i.imgur.com/LLIKd7G.png Voted

2014-11-19 edit: You would ONLY be able to star a post from within a post, because unlike a vote -- where you can often tell if you agree without reading it all -- you can't really identify a thoughtful post without reading it.

2014-11-19 edit2: Changed wording in post to clarify that a star means a thoughtful post (I used a lot of words to describe why you'd star a post before). #Clarity

Thoughts?

8 Comments

Daen11/17/2014, 5:54:32 PM1 votes

Hey there Hyrum,

I know we've talked about this, but I wanted to touch on a few things that have changed/weren't quite discussed fully. I'll be devil's advocating here a bit, but that doesn't mean I think your idea is a bad thing (far from it!).

You star posts that are well-written and promote good discussion, whether or not you agree with them. The kind of awesome discussion you want to read when you jump into a rework thread. The post that opened your eyes.

What stops people from deciding to both upvote and star something just because it gives something more visibility rather than as an expression of content appreciation? How often would users star something that they feel is incorrect (downvoted)?

You'll notice that there's no number associated with a star vote. That's because, rather than being placed on a spectrum, star votes are designed to quickly and easily highlight awesome posts and comments. So, if a post/comment reaches a certain threshold, it'll get a star displayed next to it, allowing it to be easily picked out in a discussion. The poster will be able to see how many stars they've gotten, but not how many they need until their post gets a public star. It's like the way honor badges work.

What will be the counterbalancing factor to allow for a threshold? As an example, Honor is roughly a ratio of Honor per game; what would the ratio be here? Would it be "reach x number of stars", or a comparison of stars to another factor?

This would be a new way to showcase high quality posts, even those that aren't popular (but also those that are popular). One cool things I thought of we could do with a star idea is to create a page like the red tracker, which shows posts that attained star status.

This could be cool, though is it possible it could devalue voting?

Would this functionality also be included in replies/comments? If so, how would that be implemented?

EMOFRATPARTY11/19/2014, 6:20:27 PM1 votes

So, if a post/comment reaches a certain threshold, it'll get a star displayed next to it, allowing it to be easily picked out in a discussion.

What would your ideal threshold be? To me, your post idea is what the "Best" tab should be utilized for.

Hyrum Graff11/22/2014, 7:05:14 AM1 votes

content, quality, length, the user posting, and the user viewing (and probably some other stuff I forgot to throw into the mix).

Well, the reason I say "random" is that, if these factors contribute to how many votes a post gets, isn't that an indication of what the community wants to see? Like, if short, high quality balance posts tend to get voted on more than long, low-quality, skins posts, isn't that the system working as intended?