Well thanks for bothering. Perhaps I should post the English confusions in the English learning thread in /General.

I thought that the metrics are highly dependant on the post count and time joined.

Seems like if you want everything to be accurate, either somehow figure the existing metrics into this or reset everyone's post count and join date.

and that would be fair because?
not to mention not directly possible without direct manipulation of the forum's database which could screw things up

I would prefer to see more work on adding incentives to motivate OPs to report that a problem has been solved and indicate which posts solved the problem.

We should have a reputation system for OPs. They should get credit for going the extra mile and marking a thread as solved and indicating which replies were helpful and which reply solved the problem. An OP could get one point for marking a thread as solved and indicating at least one thread was helpful. You could even calculate the ratio of posts to completed posts and that would give you a good idea about the reputation of an OP.

The reputation system for people who reply would then be simply the ratio of solutions to replies. That seems like an easy number to calculate and a much easier way to recognize a reputable replier.

The only wrinkle is that you would need two new buttons. One to indicate "helpful" and one to indicate "solution".

Note that looking at how the system is designed, it may actually make sense to start new members off with a very small amount of rep (in fact, so small that even once they meet the time and post requirements, they'd still need someone to rep them to be able to give rep away). Also, I think some of this is probably a bit difficult to understand without actually seeing the system. I may enable the system only for Admins (ie. me) so that members can get a better idea how things will work and look. From there we can slowly roll it out to other members groups.

--jeremy

1 members found this post helpful.

FWIW, we recently rolled out a feature that emails new members if a post they made has received replies yet hasn't been marked resolved. This has increased the number of threads marked solved significantly. We're still open to additional suggestions on the topic, but those should be made in a dedicated thread.

--jeremy

2 members found this post helpful.

I don't know if you read my whole post, but at the end I showed how an incentive system for OPs directly results in a reputation system for repliers. In other words, I think my post was on topic.

I did read the entire post and much of it was on topic. We're still looking for feedback on how we can improve the usage of the "Solved" system and anything relating to *that* should go in a dedicated thread.

--jeremy

Jeremy, thanks for starting this new thread. Indeed this has taken a weight off of my mind!

I think a user in the "New Member" category should start at zero until they meet two requirements;

a) Post in a thread they have not started.
b) Their post is found "Helpful" (possibly by someone who is not in the "New Member" category?)

On a side note, a way to redact negative feedback would be nice. Just in case there's a language barrier or other form of miscommunication.

P.S: Thanks for clarifying about "Member groups" versus "User Titles" earlier. I see my noob was showing when I marked-down that post.

When I read that, I immediatly envisioned a penguin dressed as Mad Max with the words "How to Survive the LinuxQuestions Apocolypse" emblazoned above.

(not a bad thing, just a tad extreme)

Edit: Yes, I meant "retract", not "redact". Spellchecker makes fools of us all at times.

don't you mean retract?

anyhew back on subject i agree since someone may either accidentally give negative feedback or do rashly in the heat of a moment, possibly unrelated to the topic at hand so i would agree that the ability to 'take back' at least some negative reputation might be a good thing, on the other hand if such a feature is too readily available people won't be as careful about assigning negative feedback perhaps

I wouldn't want everything to be reset, but I think it will be unfair for all us helpful members to have a high post count and no reputation.

I haven't figured out the exact details yet, but existing users will be seeded with some kind of Reputation Level, in addition to having a higher Reputation Power.

--jeremy

My current plan is to turn the system on in the near future. From there I'll enable it for mods->Contributing Members->Senior Members->Members->New Members in 12-24 hour intervals so we can catch any bugs or issues early. The end result is still that things should be enabled for everyone by our target of Sunday.

--jeremy

Also, to clarify: based on feedback, all new members will start with 0 rep. I've seeded some existing members with a tiered amount of rep based on post count/time of membership/etc. With these seeded members the system should start with enough initial inertia to be useful quickly.

--jeremy