Why do I have a rating of minus 11? Why am I a deadbeat here!

[markebenson]

On Ebay I am a top rated seller. On this forum I am a deadbeat! I only post here about the Stability of Ots and my opinion on wasting money on windows 10 when I Heart Media is still using 7 and they own the market here in the U.S! I don't know what I have done to get this rating! On ebay I  would get a report of such.

Dear moderator,

Please provide me with the reasons I have a -11 rating being that I am one of the most pro-Ots customers here! Please advise  on what I have done wrong and why I have a -11 rating and how I can improve it!

[Jumpin' Jeff]

Mark, the rating system you are looking at is usable by all members including yourself. You can rate each and every person with a useful, or worthless post marker. I honestly haven't marked anyones post useful, or worthless. I am not able to speak to those users that marked your posts as worthless, as we do not have a record of who has done so.

As you are the very first to comment on that system, I honestly don't think many pay attention to it. I could just as well turn it off completely, and if I get sufficient requests to do so, I shall.

[milky]

I've never rated anyone, and, frankly have no idea how to. I did wonder why, after I had written a long and (I thought) helpful piece a while back it was rated something like 25/-15, so I really think it is very uncomplimentary, considering we are all doing our best here, and, if that falls short of expectation, we really don't need anyone playing Julius Caesar and laying judgement on our endeavours.

[Darryl]

There you go - I just gave everyone in this post a useful (you just click the useful or worthless link under the user name). 

I'm happy when people just say thanks for the help, but some are less comfortable with that approach - it's certainly harder when you feel the urge to be critical (I have in the past - hopefully no-one took offence - I think I was trying to be constructive).  If this rating thing on the forum upsets anyone then it is probably counter productive.  I think we all appreciate that many users are frustrated and feel the need to vent some steam from time to time, but on the whole the atmosphere on this forum is very positive - lots of like minded people trying to assist each other.

Feel free to click worthless for this post if it makes you feel better - it won't bother me.

[Jumpin' Jeff]

Even I have a -10!
To be honest, I would have preferred to have a like or a thank button, but I can't turn off the worthless link by itself, and the other options aren't available in this version of SMF.

[clover-leaf-productions]

I have seen things like this on other Boards, but I had never seen it here.  Perhaps it is a new feature that showed up in a more recent upgrade of the Board software.

Gee now I have to go check another post to see if anybody likes me.  Oh the stress of trying to be popular.

[milky]

I think it is probably the term "Worthless" which has the wrong connotations on it. If the options were "Useful/Not Useful", although semantic, they don't sound as bad.

Even then, I would prefer to acknowledge positively that someone tried to offer help, even if it didn't resolve my particular problem.

The interesting thing is, immediately after posting, and I'm sure before anyone could have had the opportunity to respond, it posted a 46/-5 value to this particular post.

[socialdancer]

(you just click the useful or worthless link under the user name). 

Nope, can't do that, I see no such links
I guess the karma function is not enabled for basic members.
Doesn't bother me as I am not trying to prove anything, a zero rating would be fine, but I can understand why a big negative score would be upsetting.

I don't think we need personal karma on a forum like this but I suppose it could be a useful admin tool to identify particularly useful posts that are worth making sticky.

[markebenson]

Lol its not that serious. At least I started a interesting thread 

[Jumpin' Jeff]

At least you started something Mark. It's been a little dead around here lately.

Made a few changes to the Karma.
Instead of showing positive, and negative, it is now totaled.
The heading has been changed to "Help Score", and the links "Helped Me" and "Didn't help".

Oh, and Mark, I bumped you back to "0".

SocialDancer, I checked, and you are correct, the regular member base did not have access to the Karma. That is now fixed.

I'm open to further recommendations/changes as well.

[milky]

Ah, that's better, JJ. It's all in the wording. My only concern now is that the software seems to generate a figure whenever a new post is made. For instance, without offering any help whatsoever in this post, I managed a Help figure of 41.

[Jammin' Adam]

Got to agree, "worthless" is such a negative word, definitely like the change in wording the links.

[Edit] I checked my help level (26) before posting, didn't change. Milky must of gained one from another member while posting.

[Jumpin' Jeff]

He must have been helpful!

[Jumpin' Jeff]

Yep! Mine didn't change from 66 either!

[markebenson]

0 is better than minus lol.

I'll try and post helful things her more often