Low ratings by those with no uploads

Clearly people need to vent on these subjects. I see no need to delete these threads, boring and repetitive as they may be for some people.

 

This isn't a forum for general reading, it's a forum for bitching and moaning about photo.net, for asking how certain photo.net features work or for reporting bugs.

 

It's not meant to be entertaining!

Screw the ratings...if you want to know if people really like your photos look at the other numbers. Number of ratings, Number of views, and number of comments. If you are running up 10,000 and more views on your photos, I think that means a hell of a lot more than the unsubstantiated 3/3's without a comment.

Simple and easy solution. Leave it all as is. People who like it like that will stay. People who don't like it will leave. Only a slightly factious remark, as that seems to be just the way it is here at photo.net.

 

Simple and slightly less easy solution. Change the default page to a top photos page chosen by non raters. The elves, new curators, Your Aunt Milly, whoever. Just don't make the rated photos the first thing anyone will see as the top photos. Let people dig a bit to find the mate rated top ones. This works for me on another site which is fast becoming a serious contender for the best critique site, IMHO.

Glancing at Bob's Comments on Photodb, it appears that 4 of his 6 comments are shorter than 25 words. That means that he is "simply not qualified to offer an opinion and/or you simply haven't given that matter any thought" by his own standards. Now let's look at someone who has actually spent a lot of time Rating and Commenting on images.

 

Marc G. has given 5322 ratings and 4842 comments. A quick look at his comments shows that he often writes long, detailed comments. But even Marc has quite a few short comments. 3 of his last 5 were under 25 words and only one was over 50 words (barely). Probably 25 to 30% of Marc's comments are under the 25 word limit. Does that mean that Marc is unqualified or that those short comments are useless? Some of those short comments are actually helpful suggestions or deserved praise.

 

And a lot of the one-word comments exist solely because people are forced to comment in the first place. They are basically saying the same thing with the comment as they say with the rating: "7/7 -- Wow, Great, Wonderful". If they could leave a 7/7 without comment, I think most people would stop wasting that space.

 

If we require 25 word comments on the low and high ratings, what will the result be? Will members actually start giving more thoughtful comments? Or will they simply shy away from the 1, 2, and 7's? Will the mate-raters give up? Or will they simply take a minute to write some meaningless dribble that meets the word limit?

 

My guess is that this hindrance will affect the honest raters much more than the mate-raters and essentially give them more weight. On the other hand if we make the ratings system easier to use then the honest members have a chance at overwhelming the mate-raters. I think it is a move in the wrong direction. Photo's with 10 mate-rates can be brought down if 100 honest ratings are given, but the number of ratings per photo is too low right now. We need to limit submissions and/or encourage ratings/commenting much more than we do now.

I'm now with Margeret, let's leave it as it is.

 

By the way Jim, that's 9 words. Amazing how much you can cram into a short comment isn't it.

yup

.

I have rated some 1700 photos and left around the same number of comments.

 

When Photo.net was kind enough to offer me the ability to see the photos I had ranked highest, I found (to my chagrin) that my ratings didn't correspond closely enough to my feelings and opinions concerning many photos.

 

Ones that I thought were truly great were "6's" and ones that were just really good were "6's," too. So I changed many to "7's" and others to "5's." With the "7's," I found that I had very little to say other than "great" and little advice to give on improvement. With "3's," however, there is always much to say.

 

Therein lies the value (and the shortcoming) of the ratings - it's a shorthand and fairly unequivocal way to offer feedback, but it is imperfect and really only meaningful in a collective sense.

I strongly believe that those who are able to rate should at least have a photo or two of

their own posted. Then, if they single out a particular image and give an arbitrary 1/1

because they 'feel like it' that day, then, the rest of the community can take a shot at

reciprocating. -- It might humble those that act out of ignorance and immaturity.- Just a

thought. But, really, what is the point of allowing the 'tedious and rude' to give other

members 'black eyes' often, just for mean spirited sport? I have been the victim of a

couple bad apples and it blemishes the fun. The only thing to 'learn' from these attacks is

that the world is rife with donkeys. We already know that. Right? I know donkeys have to

eat too. But, hey. Why not let the non artists share their own community? - Just a thought,

here. (at no time were any donkeys actually injured or shot during the writing of this.)<div></div>

Reciprocate or retaliate?

 

Maybe only people with no photos posted should be allowed to rate.

It is all very complicated--Maybe only blind folks should post ratings..then, the playing

field will be equal. BUT___ I respectfully submit that we Eliminate the negative area of

scoring- 3, 2, 1's--. If someone does not like the shot--let them Move on. Why give

power to the merciless and ruthless few? - I believe in encouragement, not punishment. If

photos are ignored and not scored for example---this would stimulate growth, not painful

annoyance.

Brian Motorshead, said earlier ?

 

'If you notice abuse and have more than just vague suspicions to report, please send a message to abuse@photo.net. However, you should be aware that we don't consider 3 through 5 to be low ratings!'

 

Brian I have been with P.N now for some time and brought with me a good number of keen amateurs as well as a couple of pros through my work and teaching. I have noticed in the past that there have been sporadic sniping but it does seam to have grown much more recently and started to get personal.

I have always tried to be fair with my judgement and have come to a conclusion that if a photo is so bad as long as the photographer enjoys what they are doing don?t rate it just give a constructive nudge on how they can make it better but not to rate it as this often upsets the person and I have no intention of upsetting someone just for the sake of it.

I took a photo which was used by the Mayor of London for his annual equality report a photo which I know is good and have had great feedback on before bringing it into P.N yet once I did, someone,,, well let me just say that I feel that it was an attack more on the subject than on the photo and this makes me very unhappy anyone who knows me knows just how close I am to my subjects and how much the work I do means to me. all I ask is if an image is defined as being above average and someone makes a point of slamming it should they if not have to explain to the artist why - then at least to the P.N their reasons for doing so.

It?s not just this image there are others most noticeably recent uploads but how are we to know if there are P.N trolls out there if these ratters are not being looked into.

 

If any other viewer can tell me why this image deserves a 1/1 I would be very grateful.

 

http://www.photo.net/photo/3727697

 

 

Sincere regards

 

 

Hugh Hill

How about no numerical ratings, only comments. The top rated gallery would be based on the selections of an editorial board. I think there would be plenty of people who would volunteer as members of the boards, and with qualifications too. No comment shorter than 25 words would be accepted. Images could be selected for view according to selected critics (who change from time to time) or number of comments. The number of comments field is actually very useful for finding interesting work.