What could the rating system be?

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<p><em>"In view of recent events, I have revised my point of view on this matter..."</em></p>

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<p>Line, your recent experience has been described and debated since before I joined in 2000, and no doubt your perception will further evolve as things calm a little; and that's the problem with setting site policy - it's impossible to please everyone so weighing cost/benefit to the site must take precedence over personal feelings. <br>

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The general objective of the site, by my understanding, is to create a harmonious atmosphere in a way that is conducive to attracting new members, promote high rate of existing member participation, and hopefully resulting in member subscriptions. Ratings play a big part in this, so any revision must take into consideration its impact on the overall functioning of the site, or at least make it "better". <br>

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<p>Michael, I was not implying that my feelings should be addressed, and I do share your understanding of the objective. I was only pointing out that there is bullying by a handful of people and that it contributes to a lesser participation. Thanks for taking the time to share your opinion. We share the same goal of a better environment with more involved members... hoping to build a stronger community.</p>

<p>Line, many of us have experienced the same thing - emails or private messages accusing us of giving ratings lower than the photographer believed he or she deserved. It's unfortunate and unpleasant, but I just ignore them.</p>

<p>And, yes, that's one reason why I've long suggested the popularity contest ratings system be entirely anonymous. That includes eliminating the "photos rated highest by this member" option, since this option is used to determine who gave our photos ratings of 6 or 7 (the only photos that are shown via that option). That option tends to cause some folks to obsess over who gave them ratings of 6 or 7, and who gave them "low ratings". So now anything lower than 6 is considered "bad".</p>

<p>It probably does discourage some folks from offering ratings. At the moment overall site activity seems way down, as does the overall volume of ratings. Photos submitted for ratings used to quickly accumulate the five ratings necessary to show an average. Now it may take several days, or the photos may never accumulate enough ratings at all to show an average.</p>

<p>Unfortunately this skews the ratings because it takes only a handful of people to significantly manipulate the ratings. I see some of this happening now. So the simple popularity contest type of approach to the current ratings system doesn't work well when only a relative handful of people are participating, many of whom are generally using the system to reward friends - literally rating everything their friends post as 7 - rather than showing any discernment. </p>

<p>Encouraging more people to participate in the ratings would help minimize the deliberate skewing. It should also help show more diversity in the TRP, which now tends to suffer from a certain uniformity and predictability. I see the same handful of photographers producing the same types of photos, dominating the TRP every day, week and month throughout the year. It's probably discouraging to new members who haven't figured out that the current system is primarily dominated by cliques of a handful of veteran members.</p>

<p>Lex,<br>

I did ignore it although it means I have to play in an unpleasant setting, since the alternative was to stop playing and giving them what they schemed to get from me. Unfortunately I am sure that many people just walked away from it and I can't blame them... </p>