Low ratings by those with no uploads

There are many of those who, without any pictures uploaded, give LOW

ratings to everyone. I wonder if these are "real" people...or just

other photographers who, with an alias, want to lower everyone else

so their pictures become higher rated.

My suggestion: If you have NO photos uploaded, limit the ratings to

6 and 7.

Why wouldn't they then just give themselves 6s and 7s. It would have the same effect as giving others 1s and 2s.

 

Sometimes I think the best idea would be to make photographers give proof of age. That might limit childish behavior...but probably not.

The best way to deal with the issue is to ignore numerical ratings and be grateful for the relative handful of photo.netters who take the trouble to comment on our photos.

There is no way to legislate common sense or good taste. It is suppose to be a photo critique site, it seems to me. I am with Lex. The ratings are meaningless. And even worse than meaningless when they cause people grief. The best thing to do is ignore them.

"The best way to deal with the issue is to ignore numerical ratings"

 

Now how am I supposed to tell if my photography is any good if I don't have a number to rank it with? Or the scarier question.....how will you know if my photography is any good? Ignore the numbers? That's crazy talk.

 

(tounge planted firmly in cheek)

 

Karl

I prefer commenting other people shots, and explain why I like/dislike it, instead of rating without any explanation. I only rate those shots that, in my opinion, do deserve it. But I comment great shots, good shots, and not so god shots (from my point of view). So what´s the sense in rating if you don´t explain why? This is a site to learn and to improve our photographic skills, isn´t it?

So don´t get upset about the low ratings you get unless they come with an explanation, and even them, just consider that there are as many different opinions as many of us.

A few people here provide detailed, meaningful critiques. Whether we agree with what they say or not, we should appreciate the trouble that they go to in providing them. The more detailed their comments, the more we are able to understand their own viewpoint and, by implication, to understand the viewpoint of other people generally.<br>I provide very few critiques (simply don't get the time)and I provide hardly any 'ratings' - 5 in 2 years, I think. The ratings made without comment are, as others have said, almost meaningless and many are probably engineered. Anyone who wants to amass meaningless points is, IMO, totally missing the whole community concept of photo.net and should go to photosick instead.

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. According to the rating system, they are average ratings. In my opinion, the ratings on the whole are inflated, and in many cases the 3-5 ratings are more warranted than the 6's and 7's. Many of the latter are given by people trying to attract high ratings for their own photos, which (in my opinion) is more a problem than "low" ratings given by people without uploaded photos.

 

It is not a requirement to have photos uploaded in order to rate photos on this site.

 

Finally, a single rating on one photograph does not have a great deal of meaning, and it isn't a good idea to pay much attention to a single rating or a few. The ratings don't become meaningful until a photo or photographer has enough of them to be able to draw some statistical conclusions based on the overall trends.

I guess being in a technical career, I tend to view things in numbers.

 

My point is not the 3s and 4s. I mean the 1s and 2s that some members consistently give.

I guess my first question is "What do you consider a 'low' rating?" Is a 5 low? Is a 4 low? if you consider 4's and 5's low, then maybe your expectations are too high. I see very little in the way of questionable low ratings here on photo.net, the larger problem was the bogus high ratings that in my opinion, the staff has started to get under control with very minor changes to the site.

 

Lot's of folks say that the numbers mean nothing. I have to disagree, they mean something, just not everything. Comments are certainly preferable to numbers, but numbers can be used effectively and interpreted to gauge interest in your image. Isn't interest more important anyway?

 

Whenever I have an exhibit, nothing bugs me more than to have someone walk by one of my photographs with a casual glance and on to the next. I would rather they stop in their tracks, eyes pop out, and rant about how it is horrible than to ignore it.

 

You can't be all thing to all people. You can't please everybody. So even if 20 people give you 6's and 7's on what you think is one of your best images, invariably, someone will not be to keen on it and drop a 4 or 5 on you. It doesn't mean they are sabotaging you, it just means they don't like it as much as everyone else. They didn't tell you it was horrible, they just said that it was "fair" or "good". And the way that the default is set up in the top photo galleries now, the images with the most ratings are the ones at the top now, so if they really wanted to keep you off the front pages, they would ignore your photo and not rate it at all.

 

The ratings are an important part of photo.net....just not the most important part. The members are what make this site great.

I am unaware of any members that "consistently" give out 1's and 2's.

I don't mean to drag this on since obviously no one agrees with me. But take a look at this: http://www.photo.net/shared/community-member?user_id=511705

Actually, I don't think everyone disagrees with you - there are people who give low ratings and those who give high ratings consistently. [The example member you linked to seems to have an average in line with what is supposed to be an "average" rating, though.] The real issue is just that, in a large community, not everyone applies the same standards, so the rating system isn't really consistently applied. Perhaps someday, each rating will be accompanied by a stat showing whether that number is lower or higher than that individual rater's average. [Of course, that just means people will take it personally when they get a "lower than average" rating...]

 

That said, I do have a couple pictures uploaded and would give you all 1s and 2s if you like. [Just kidding.]

Photo.net ratings are like Photodo lens ratings.

 

Useful, as long as the rating isn't the only factor considered.

You wrote the following:

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1) "We don't consider 3 through 5 to be low ratings. According to the rating system, they are average ratings."

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I can see what you are trying to say here, and for the most part, I agree, but I also feel it is not right to dismiss all abuse complain regarding 3s and even 4s - 5s should probably indeed be dismissed 95% of the time. My point is that giving a rating of 2 to an image which has an average rating of 4 is not any different from giving a 3 to an image which has an average rating of 5, etc. There are pictures that obviously don't deserve a 3, but at least a 5. So if the same user repetedly rates with 3s such images, something there is worth your attention, imho.

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Then you wrote this:

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2) "In my opinion, the ratings on the whole are inflated, and in many cases the 3-5 ratings are more warranted than the 6's and 7's. Many of the latter are given by people trying to attract high ratings for their own photos, which (in my opinion) is more a problem than "low" ratings given by people without uploaded photos."

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Here, I agree 100%. But my question has been raised quite a while ago: what is photo.net going to do against this inflation. When I look at the top-rated pages, honestly, I just get sick. So, what I've been doing lately was to go to the Last 24 H > Number of rating pages, and to mostly critique pictures which had no ratings yet. That way at least, I feel I'm "saving" a few good or quite good shots from disappearing completely. I have - and very obviously MANY members have - completely given up rating the top pages.

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Why ? Because everything there gets 20 6s or 7s in a day or 2... and you'll be slammed by 20 people if you dare to disagree... By the way, it works wonders... Since I stopped critiquing the over-rated top images, people leave me alone - no more retaliations -, and I found my own pictures being over-rated on certain occasions. Very few people still bother opposing a general opinion expressed by 20 or more high ratings, and as a consequence of this, criticism is dying slowly, and people just pass when they don't like a shot, instead of explaining why. It's VERY obvious. E-mail me if you want examples...

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Shots that to me deserve a 4 or at most a 5 remain on the top pages for days accumulating what I would call undeserved 6s and 7s, and end up with an average of 6 and above. It has become IMPOSSIBLE to find the best shots without going through at least HALF of the top-rated pages. There are better shots on page 10 or 20 than on page 1 or 2...

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If rating mean nothing at all anymore, WHY HAVE THEM AT ALL ? If nothing else can be done right now, I was suggesting 2 things:

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a) The possibility of getting curators to go through the top pages soon and regularly.

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b) The possibility of simply limiting the number of 7s (and, to a lesser extent, 6s) available to each rater.

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These 2 measures appear to me as an easy way to stop or minimize the current inflation. I still have no clue why something you assess as being a problem would be left without a solution. I'd be really glad to know what I'm missing here, and why Photo.net lets this inflation ruin the whole system day after day... Good pictures disappear from the long term top pages every day, replaced by second or 3rd class photography. Doesn't it matter ? Is it really that difficult to put an end to this ? Do we have to watch the top pages sink like the Titanic, day after day...?

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Please, Brian, do address this matter once and for all... before it's too late... At least, let's discuss this, or just tell us what is your plan. Best regards.

Perhaps the solution is to allow 6 and 7 rating only from those who are photo.net patrons. People aren't going to jump in under several aliases and hand out 6s and 7s like candy if they must first make a donation to photo.net. We could do the same with 1 and 2 ratings.

 

Non-patrons would only be allowed to give ratings of 3, 4 and 5, so people with "fake" accounts created for the purpose of influencing ratings could only give ratings which are around the average level, while still being able to rate as "below average" with a 3, "average" with a 4 and "above average" with a 5.

 

Personally I think this is the best solution to the "problem". It would also encourage those who are heavily involved in the gallery and rating schemes to contribute to photo.net and support the large amount of time, effort, bandwidth and hardware resources that the gallery section of the site consumes. It's a win-win proposition.

Let's just imagine for a second, Bob, that some people would continue rating without suscribing - and there will be people like that, I believe... So, these people will then rate a 5 what maybe deserves a 6, or will rate a 3 what deserves a 2, simply because they wouldn't have the ability to rate according to what they think. This will certainly bring the averages down, but averages will make even less sense than they do now, since many raters won't be able to rate the way they would feel is right. If they suscribe, as a result of this, then fine, it will make money. But if not, they are just going to add irrelevance to the rating averages, or to drop out.

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Secondly, I do not think that there are THAT MANY fake accounts on PN - simply because fake accounts are not necessary to "win the race" -, but the real problem seems to come from a few groups of real individuals who basically team up and exchange 7s on daily basis. If all these individuals become donnors, fine, PN will get more money, but the system will be at least as flawed as it is now - assuming honest raters become donnors as well -, or will become even worse - if lots of honest members who are still critiquing drop out or are limited to 3s, 4s, and 5s.

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So, if I try to improve a bit on your idea, here's what comes to my mind. Donnors only can rate, full stop. The others don't even get 3s, 4s, and 5s - because that would just add flaws to the system.

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I can certainly see how it would help the site financially and also reduce on another hand the number of double accounts, but I can't see what real difference it would make to give back visibility to the pictures that deserve it, and to make the site easily searchable for the best images.

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If everyone suscribes, we'll just have the same situation as we have now - just less fake accounts, but I believe that's not a major issue -; and if only mate-raters subscribe, the situation will only get far worse. Right ?

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So, Bob, I'd say your idea - maybe amended a bit - is fine, but is just PART of the solution, and solves only the fake IDs problem as well as the $$ problem.

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Something else needs to be added to really solve the mate-rating problem and the rating inflation problem overall. Curators maybe, or maybe limit the amount of 7s and 6s and 1s and 2s available to EACH user - donner or not -, for example...

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What I don't understand is why it would be complicated to implement these 2 measures or what is wrong with them...? Probably very easy to implement, don't you think ? And wouldn't it solve the problem...? Couple these 2 ideas (or even just 1 of them) with the idea of allowing only donnors to rate or such, and the site will be clean. Right or not...? Seems clear to me, so what's wrong with the 2 measures I propose ?

What's wrong with them? Not much really, but you seem to be the only person who is seriously worried by the current scheme. Perhaps there are others, but they seem to be pretty silent on the issue. I don't know how many gallery users there are, but I suspect there are thousands.

 

There is NO scheme that will ever prevent friends from tradings 7s and enemies from trading 1s. That's just an unfortunate aspect of human nature. I don't think the effort of making an "overseeing committee" to rate the raters is really worth the effort, and nobody wants "the rating police" running the show.

 

I think registered users limited to 3, 4 or 5 and patrons allowed to rate beteen 1 and 7 is a good compromise. It doesn't take much away from the registered user and it gives the patron added benefit. It also eliminates "bogus" accounts made just for ratings having a large effect on overall score.

 

It's not perfect, but then we don't have a full time team of programmers and ratings police working 24hrs a day on this issue, nor is that likely to happen unless someone gives photo.net a grant of $250,000/yr to create and maintain the ultimate photo critique site. I'm pretty sure the majority of users don't care about petty gangs of photo thugs distorting the ratings of each other's images. There are probably better uses of photo.net's limited resources than forever tinkering with the ratings scheme.

"What's wrong with them? Not much really, but you seem to be the only person who is seriously worried by the current scheme."

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I don't think so. See the rating inflation thread and you'll see that there are a few others who are concerned - or read Tony Dummett's posts here and there on the site. But I can't tell for sure how many people actually care but keep quiet, and how many just don't care. According to the above, even Brian cares.

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But anyway, I guess it means that for as long as people don't all post a complaint in the forums, nothing will be done. Fair enough. At least it's an anwer.

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As for this: "There is NO scheme that will ever prevent friends from tradings 7s and enemies from trading 1s", I feel I have already demonstrated above that this is just plain wrong.

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Limiting the number of 1s and 2s and 6s and 7s available to all raters would obviously "prevent friends from trading" too many 7s and 6s, etc.

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I've got nothing more to add, and may the site prosper as it is, then. If the management has decided that it wasn't worth doing anything, I can't do much about it. Cheers, and thanks for your reply.

I'd add that the decisions on this matter are Brian's. I certainly don't speak for photo.net on this issue and I'm not directly involved in making or recommending changes to the existing system.

 

I think Brian has done an excellent job in accomodating the wishes of most users with regard to the gallery section of photo.net.

 

I'm not sure limiting the number of 1s, 2s, 6s and 7s would help anyway. All the "rogue users" would need to do is to give all the 6s and 7s to their friends and all the 1s and 2s to their rivals. My only point about limiting such ratings to patrons is that if people are going to play these games, photo.net might as well get some benefit from it!

 

But as I said, I don't speak for photo.net on this issue. These are just my own views.

"I'm not sure limiting the number of 1s, 2s, 6s and 7s would help anyway. All the "rogue users" would need to do is to give all the 6s and 7s to their friends and all the 1s and 2s to their rivals."

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To me, it's like saying that there is no difference between have 3 units of 100 USD notes to spend per month, and having an unlimited number of them. How can it not make a difference...? :-) If I've got an illimited number of 7s in my bag, it's very simple, I give 7s to all except those who won't return the favor ! And I wait till they return the 7s to me, as simple as that. If I have only a few 7s (and 6s) available per month, once I've given out these high ratings to a few of my friends' images, I'm running out of stock. But all the other honest members will then use their 7s on other pictures which deserve them, and it will make the majority's votes count more than mate-raters' votes in the end.

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But that's probably too obvious, and I must be wrong somewhere...:-)

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I know that you are not the decision-maker on these matters, Bob. Thanks for your concern anyway... Regards.

I'm in the care very much, but normally keep quiet group. The

inflation within the specific groups is not just related to photo.net.

You find it everywhere in art. There isn't really much one can do,

because humans will always find a work around. My only

reasons to visit critque sites have become learning, and sharing

thoughts. If it weren't, human nature would destroy my

enjoyment. The clique mentality is a shame, but seemingly

unavoidable.

I agree with Jay that it would be wonderful if there were a system that was totally objective and in which ratings today could be compared with ratings 5 years ago and ratings 5 years into the future. I also agree with Jay that this is probably an impossible task, given human nature.

 

I don't think devising ever more complex and convoluted schemes to thwart either "rating inflation" or "rating abuse" is practical or productive. There will always be a way for the determined to get around any "checks and balances".

 

The best cure would be to get more people to give ratings (assuming you want ratings). If you have 1000 ratings it's not likely that any small cliques could influence the numbers much. When you have 10 ratings it's pretty easy. I'm not sure how that can be done either. That doesn't address inflation though.

 

If you assume that the average image submitted to photo.net will always be of the same standard I suppose you could "normalize" the ratings every month so that the mean (or median?) score would be 4.0. Sort of like grading on a curve. Sound pretty artificial though. Still I'm sure it would make some people happy...

"I also agree with Jay that this is probably an impossible task, given human nature."

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"PROBABLY" ? Well, here's a different stand point. Are you a chess player, Bob ? If you are, try looking up for Gufeld's "Mona Lisa", one of the most beautiful chess games ever played. Nobody, even among so many masters and grand-masters, would PROBABLY ever think of any of the 5 decisive moves Gufeld played in this game. Almost nobody would even have the idea of considering the first move, because "probably" it is a losing move. Yet, it wins the game in all variations.

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To me, saying that this or that PROBABLY wouldn't work is a flaw in itself. What a logical person does in such case is to analyze rationally whether there is a way to beat inflation, or not.

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"I don't think devising ever more complex and convoluted schemes to thwart either "rating inflation" or "rating abuse" is practical or productive."

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That's an opinion. My opinion is that it isn't very productive for me to log on to photo.net nowadays if what I want is to see great images and interesting threads.

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"There will always be a way for the determined to get around any "checks and balances"."

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That's what you assume, whereas I assume exactly the contrary. But what's funny is that eventhough I present above clear reasons to show that reducing the number of 6s and 7s would work, that's still not good enough, though you can't refute this idea logically. And there comes the general statement "It can't be done".

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I hope you and photo.net realize that a person called Jim Schwaigger has spent hours and hours analyzing to come up with a way to solve the rating inflation, and that you are now saying that all this was for nothing, based on one general assertion, without any logical demonstration.

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"The best cure would be to get more people to give ratings (assuming you want ratings). If you have 1000 ratings it's not likely that any small cliques could influence the numbers much. When you have 10 ratings it's pretty easy."

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Yes, that is correct. How to stimulate people to rate images more than they do now ? Well, Jim had quite a few interesting ideas on that topic. What I would do for sure, as a start, would be to simply ask people the following questions: 1) Do you rate images on PN ? 2) In average how many images per month would you say you rate lately ? 3) Do you rate less images than you did before ? Or more ? Or roughly the same number ? WHY have your rating habits changed lately, if they have ?

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Then PN could also ask members: Are you happy, unhappy, or neutral about the rating system as it works now...?

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You told me that I'm the only one being unhappy with what I see, and admitted not knowing for sure. So why not ask ?

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You can ask in an archived thread that is prominent on the front page for a month or even more, and if that's not good enough to get enough replies, you can add the questions right in peoples' workspace, and make it compulsory for them to answer. So, if photo.net WANTS to know all this, it's easy to find out.

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What's even easier is to find out that many people stopped rating, and to silently wonder why they silently dropped out, and then to conclude that everything is as good as it can ever be...

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Nobody wins a chess game by resigning at the first move, that's for sure...

There have been numerous discussions of the rating system. The problems with the system are very well understood. The difficulty is finding solutions to the problems.

 

Most of the solutions fail because they don't take account of the fact that people participate in the Gallery and the rating system voluntarily and for fun. photo.net is not the government and photo rating is not like jury duty. We can't compel people to rate photos. The number of people who selflessly give many more ratings than they receive is quite small. (Ironically, some of the most selfless people receive the most criticism from other participants.) A rating system which is statistically "accurate" (whatever that might mean) but which does not attract anyone to participate is not much use to anyone.

 

Another constraint on solutions is that any new system has to be not too different from what we have now. There are three reasons for this: (1) a radical change would require too much development time; (2) a radical change might not be accepted, and would be a big risk for the site; (3) a radical change would leave us with the problem of what to do with the millions of ratings already in the system.

 

At present, we are currently averaging somewhere around 1200-1400 photo submitssions per day and around 4500 ratings per day, meaning around 3-4 ratings per submitted photo. This is not a statistically significant number. In order for a particular photo to get a statistically significant number of ratings, it must get many more than it's "fair share" of ratings. This happens through two main mechanisms:

 

(1) the photo is excellent or controversial and attracts a lot of ratings. This is the mechanism that we intend, and it would produce generally reliable rankings of the top 10% or so of photos.

 

Or, (2) people organize themselves into groups of friends and contribute more than the average number of ratings per person, but mostly to their friends' photos. The ratings become the currency of exchange within social groups, and the photo rankings become as much or more an indicator of social skills than the quality of the photographs. This second mechanism is not what we intend. But it is pervasive, and while it results in photos with a number of ratings that might be statistically significant, the results are suspect because of the manner in which the ratings are exchanged.

 

So, it looks like we should just "eliminate" friend-rating -- somehow. But, will we be driving people out of the system entirely? The friend-rating problem (and ratings inflation, of which friend-rating is a primary cause) were created by making ratings non-anonymous in August 2001. That is very clear. However, Gallery participation, as measured by photos submitted and number of ratings, has also doubled since August 2001. So, friend-rating may undermine the statistical value of the photo rankings, but it may also be the factor driving increased participation in the Gallery.