Negative Votes Changes - Commenting is now Required

scotty on 24/02/2008 - 22:14

Negative votes have always been controversial here at OzBargain, and I am making a new change again and hopefully the situation will get better this time. This change is derived from a small discussion from this deal post (somewhere in the middle when ozpete raised the issue on negative votes), and I thought it was a good idea so I coded the change.

Basically,

  • Now you need to have at least one comment in the deal to cast negative vote against it.
  • One-liner comment is no longer required as you would have written a comment explaining your action.

Hopefully it will encourage members to fully explain why negative votes are given.

Site Discussion

Comments

  • POWERevolution on 24/02/2008 - 22:48

    Good idea

  • bevisaurus on 25/02/2008 - 00:32

    Great change!

  • moo on 25/02/2008 - 08:59

    At least now there will be justification behind negative voting :) Cheers Scott.

    • JeffreyM on 25/02/2008 - 16:02

      moo - ever since the comments part of negative voting has been launched most of the time there is justification behind a negative vote.

      • moo on 26/02/2008 - 00:51

        Ah yes. I have misread the post, sorry…I must be getting old sigh

  • [Deactivated] on 25/02/2008 - 11:49

    Scott- nice change and fast action as well - Lets see how it goes - at least we will have some constructive comments on why a deal isn't always well received, and a way someone can reply to that comment

    • JeffreyM on 25/02/2008 - 16:51

      ozpete - I agree about the constructive comments bit, but someone has always been able to reply to someone else who has made a negative vote but choose not to that's why no they have to.

  • JeffreyM on 25/02/2008 - 16:52

    I think this is a good idea, but there still should be the comment box, so that when you click on the votes tab - you'll know why that user has voted negative without having to go to another page.

  • JeffreyM on 25/02/2008 - 16:59

    Also I found a new feature that Scotty has added, if you click on any member then click on their picture & you head into their page & click on "Voted Deals" - it tells you the deals that the member has voted for.

  • John on 25/02/2008 - 17:03

    Good one!

  • MiCCAS on 07/03/2008 - 23:46

    Smart idea!!

  • Mikinoz on 20/03/2010 - 18:51

    Good start although good we then justify a positive vote, that way we have everything transparent. Personally i dont see the problem with a neg vote i think it balances up the equation more than we realise.

    The problem with the current system makes it hard to neg vote but keep the deal active which is probably a mathematicians nightmare, its nice to see an objective opinion and a postive exist in the same thread at the moment it cant without to sides naturally opposed and no one wants that in the end we all want to save money and buy good deals

    my main point is let it be more open to both postive and negative points of view without the knives coming out (maybe impossible)

    You vote you comment is my thoughts

    • Blah Blah on 22/05/2010 - 14:48

      "Good start although good we then justify a positive vote, that way we have everything transparent."
      Agreed, some of the moderators here are trying to stop (and even removing) negative votes whilst there are members that vote everything they see as a positive. As there is a limit to how many negative votes can be voted by a user a day then there should also be a limit to how many positive votes can be votes also. Right now a member can't vote negative enough times if there are enough bad deals but other members can merrily vote positive even without consideration of the "deal".

      Many people vote positive with no reason (as they don't need to) when later it turns out the "deal" wasn't a good deal at all, but the positives don't get removed but the moderators sometimes remove negative votes. I personally read one moderator here ABUSING members (and not just one time, hint hint it is the ex American). You wonder why people don't post deals as much as people think would occur (there is a discussion about leechers elsewhere and also being afraid to vote negative); I personally think its because of the attitude here of moderators REMOVING negative votes and other times persuading or coercing members to remove their negative vote and comments.

      This site is hardly transparent nor fair to many "deals" that are posted or even to members (being abused by a moderator (IN PUBLIC EVEN!) is hardly right, yet Scotty allows (encourages presumably as that moderator is still a moderator and there has been NO apology from that moderator)) abuse of members by his moderating team.

      I think Scotty only wants good deals so he can make us much on advertising (I never said profit), if there appeared to be less high voted deals (ie real member input) it may not seem to be such an attractive place to advertise.

      I've seen people comment how they have only brought as the deal had a positive vote then they realise it wasn't, if people could vote negatively easier with less abuse from moderators AND positive voters had to justifying their votes then there maybe less high scoring "deals" but more thought going into voting.

      This site seems to be ONLY after positive votes even if the deals are not great at all (many deals get less then 10 positive votes anyway).

      • [Deactivated] on 22/05/2010 - 15:09

        Read the wiki, then come back and raise points that it doesn't address.

        http://www.ozbargain.com.au/wiki/help:voting_guidelines

        And if you are really still concerned that mods haven't followed these then raise them, but not in a general way. At least copy the URL so we can see what the problem is.

      • pauly on 23/05/2010 - 03:24

        Blah Blah, as per ozpete's post, pretty much most things you need to know about the voting system on OzBargain is explained in the voting guidelines. I think there are misconceptions by some members about what negative voting is about on OzBargain and how they work here.

        Negative votes should not be used to determine how popular a deal is or to express your personal opinion on the deal, rather it should be used to as a warning based on facts (hence justification required) that something is seriously wrong with the deal. Unlike the voting system on most sites, negative votes here do have an impact on its visibility for all other members and visitors. As a member myself, I surely wouldn't want to miss out on what may be an excellent deal for me, but not for majority of others. Hence why we moderate these.

        If you don't like a deal, then just don't vote. From a popularity perspective, this alone is sort of a 'negative' for the deal. For unpopular deals or deals which are not really that great for many, they wouldn't even make it to the front page for most (based on their customised preference) because the deal doesn't get enough positive votes.

        some of the moderators here are trying to stop (and even removing) negative votes whilst there are members that vote everything they see as a positive.

        As explained above what negative votes are for, and why moderators revoke them when not used properly.

        As there is a limit to how many negative votes can be voted by a user a day then there should also be a limit to how many positive votes can be votes also. Right now a member can’t vote negative enough times if there are enough bad deals but other members can merrily vote positive even without consideration of the “deal”.

        Like a deal / personally think it's a good deal = Positive
        Don't like a deal / personally think it's a bad deal = No vote

        They both don't have limits. They both don't get moderated.

        Many people vote positive with no reason (as they don’t need to) when later it turns out the “deal” wasn’t a good deal at all, but the positives don’t get removed but the moderators sometimes remove negative votes.

        As above, we moderate negative votes because the purpose of these tend to be misunderstood by some members. We mods respect all votes that affect the popularity of a deal, hence why we do not moderate your no votes/positive votes regardless or whether a comment is made. If a member requests for a vote to be revoked long after casting a positive, mods can do this!

      • scotty on 23/05/2010 - 23:29

        I think Scotty only wants good deals so he can make us much on advertising.

        I would love to know how to make advertising on good deals, as Google AdSense is pretty much what I have here, and those guys don't care whether a deal is good or not.

        For every person complaining about their negative votes revoked, we are probably getting similar amount of reports (or sometimes even more!) that those negative votes are not justified — not just from the OP but many other members as well. Moderators are sometimes between rock and a hard place and we cannot please everyone, but please trust our judgement here.

  • Mikinoz on 21/03/2010 - 09:26

    After replying to another post i thought it more relavant here:

    After a bit of thought, i think it would be relavant to have Mini Bargains in addition to normal bargains that way it would be a good indentifier that it didnt quite make it, or its not quite deemed a bargain like others here .

    For example if it gets voted down it goes to a new category ie Mini Bargains until the reps either improve it or it has a time limit of say 24hrs, that way making it available to all for a longer period. Obviously blatant non bargains should still be removed.

    I think this will help new users and new reps, without sending them completely of the ozbargain playing field.

    We are trying to encourage reps with great baragins right ? but obviously we want them to play by the rules :)

    • scotty on 21/03/2010 - 21:22

      Thanks for the suggestion. However with the fast moving nature of OzBargain, having the store reps re-work on their offer for 24 hours might not be feasible.

      Store rep presented bargains should really be "real deals" before they even attempt to post on OzBargain. I found for many they will eventually work that out after a few tries. I do thank members giving constructive comments/suggestions to merchants on what they can offer — they will hopefully come back with a better offer next time.

  • Cripto on 02/07/2010 - 23:31

    Minor question, in a scenario where there's an overwhelming request for a negative vote to be revoked, do moderators have godly power over the choice irrelevant of what any normal members think?

    I understand moderators do a great job here and it's not easy when it comes to making complex decisions, although are mods personally selected through friendship? through skills of judgement? is there a degree required to conclude an outcome? Basically an example would be, if a couple of mods decide a negative vote has merit and should stand, whilst numerous other members think otherwise, does this mean mods decisions are final based merely on what they think?

    As being a moderator at various forums, I feel mods generally have distinct power over decisions; and any other mods/admins would back me up, but in case of many members questioning the act (either before or after the mod has spoken), does this mean the negative vote will always stand? or should the negative vote be discussed with all mods without being biased - or even deciding what members think. I think if there are many members who think a negative vote should be revoked, then it should be up to the wider community with a little influence coming from mods, despite of what they may think.

    To quickly bring up the point about reputation, I don't think a founder of an organisation would contact a moderator over a couple of negative votes, as seen previously, most are quite modest. Hence any negative votes have (I believe) an impact on the offer/promotion.

    Recent example of such discussion between members and two moderators.

    http://www.ozbargain.com.au/node/27929

    • scotty on 03/07/2010 - 23:03
      +1

      My philosophy behind moderation (whether the moderators agree or not :) is that less is more. Let the community decide, and only intervene when necessary.

      We have discussed about using negative votes on the comment to automatically revoke negative votes on the deal, since you must provide a comment before you can vote on a deal. Some level of threshold needs to be defined.

      However there's always a worry that a merchant would use the community power to force removal of a negative vote. For example a merchant can promise an "exclusive offer" for the removal of a negative vote, and the community might bite that — this is something we want to discourage. I guess mods need to intervene in those situations, which should be pretty rare.

  • t400 on 20/03/2011 - 01:54

    I am going to take this plan, but need to know,

    1 how long can the $10.99 plan go? 1 month or 2 months, then move back to normal price?

    I don't want to port out the current plan to LC then port out LC again after a few months.

    2 how to check the usage?

    $400 is a lot, but it is also easy to spend over $400, really need to check usage every day.

    • pauly on 20/03/2011 - 05:09

      I think you are replying to the wrong thread. Perhaps this thread?

  • bcheng on 20/03/2011 - 08:29

    Good idea, I support it.

  • 1mick on 22/04/2011 - 08:35

    website does not work

  • bargainhulk on 27/02/2012 - 22:13
    -2

    doesn't work

    • scotty on 27/02/2012 - 22:26
      +1

      What doesn't work?

  • Parko on 02/05/2012 - 14:58

    My first negative rating/comment and well deserved. Don't put up a great deal if your site cannot handle the increase in traffic. What a joke and a waste of time. I now boycott www.winemarket.com.au and give them bad karma.

  • Geewhizz on 24/05/2012 - 07:03

    I've just come accross an occurrence where a member has commented (obviously to be able to neg) and then simply deleted their comment - pretty much defeats the purpose of the exercise really.

    • scotty on 25/05/2012 - 07:30

      If you come across something like this, report it and moderator would remove their votes. Do note that sometimes they have left comments elsewhere that support their negative vote so do look around in the same deal.

  • madmax2 on 05/10/2012 - 14:32

    As always - Out of stock. Thank you for clicking Dick Smith

    madmax2 on 05/10/2012 - 14:32 (Collapsed - Offtopic. Show)
  • sludo on 12/12/2012 - 10:37

    wrong section

  • newington07 on 17/12/2012 - 12:15

    Hi,

    I was having a discussion on neg vote with a mod, and I was referred to this forum. Found this thread so thought will post here.

    I noticed that my negative vote was revoked on this deal:
    http://www.ozbargain.com.au/node/87704

    I had commented twice initially (but didn't vote at all):
    http://www.ozbargain.com.au/node/87704?page=1#comment-115213…
    http://www.ozbargain.com.au/node/87704?page=1#comment-115215… (somebody even neg this info comment, jeez!)

    Only when I realised the impact of the deal later on, did I vote negative after my third comment here:
    http://www.ozbargain.com.au/node/87704?page=2#comment-115255…
    Do note that I got +13 positive votes here.

    It looks like there is a fundamental issue here. Since my negative vote was attached to all comments made by me, a few users might have thought that I voted neg with my first comment (which was not the case) and I got -6 votes which revoked my neg vote.

    I suggest following solutions (these may not be possible/ideal, but I am trying):

    1. If users feel that the voter incorrectly voted negative, then other users should REPORT the negative vote and a notification is generated to the comment-writer to justify. Mods should be copied on such notifications. If no justification is received, the vote is revoked.

    2. All negatives votes require a reason (not just a comment). When users click '-' on the deal, a reason text box pops up. That reason may be highlighted/starred in the comments section so people know THIS is the reason of a negative vote and not other comments of the same user. Negative votes by other users on some other comments of negative deal-voter should not impact his neg vote. Negative votes by other users on the REASON should revoke the negative deal-voter's vote.

    Cheers.

    • Moderator[Deactivated] on 18/12/2012 - 12:45

      Like all ideas there needs to be an assessment of the degree to which implementation occurs.

      To moderate to the degree that you mention just doesnt seem worthwhile.

      Given the deal you voted on (308 plus votes) what do you think your 1 negative vote would achieve?

      In the overall scheme of things it means nothing.

      Plus the issue is that if someone sees a negative vote, they and the mods will tend to look at the first post you made, nothing will stop that. This is emphasised in the guidelines.

      From guidelines

      NOTE the mods look at your first comment about why you voted negative, they don't go through all the comments you make, so if you are adding to the reason you voted you must add these to your first comment.

      You say that you got 13 positive votes on the deal, 4 of those were after the vote was revoked, and there were also 2 negative votes on that specific comment.

      If no justification is received, the vote is revoked.

      Your reason for voting this down was because it closed a loophole that was be exploited by a few. This you made after the loophole was closed, so in effect pointless - the horse has bolted.

      Plus this is a place to share, not hide "deals" like all exploits or errors, if the person who discovers it doesnt post it, then we wont know, and often the exploit wont be discovered. Its a conundrum but its against what we are here for - Sharing.

      Now that then would mean as a mod, is this a valid neg, given that its recommending not to share, which is what this place is.

      So what you propose, ie that the mods make the decision, might not end up changing anything, and it might end up depending on which mod reads and acts on the reports.

      • newington07 on 18/12/2012 - 13:32

        Hi ozpete,

        1. You should not view that deal in isolation (it is not about 308 v 1). My general point was that the revoke implementation has holes.

        2. I understand and agree with your reference to the guideline that I should have edited my first comment. That's a workaround which would do for now I guess. Somehow I missed it.

        3. If you read my other later comments on the same deal, you would understand my point. I have clarified that I not anti-share. What I am saying is that do not kill the golden goose, let it lay the golden eggs regularly. I never said not to share, I only said do not share like that which closed all the future benefits OzBargainers would have got. Sharing the original code was perfectly fine. but not the javascript thing. That's my two cents.

        • Moderator[Deactivated] on 18/12/2012 - 14:53

          OzBargainers would have got. Sharing the original code was perfectly fine. but not the javascript thing. That's my two cents.

          Probably also need to make that clearer. It wasnt obvious to me on the reading by me.

          I guess one major point is that its hard enough moderating deals/complaints etc without adding complexity. If you can think of a way that doesnt add to that then its probably workable. With multi posts, etc and volunteer administration making it more complex probably wont work.

          This is not to say we dont understand the frustration, in the 5+ years of being on this site, there are still members of equal standing who dont know how to use the negative vote as intended.

    • Moderatorscotty on 19/12/2012 - 23:34

      @newington07 — agreed that it's a current shortcoming of the negative vote revocation system, where any comment by the neg-voter can be used to revoke the vote. The occurrence is rare though — at least from the reports that we've received so far.

      As of your solutions:

      1. We have users reporting incorrect negative votes, where moderators end up having to decide whether a vote is valid or not. That puts the burden on the moderators, which we ended up having a pretty complicated voting guidelines yet still producing inconsistent result. We currently have a pretty small moderating team and I can see the inconsistency magnifies even more if the team grows bigger.

        Having community moderates the votes just mean the moderators can work on something else (and put the vote disputes as "someone else's problem")

      2. We'll consider that (associating negative vote with a specific comment) although that (1) adds more complexity (2) neg voters sometimes make better arguments in follow up comments so the original comment might still got voted down, even though subsequent comments provide more justifications. So it's still not solving the initial problem.

  • helnandez on 29/11/2013 - 13:29

    Typical Australian Apple Deal

  • foobar on 03/12/2013 - 07:51

    On the subject of voting, would it be possible to change the ability to re-cast a vote? I just tried to + a comment but the mouse moved ever so slightly to the right and I negged instead. I revoked immediately and would still like to + but can't. I know I'm not the first to make this mistake and I certainly won't be the last, there's only a few pixels between a + and - on comment voting.

    I propose that a small window of time exists - say 60 seconds or less, even 30 would do - where if you revoke your own vote, it's like you never voted in the first place and are still able to vote the way you intended.

    • Moderatorscotty on 03/12/2013 - 08:54

      Yes yes. It's on our TODO list for a while and we'll allow re-casting votes within a short time frame to allow people to correct mistakes.

      • foobar on 03/12/2013 - 09:00

        Okay cool, I did look at the developments list the other day when Neil linked to it and there are a few voting related things listed but I didn't notice this particular item or anything similar.

        This would also help people on mobile devices where it's even more likely a voting mistake is made. I've generally given up trying to vote on my phone and when I do I make sure I zoom in as much as I can to make sure I don't get it wrong.

  • flocof on 13/02/2014 - 10:45

    I am negging this post, ridiculous!

  • craigdalejohn on 01/03/2014 - 11:31

    Its expired

    • Food on 01/03/2014 - 21:07
      -1

      Cheers, it was a good deal while it was around! got 4 im my time

  • craigdalejohn on 07/03/2014 - 22:17

    Problem viewing

  • craigdalejohn on 07/03/2014 - 23:26

    It prohibits me from viewing.

  • JJPS on 23/04/2014 - 21:32

    i found most of the items are price doubled compare to other Chinese grocery shops. $10 off $70 is not a bargain at all. Unless you got no choice, otherwise, forgot about this.

    • neil on 23/04/2014 - 21:39
      +2

      Ummm. OK?

  • Gav on 24/04/2014 - 00:02

    Please consider this a requirement for negative votes on comments too. For example I got -2 tonight for fact correction (with facts clear as day for all to read). Without the context of the vote I can only assume it's a personal attack or an inability to properly understand facts from those voters.

  • TRENT86 on 24/04/2014 - 21:21

    I don't mind the idea but now I'm sure we will have people just saying nasty things in their comments

  • tongyun on 20/05/2014 - 14:17
    -1

    it is a definitely website of lier

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