I was thinking of something the other day and thought i'd toss the idea here. What do you think?
There are two reasons to vote up posts:
- To help identify good content.
- To gives kudos to a poster of a helpful reply.
These are not the same thing, nor do they apply the same way.
- Good content merely needs identification, so one point is usually enough; Kudos have no limit.
- Good content may be proved incorrect, and thus should be downvoted as well; Kudos are for the effort, not the content.
- Good content recognition is obviated when it becomes an answer (which has its own recognition); kudos are separate from being the answer.
- Good content recognition does not thank the poster's attitude; kudos do.
I have been assuming the "vote as helpful" means the reply is helpful (as opposed to the poster), which leaves me wanting a way to thank a poster for good effort. A few times i have voted a post as helpful and also posted a reply expressing gratitude.
This may be a bit much, but i would almost want to see two separate vote boxes. One for the post and another for the poster. Having two votes boxes next to each other, however, would be confusing, intrusive, tiring, and probably abused. I think i just want
a way to identify good posters.
The obvious answer is that's what points are for. To me, points identify activity. Well, the new point system does address this, but it rewards frequent posters of answers, as opposed to those otherwise helpful posters.
Just some thoughts which i am not quite clear on myself. But i thought i'd share. :)
