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On the serious issue of XP devaluation and other tangentially related or unrelated passing thoughts

by oiskuu (Hermit)
on May 19, 2016 at 17:59 UTC ( [id://1163505]=monkdiscuss: print w/replies, xml ) Need Help??

Now that the shady practices of XP-clipping have been brought to light?, I was thinking this could be the right occasion to address the shortcomings—whether perceived or actual—of the feedback and voting mechanisms, that is to say, to mull things over.

I'll start with a few ideas.

  • What if monks could cast two votes on any node: first strictly during the main voting period, the other available later (but no sooner than one voting period after the first). This would open up the possibilities of correcting mistakes, placing emphasis.
  • Reminder messages. A node that you've accepted has not been answered in 24 hours. A node you've frontpaged has no answer in 12 hours. (XP demerit elective.)
  • Preliminary votes ie temporary-votes ie fake-votes ie phantom-votes ie were-votes ie mere-hints. These votes disappear after a month or so. How's it going to work: somebody soft-votes to place your node higher in the thread, now other monks are more likely to vote on it, everyone's happy.
  • Monk of the Year. Get your pic (statue) on PM during the next year. (Best XP gainer wins the Trophy.)

Discuss.

Replies are listed 'Best First'.
Re: On the serious issue of XP devaluation and other tangentially related or unrelated passing thoughts
by Your Mother (Archbishop) on May 19, 2016 at 21:25 UTC

    I object to the use of "shady." It's an open codebase, well, partly, with a standing invitation to anyone who wants to become a dev to join in and dig a ditch.

    It doesn't matter if the system's design doesn't sit right with one. If equal rules apply to all, it's egalitarian. If one actually cares, one can get a commit bit and find out just how enjoyable this fork3 of the Everything Engine is to hack. :P I thought I cared once and tried. it Now I'm just grateful others who have the chops care a bit more.

    These discussions have always bothered me. They seem to start with acrimony and land at demands for difficult code changes without anyone making the demands stepping up to do the work they insist needs be done.

Re: On the serious issue of XP devaluation and other tangentially related or unrelated passing thoughts (RTMF?)
by tye (Sage) on May 20, 2016 at 02:56 UTC

    There is no "XP clipping". And there is nothing shady going on as the exact calculations have been rather prominently and rather extensively documented for over a decade. You don't even need access to the code base as Your Mother at least implied. You simply have to take the time and effort to read and understand the documentation.

    - tye        

      It was more about if one felt the documentation or gods were lying, one could check, not that there was no documentation, nor that explanations were not full and forthcoming when requested. :P

Re: On the serious issue of XP devaluation and other tangentially related or unrelated passing thoughts
by LanX (Saint) on May 19, 2016 at 23:04 UTC
    1st of April... again?

    This sounds like XP was a real currency and you are selling start-ups to venture capitalists. ;)

    BTW up and down-votes are so 90s. .. how comes PM still has no side-votes ? ? ?

    Cheers Rolf
    (addicted to the Perl Programming Language and ☆☆☆☆ :)
    Je suis Charlie!

      I want my “no confidence” vote.

      Also, how dare you make light of this dire serious situation?!?

        Careful my friend, I still have 7 back-votes left!

        Cheers Rolf
        (addicted to the Perl Programming Language and ☆☆☆☆ :)
        Je suis Charlie!

      It sounds like you are onto something here Rolf and, since I know that you are mathematically astute, I can't help but connect the dots to understand that you are talking about using the square root of -1 as the basic voting unit, with complex multiplication as the group operation. I'm all for it! In the spirit of perl, we can let monks cast "i" or "j" votes, but the real mojo would be in acquiring a scaling factor to break out of the unit circle.

      Even better, if you can come up with a sensible voting scheme that uses quaternions, then we'd get the voting system "out of the 90s" and I could finally get a feel for what those darned things are.

Re: On the serious issue of XP devaluation and other tangentially related or unrelated passing thoughts
by oiskuu (Hermit) on May 20, 2016 at 22:29 UTC

    My apologies'n'condolences to those of us who cannot handle the dead-pan Leslie-Nielsen-serious?. And I do admit, the idea of having BUK discover his nodes losing rep made me giggle a bit. But! Tongue-in-cheek and serious aren't mutually exclusive.

    Part of the reason that gave me this writing impulse is having been witness to some disheartening events on certain other forum(s). Growing organically for more than a decade, they must've had the right stuff going on. And yet, I see the ham-handed approaches of the administrator: where a thread becomes unpalatable, the response is to lock it down. Something based on ancient phpBB; there's no XP, no thumbs, no voting there. Which lead me to a premise...

    It's 2016 now, and I think any sizable open forum needs a smart method for tension management. Personalities will always collide; trolling and counter-trolling will happen. To shut them off is to preclude conflict resolution, preclude any meaningful outcome (other than frustration).

    But what better way to handle this than to employ a game framework. The usual usual: a resource that holds a meaning, moves one can play, victory conditions. Trophies, Top20, you name it. Perlmonks already has this XP minigame (and to great advantage too), but it's about as complicated as a broom simulator.

    Want it simple yet complex? Well, probably the easiest is to bring in some poker elements...

      And yet, I see the ham-handed approaches of the administrator

      No such thing as the administrator here. Plenty of cabals, though... but checks and balances are working pretty well imho.

      It's 2016 now, and I think any sizable open forum needs a smart method for tension management.

      Didn't you realize yet that the smartest method of tension management is the peaceful and considerate interaction of the PerlMonks regulars? In your lifetime you couldn't program a better tension management framework involving agents, methods, charts, roles, delegation and whatnot but what already is established.

      But what better way to handle this than to employ a game framework. The usual usual: a resource that holds a meaning, moves one can play, victory conditions. Trophies, Top20, you name it.

      This would go against the Camel's hair and against PerlMonks Zen-Sation. People are here to learn, and teach. No such thing as victory conditions, for victory on one side means defeat on the other. Whilst I have seen strife and battle here with arguments to make a point, I rarely sensed that these were carried out to boost ones ego, rather these were struggles to nail down and get some enlightenment.

      Game framework - really? My neck hair - and my beard and eyebrows - bristle, hearing of that idea. What's next? Game theory cast into PerlMonks engine code, that old blunder inherited from the cold war which made its way into economy via neoliberalism, into society as a whole via Thatcherism, into working conditions via ISO-9001, ISO-127001, into coding via scrum and agile, into schooling via PISA and whatnot? Please.

      Perlmonks already has this XP minigame (and to great advantage too), but it's about as complicated as a broom simulator.

      PerlMonks is the minigame, and XP is nothing but a bit of spice spread over it. Nothing more. Don't let us overestimate the pepper and foster spice wars. PerlMonks is a wonderful game, and we all are the game, the players, the rules, the gaming delight and the game's bounty.

      perl -le'print map{pack c,($-++?1:13)+ord}split//,ESEL'
        No such thing as ''the administrator'' here.

        Well, I wouldn't stretch that too far; we do have 'an administrator', it's just not a single person. We have the gods, and the janitors and power users to whom aisle clean-up and troll squelching have been delegated (respectively); but in general, each member of these groups is free to act alone -- even ham-handedly. You're right about checks and balances, though, because any cabalist (including gods!) can find himself defrocked if he's deemed to have abused his power.

        In your lifetime you couldn't program a better tension management framework involving agents, methods, charts, roles, delegation and whatnot but what already is established.

        It almost sounds like you're saying our system is perfect. Do you simply mean a better system couldn't be programmed?

        I rarely sensed that these were carried out to boost ones ego

        Not nearly rarely enough, imho. "Our chief weapon is hubris! Hubris, and impatience. Our two weapons are..."

        Game framework - really?

        No such thing as victory conditions, for victory on one side means defeat on the other.

        PerlMonks is already gamified. The XP system we have now is a stereotypical example of gamification.

        I don't think having "victory conditions" in a gamified system requires that victory (and defeat) occur as they do in an actual game because, among other things, there is no end. It really just sets the definition of what the users are striving for (e.g. high XP). As the doco says: XP is just game. And it is.

        PerlMonks is the minigame

        That may be true, in a broader, more abstract sense... much as we might say life is just a game. But that's different from how the site experience has been gamified using XP.

        I reckon we are the only monastery ever to have a dungeon stuffed with 16,000 zombies.

        Thankyou for your thoughtfulness.


        With the rise and rise of 'Social' network sites: 'Computers are making people easier to use everyday'
        Examine what is said, not who speaks -- Silence betokens consent -- Love the truth but pardon error.
        "Science is about questioning the status quo. Questioning authority". I knew I was on the right track :)
        In the absence of evidence, opinion is indistinguishable from prejudice.

        Basically, you're saying that PerlMonks is a small, tight-knit family, and that is the way you like it. Fair enough.

      Poker elements? XP already has the luck of the draw (wighted random chance) and a consideration of what's in the hands of others ($NORM).

        Poker is just one game where simple elements engender deep complexity. It doesn't have to be XP, we can leave that well alone.

        To give another example: let's say anyone casting a vote can also submit a number (\d+). A purely optional choice, zero by default means to ignore it. One or two of the smallest unique bids are the winners and will go on to perform an action. The action is just a CSS selector: node highlight for +rep, comic sans for -rep?

        The idea is not to arbitrarily gamify everything, it is to provide depth where there is room for contention. One may need to spend a little thought to effect their verdict. The hope is that intelligence might win.


        Edit. It suddenly occurred to me that use of the word "intelligence" might have upset someone. Refer back to the previous sentence please: in order to play, one would need two resources: (1) a vote, the price of admission; (2) "a little thought"; meaning a barrier to unthinking participation. That is all. It's just a lottery anyway. Also, let it be noted that the example as such would not work. Too... fidgety, too obscure. But it could serve as a basis. (And if you don't like lottery, maybe some other game. Remember, voting is a game too with its own rules, moves to play, victory conditions.)

Re: On the serious issue of XP devaluation and other tangentially related or unrelated passing thoughts (xp is thumbs)
by Anonymous Monk on May 19, 2016 at 23:49 UTC

    *sigh*noobs* :P

    two voting periods is insane, lots of people don't care to vote at all

    also insane, using thumb pressure to coerce/bribe mistake-correction -- can't gold farm xp its ridiculous

    reminder messages are insane, its spam, and demerits? for not participating enough? Thats cancer

    sort by xp is weak, lots of top replies are update: I was wrong A.M. was right read his answer

    monk of the year? trophy? Will it be made of human thumbs? Your thumbs?

    Discuss

    All the important discussion happened 15 years ago and a million nodes ago

    There is no tweaking the XP system to change its nature, its honk if your thumb itches, noise pollution, changing the horn to la cucaracha is just more honking, go insane and deaf or go home

    If you want to improve perlmonks, stop dogpiling esp in the chatterbox

Re: On the serious issue of XP devaluation and other tangentially related or unrelated passing thoughts
by BrowserUk (Patriarch) on May 19, 2016 at 22:17 UTC

    Since I have plenty of votes each day, most of which go uncast; send me a /msg BrowserUk <node_id> <+|-> and I'll have my bot issue the vote on your behalf.


    With the rise and rise of 'Social' network sites: 'Computers are making people easier to use everyday'
    Examine what is said, not who speaks -- Silence betokens consent -- Love the truth but pardon error.
    "Science is about questioning the status quo. Questioning authority". I knew I was on the right track :)
    In the absence of evidence, opinion is indistinguishable from prejudice.
Re: On the serious issue of XP devaluation and other tangentially related or unrelated passing thoughts
by stevieb (Canon) on May 19, 2016 at 18:09 UTC

    Discussing changes to the XP/voting system feels awfully strange without the input of many people's favourite monk, ... ;)

    update: removed the monk's name. Use your imagination :)

      Responding if I may to stevieb’s exceedingly discourteous, but not-unexpected reference to our highly-esteemed “Perl-monk.”

      Do I care about “XP-clipping”?     Nope.  I have a “Rhett Butler”™ attitude about “XP.”   Besides, what’s wrong with dressing up a load of old codswallop with “lot‘s” "of" ‘different’ quotes and stylistic devices and flowery analogies to fool the unknowing into a few up-votes? Having from time to time been the subject of “down-voting” and some fairly harsh statements   ...   I simply take all of these things in-stride  ...   I welcome it  ...   I don’t give a “tinker’s ‘dam’” about XP as in “brownie® points.”   upvoted.   “++”

      Update: in-step with the OP, removed name of our highly-esteemed “monk who shall not be named.”

        Yeah, I don't care anything about XP either. I'm here to learn and hopefully help.

        It was discourteous of me to name someone like that (note I had removed the name). I was quick to post before thinking... I apologize.

Re: On the serious issue of XP devaluation and other tangentially related or unrelated passing thoughts
by FreeBeerReekingMonk (Deacon) on May 26, 2016 at 22:33 UTC
    $ perl -E 'say eval("2016-05-27")' 1984

    Ah... it's 1984... that's why we are re-evaluating these status-quo things.

Re: On the serious issue of XP devaluation and other tangentially related or unrelated passing thoughts
by Anonymous Monk on May 20, 2016 at 10:30 UTC
    Become a group of adults and remove the XP system for members. Replace it with a voting system like stackoverflow that gives a rating for the answers of the questions. That would be more helpful to be able to skip through the nonsense chatter in the nodes and get to the real subject.

      tye neatly summarized the fundamental difference in philosophies between the two sites:

      StackOverflow: I have a question, I want the best answer.
      PerlMonks: I have a doubt, I want to read an interesting discussion about it that is likely to go on a tangent. q-:

      So.... No.

      I reckon we are the only monastery ever to have a dungeon stuffed with 16,000 zombies.

        My biggest grievance with SO is when I google some problem and it turns up almost the exact thing I'm looking for at SO; only to find some ^&^*&^ who didn't understand the subject matter has noticed it has two keywords he also doesn't understand in common with some otherwise unrelated question, and closes it as a dup.

        Forever more, every attempt to find an answer to that question leads to that same unanswered and unanswerable post.

        In general, the place seems to encourage and savour meta-responses over content, discussion or debate; which is not just sad; but intensely frustrating.


        With the rise and rise of 'Social' network sites: 'Computers are making people easier to use everyday'
        Examine what is said, not who speaks -- Silence betokens consent -- Love the truth but pardon error.
        "Science is about questioning the status quo. Questioning authority". I knew I was on the right track :)
        In the absence of evidence, opinion is indistinguishable from prejudice.

        This is one of the main reasons I love PM so much. Any question can lead to a bunch of learning in areas that may not even be related to the specific question asked.

        That reminds me of what i (used to) consider the difference between SQL Server and Oracle forums:

        SQL Server: It doesn't work, please make it work.

        Oracle: Something's not working as expected, please explain what is going on.

        It's not exactly like that, but it does seem to me as the overall direction.

      The lack of downvoting for comments at SO is part of why I hardly ever visit despite the interface, layout, and such being superior. Their ethos is unpleasantly clinical and literal.

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