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Re^5: A Level Playing Field

by Perl Mouse (Chaplain)
on Oct 31, 2005 at 11:55 UTC ( [id://504229]=note: print w/replies, xml ) Need Help??


in reply to Re^4: A Level Playing Field
in thread A Level Playing Field

When I started there were less than 20 Saints and only about 100-200 regular users. We currently have a regular user base of about 4000 and we have over 400 saints. This is a drammatic inflation.
No doubt there's inflation (I only recently arrived here - I only know the current situation), but the numbers you quote don't show "drammatic inflation". In fact, they show *de*flation. "Less than 20 Saints and about 100-200 regular users", suggest the ratio of users/saints is between "1:10" to "almost 1:5". Currently having 400 saints and about 4000 users gives a ratio of about "1:10". Which means that if the number of regular users in old times is in the high end of your estimate, we have an about same ratio of saints, perhaps slightly more. But if the number of users was at the low end of your estimate, the relative number of saints has almost halved.

Note that I'm not commenting on the real situation several years ago - I wasn't there. I'm just commenting the numbers you state, and the conclusion you draw from those numbers.

Perl --((8:>*

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Re^6: A Level Playing Field
by demerphq (Chancellor) on Oct 31, 2005 at 12:13 UTC

    Sorry, i should have been more clear. Its a drammatic inflation of the votes available in the system. The point is that the amount of votes in common circulation is much higher now (even with the new vote allocations), as a relative number, as a ratio of users regularly online, and as a ratio of posts being made.

    For instance the saintly ones are so because they come here often, if you took a look at the average days stats a much higher proportion of saints would be online on a given day than any other level. Back when there were much less saints this was much less relevent, in the recent past it was ridiculous.

    With something like an average of 20-50 posts a day we had 16k votes in ready circulation. Thats something like 800 votes a node if fully utilized. The only reason $NORM didnt go completely crazy over the recent past was because many of the saints were aware of this and tended towards minimizing their votes.

    So the inflation I mean is the amount of currency available to the community at large. We reduced the amount of votes allocated in order to try to counteract this tendency. Hopefully it will work out ok.

    ---
    $world=~s/war/peace/g

      With something like an average of 20-50 posts a day we had 16k votes in ready circulation. Thats something like 800 votes a node if fully utilized.

      Are you really saying that PM only gets 20-50 posts a day? I've never tried counting, but that doesn't jive with my experience...

      And, uh, we've got over 500,000 nodes. I've been here for about 3 years and my home node is around 180,000. So, that's over 100,000 nodes per year. Without considering the rate of change, that would make the average per day somewhere around 275. With 16k votes, that works out to about 60 votes per node, a far cry from 800.

      If I'm right and the above is with 4000 regular users as you said and there used to be only about 200 regular users and if the post ratio remained about the same... then we could extrapolate that there used to be an average of about 13-14 new nodes per day. With about 20 saints, that would work out to about... 60 votes per node. I.e. there has probably been very little net change in votes per node since you first joined.

      One thing that probably has changed is the percentage of new nodes that a saint has been able to vote on. Previously, it seems a saint could have voted on every new node in a given day and still have votes left over. Now, if my calculations were correct, a saint couldn't quite vote on 20% of the new nodes in a given day. (This fact supports an abstention option, I think.)

      With the sudden cut in votes, I'll be interested to see how the rep of new nodes will compare with the rep of old nodes... I believe we're going to see a drastic drop in node rep. I don't necessarily see that as a good thing because range compression will result in less distinction between great nodes and merely good ones. Or good ones and average ones. Etc.

      So, I've got reservations about the changes to available votes. I'm definitely interested in knowing what metrics you'll be collecting and how you'll be analyzing them to determine the success of these changes.

      As for the additional levels, I think it's great! I've got something to shoot for again. Once you are a saint 5 times over, what's the point? Well, the truth is that I've always come to try to help others anyway. That's where I get my real satisfaction. But still, I like the "game" too, and this brings new life to it.

      -sauoq
      "My two cents aren't worth a dime.";
      
        .oO(Man, this is so buried, very few will actually ever read it, but here goes anyway...)

        I too have reservations about the new voting numbers. I realize the growth of votes in circulation partially caused the "problem" that this action attempts to solve. Ok, fine, rejiggering the ranks does that. But, we've also gone and made vote more valuable by reducing the number each person has to use? Uh, sorry, I don't think it's wise to do both actions.

        Even though there was the POSSIBILITY that each new node COULD get 60 votes, experience has shown that in actuallity, a very small percentage of the total daily votes available actually get cast (at least I believe this, but don't have the necessary knowledge to find out what the percentage was).

        So, I think the two actions taken together are going to make the PM experience a far more difficult and frustrating "game" to play. With 30 votes, I had to be quite careful to pick just those posts and answers I thought were worth the votes, now I'm to have only 18? Ouch, that feels like I'm being punished. I'll have to like an answer a LOT to get me to vote on it? That seems to be against the better interest of the site. With more people posting, less votes to spread around will hook fewer new people I'm afraid.

        I'm hopeful that some more consideration is given about reducing the number of votes for the majority of the good people frequenting this site.

        -Scott

      Sorry, i should have been more clear. Its a drammatic inflation of the votes available in the system. The point is that the amount of votes in common circulation is much higher now (even with the new vote allocations), as a relative number, as a ratio of users regularly online, and as a ratio of posts being made.
      <snip>
      So the inflation I mean is the amount of currency available to the community at large. We reduced the amount of votes allocated in order to try to counteract this tendency. Hopefully it will work out ok.

      Which makes me wonder, letting aside for the monent any possible inexactness of your claims (which somebody contended), of an alternative possibility. More precisely I read some replies to the OP suggesting an adaptive scheme for levels based on a sort of normalization on the highest ranking(s) at each given time. And an answer was given, to the effect that it may not be such a good idea. I don't think it is, either, although I wouldn't exclude a priori that a less naive and more refined adaptive scheme may be a good one, instead.

      However if the actual problem that the reform is aimed at curing is the "drammatic inflation of the votes available in the system", then chances are that any fixed scheme may turn out to be in the long run not perfectly tuned to the status of the Monastry at each given time. So, maybe, an adaptive scheme for the number of daily votes based on the collection of statistical data of the system may be thought of, as an option.(And, if it were, then should also include an "inertia term" to avoid abrupt changes.) Just my two (Euro)cents...

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