As I said in a /msg to you, tilly, I don't like this idea a lot..

First, the adminstrative hassle for me... I plan on moving back to a place with no broadband very soon *sob*.. the cost of connecting to the Net being what it is there, I expect my visits to the site to drop drastically as a result.. When I visit after some time, I see the potential to be bombarded with a lot of requests for "why did you vote this way"..

Even assuming I could find the time to answer all of them, I could simply abuse the system and say "I liked your post so I ++ ed it" (even if I -- ed it in reality).. I could actually write a reply-bot to do this for myself, were I so inclined.. :o), if you do something as silly and pointless as running a vote bot, writing a spam like stock reply-bot can't be that much harder, surely ?

I welcome the idea of accountability, and I can see the point of doing what you suggest.. but please don't make it harder than it already is to actually enjoy this site for what really is, a place to learn about and share experiences on Perl and related topics...(just try visiting Newest Nodes after taking a few days off, and you'll know what I mean)

Update: When I really like or appreciate a node, I usually /msg the author and tell them that I like it anyway.. ++ isn't really granular enough, in that sense.. There are a few nodes that I would gladly expend more votes than 1, were I given the chance. But I stress that I do this through choice, not because I *have* to.. my usual policy with -- is to avoid, unless its a really abusive or trollish post, again, criteria which are pretty subjective..Sometimes I think not even PSI::ESP can explain why I voted on a node.. What will I do in that case ? :o)

An idea (update 2): How about another section, like "Explain the votes" or something.. I have no doubt this will be a massive development job, but in the interest of trying to find a solution : here goes.. I like American football, and one of the things I've noticed is the TV replay and appeal system.. essentially, a team can give up a timeout and pursue a possibly faulty decision.. In a similar vein, why not allow a perlmonk user to submit his/her node for explanation of why a particular vote was made. In order to stop abuse, the user should necessarily give up a certain number of votes to be able to submit a node in this way (and other limits should also apply)... Perhaps some limited information from the votelog could also be made available on submission (such as the total number of votes on the node or something). In other words, a challenge becomes a service (for the posters peace of mind, primarily), and there is a barrier to entry, in that you give up a few of your daily quota of votes to get this service... More details if/when I think it through, comments welcome :o)
detail: Submitting a node for an explanation should cost a percentage of your daily quota (I propose 40% of your daily vote quota). This means that saint or novice, you can only do 2 appeals a day. Votes given up in this manner should obviously not be eligible to gain XP (25% chance of +1 XP each time a vote is expended, normally, but not here).