"likes" AND "dislikes"?

Currently there is a way to "like" posts but you can't "dislike" them. Why not? I've seen it other forums (thumbs down and thumbs up) so why not here? It seems a blt one-sided to me that you can only give favorable opinions but not unfavorable ones. If someone is a troll or bully, there's no way to register disapproval of this. I've seen it time and time again on gambling forums, which seem to attract more than their fair share of trolls and naysayers. Thread after thread is disrupted and taken off-topic by these characters, who are not interested in constructive discussion and debate but only negativity. If someone generates a high ratio of "dislikes" to "likes" there could be some penalty (such as being muted for a while), or even banned if it continues.

There's a classic example in this thread -

http://www.gamblingforums.com/threads/lets-have-a-contest.1989/

 

Many newbie members, all of a sudden start to voice against someone so vigorosly as they never cared to do any positive talk about. Trolling members and shadow accounts are too much rampant to be avoided. Once forum gets open for all, alongwith a few good members these "shady" things enter here and stay forever. Monitor their posts, they are all clapping on someone and barking on a few others.

 

Yes, but then the thread goes off-topic and often ends up degenerating into mudslinging and petty bickering. The point is that the rules may not be "officially" broken, and so you're not warranted in registering a formal complaint, but everyone knows if/when the poster is just being an a**hole and a troll. I think there is some value in being able to register dislike for a post anonymously and without cluttering up the thread. The best way to deal with trolls is to starve them of attention; engaging with them is exactly what they want.

The censoring was just a suggestion, and yes there is that possibility (although I think the danger of this actually happening could easily be exaggerated). There doesn't need to be any penalty at all for "disliked" posts, just as there is no "reward" for "liked" posts.

What is the justification for being able to "like" posts in the first place? If someone gets a lot of "likes", what does that mean apart from giving the recipient a warm fuzzy feeling?

 

There are hundreds of ways to punish a wrongdoer that admin is well aware of. He wants this forum to get stuffed with debates and not hate mongering and "teams"forming. The best reward for your nice writing shows in form of "likes". Everyone can see who liked whom so no room for a pseudo appreciation. 90% of the members are merely lurkers/readers or those clapping or saying "nay" . Merely a dozen are writing worth reading original ideas. Let good work be appreciated.

 

The point is, why have "likes" and not "dislikes"? To answer that admin wants to keep things "positive" is to ignore the reality that some posters are profoundly negative and/or trolls who are simply there to seek attention or feed their egos. This has a disproportionately high effect on member contribution. It's the same in every sphere; a few bad eggs spoil the majority. Pretending that it doesn't exist won't make it go away. Why not have some kind of rating system for posts (a scale of 1-10 perhaps). "Karma" systems like this are used on other forums, although I think it depends on the forum topic/content as to how useful and effective it is. I don't even know if this forum is capable of implementing such a scheme, but I think it's worth considering, perhaps just for a trial period.

BTW, there is an interesting article on why Facebook has a "like" button but no "dislike" button.

http://www.slate.com/articles/techn...utton_why_mark_zuckerberg_won_t_allow_it.html

 

Great article!

 

What's a troll? I do not know? Help! Please!