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Now that the latest release of slashcode has settled, and we're moving ahead towards towards getting the site self-sufficient, it's time to look at our longer term plans. I have talked about the direction I want SN to go, as well as some of the trouble getting from here to there. With the help of the staff, what I present here is a more unified plan on how we get from here to there for the community to evaluate. This should however be considered a draft, so, as usual, feel free to rip it to shreds, etc. In short, here's what I want to get done over the next six months:
- SoylentNews PBC reaches self-sufficiency
- Beginnings of a major "port and polish" on both content and the site itself
- Build a more uniformed sense of community throughout the site
- Compilation and completion of a "style and policy" manual
- Preparations for running a crowd-funding campaign to get initial capital
- Define, with assistance and input from the community, a mechanism for community governance
- If possible, try and reach out to other not-for-profit journalist organizations for advice and guidance
- Bootstrap the NFP umbrella from the B-corp's funds
- Define a framework for which original content will be used on SoylentNews
- Identify people who may be willing to work in a journalistic capacity with us
- With the above frameworks in place, fundraise
- Original content launches on SN
As usual, I'm going to go through these one by one, so check past the break
SoylentNews PBC reaches self-sufficiencyThis one is pretty much self-explanatory, and we already have the basic plan in place. It is our hope that a combination of shop revenue and subscriptions will be able to offset our hosting and legal costs. Ideally, we need to raise about $10k a year to have a safe buffer here, though we can make do with less. As of right now, we have earned approximately $1300 from subscriptions and shop revenue, so we've made decent progress in this regard.
Broken down, our annual costs look like this (all values in USD):
- $~3600 yearly hosting costs (can be reduced at the cost of site reliability; having multiple machines has already paid for itself in many regards. Active efforts in this area are ongoing)
- $1-2k retainer for accountant + services at tax time
- ~$5k retainer for a lawyer for the organization (something we will need sooner or later)
Ultimately, this is the most important thing that the site hinges on; even if everything else we do goes bust, as long as the site can pay for itself, it will continue to keep going, regardless of any of the staff's economic situation. Always remember, the site and the community come first.
Beginnings of a major "port and polish" on both content and the site itself
Let me break this into two sections for the sake of clarity:
The Site Itself
As far as websites go, SN is functional, but its UI isn't exactly great, with lots of tiny text and easy to miss boxes. There's room for improvement here to help make the site more usable for everyone; some low-hanging fruit is reorganizing all the preferences onto a single page, adding more descriptive help text on various things, and all-and-all improvement. We've already made a lot of great strides here, but the fact is, the site doesn't look much different from when we launched back in February.
Now, I will first up admit I'm not a website designer, nor a UI specialist, but those who weren't deeply involved with the other site will likely struggle to understand the interface. I think there's grounds here for a series of small but incremental tweaks to streamline the site for the general public, while allowing individual users to keep the current look-and-feel if they so choose. For instance, the improved threading interface, while a massive step up from 1997, is still somewhat awkward and feels tacked on. Unfortunately, our last recruitment drive was something of a bust, but I'm hoping if we bring up the topic as a dedicated article, we may be able to attract someone who is at least able to outline and identify the roughest points of SN, and help us modify the UI to streamline them. The current plan is for the next development cycle of the codebase to be mostly dedicated as a port and polish, fixing some longstanding pain like Apache 1.3, or finishing the long promised and underdeveloped modpoint rework.
As usual, we can use JavaScript/CSS and such, as long as the site degrades nicely, and loses no major functionality when either of those is disabled. I realize this adds a real burden to the frontend side of things, but we've already promised (and frequently delivered) that extra mile, and I have no intention of stopping. Most of our users have been with us since golive, and I don't plan to alienate anyone by disrupting how they use SoylentNews.
The Content Side of Things
First off, this isn't flack towards anyone; this is simply a statement of my observations and a feeling I've gotten from reading comments posted by the community. All and all, I think the editorial team does an amazing job in getting submissions in order and ready to go, and I can honestly say I want to see you guys keep up the good work. I do realize though that all of us are volunteers, and time can be very limited, as well as the position of editor being a lot of work, and relatively little praise. The purpose of this section is to acknowledge points that the community has brought up in comments and our progress at addressing them.
From where I'm sitting, we've done a relatively good job on getting a good variety of content out the door. While our focus is a bit scattered, I think we have sourced a decent variety of articles for community enjoyment and discussion. We've had some very broad and lively discussions on diverse topics, with some articles breaking 100 comments. Unfortunately, for as many successes as we had, we've quite a few posts go out with technical errors such as obvious typos, which sometimes go unedited even after the post has been publicly out for awhile (and said typos frequently get called out in comments). While the main-page at any given time is usually in good shape, folks tend to remember the bad, and not the good, so we need to find better ways to minimize the amount of mistakes that go out the door.
When it comes to editorial quality, my standards are the same as the Borg: absolute perfection.
On this front, I will be looking at ways to allow the community to suggest edits and revisions to the article (perhaps something similar to the Wikipedia "Proposed Revisions" functionality), to allow folks to fix what they see as wrong.
On the other hand, on any discussion regarding articles themselves, we need to talk about the content itself. I do recognize that is a bit of a more subjective subject thing, but we have a bad tendency to be hit or miss. I'll be the first to admit that we're a little all over the board and generally run whatever comes into the queue. This isn't helped since I've pushed the angel of "general journalism" vs. limited to a subset (ala arstechnica), which I suspect has made it difficult to define what we will and won't run.
For example, here are two articles that were at the top of the page from when I originally draft of this post:
Scrabble Champ Wins with Vowel Movements
Download Wrappers and Unwanted Software are Pure Evil
One of those is very high quality, and an excellent summary, while the "Download Wrappers and Unwanted Software are Pure Evil" is... not. As someone who always strives for the best, I think we need to tighten this up. Either we have to be more liberal with the use of the "Reject" button, or willing to go the extra mile and edit things into a consistent level of quality. Since I brought this issue up internally, there has been progress on defining a specific and firm guideline on how to format stories, and the criteria to decide if we approve them. As of this writing, this is still somewhat of a draft, but I am looking at running a dedicated article on this subject for some time this week, to get community feedback.
Build a more uniformed sense of community throughout the site
So, this one might be a bit controversial, but in some respects, our community is somewhat scattered. The fact is that the only venue for discussion on the site is on articles themselves, or on IRC. As a group, we're more or less united against becoming what the other site became. I see a couple of common names on posts, but I don't really know fellow posters that well. On various discussion forums I was active on, such as Bay12, you frequently get to see and perhaps know others. Within the developer community for Ubuntu, you frequently talk and discuss matters with other devs on a regular basis; as far as user-to-user communication goes on SN, one's options are essentially limited to email, journal posts (which have their own limitations), and conversation via threads. This is definitely not ideal, and while we have the friend/foe system (referred to as the Zoo), I suspect 99% of users never use it since they don't really know anyone in the community.
A lot of it is that the general involvement in SN is a passive one; folks read articles, and perhaps comment or submit something interesting. There isn't an active focus on discussing things except for the occasional "Ask SN" topic that pops up every once in awhile. Now obviously, this isn't something we can just magically snap our fingers and make appear overnight, but it is something we can help provide the tools for allowing this sort of kinship between users to form. For one, having general purpose discussion forums would help provide a venue where users can bring whatever comes to mind, and just socialize. Sub-slashes is another venue where a group of users can form to follow a common interest, such a DIY community, or folks who are interested in Magic the Gathering. The objective here is to figure out how to allow folks to us SN to socialize and form a cohesive identity, while still allowing folks to create communities-within-communities.
I'm open to ideas on how to improve the site in this regard, and perhaps run a more general (Ask SN) discussion on it.
Preparations for running a crowd-funding campaign to get initial capital
So, in previous brainstorming sessions on how to fund the site and original content, one of the ideas that came up and stuck was doing a crowdfunding campaign. As things stand, I think this is likely our best source of being able to fund our operations, as well as being most in line with our founding principles and goals. As with all things, crowdsourcing comes with various risks and never is 100% guaranteed to be successful.
As things stand, we need a sufficiently large userbase to successful fund such an endeavor, as well as a need to identity folks who would be willing to write for us. In a broader sense, we need to identify what we're looking for from authors, assemble a plan and business model to pay them from raised revenues, and then proceed to implement it. Some high-level ideas have been thrown around before, but we need something tightly focused here to help build out our business model.
Furthermore, in the interests of remaining a free and independent entity, preparations, and further research in bootstrapping a parent NFP should begin to take focus here. This leads in directly to my next point
Define, with assistance and input from the community, a mechanism for community governance
The fact is, a good chunk of the community is likely to be pretty 'meh' on governance issues. This is an unfortunate reality we need to live with, but at the end of the day, these same people are the group we are accountable to. As such, they need a way to have a direct say in our operations, while still allowing the staff to be able to operate the day-to-day business without getting overburdened in bureaucracy.
One possible solution for this (and for now the primary plan), is to have the SoylentNews PBC bootstrap a parent not-for-profit, which in turn draws its board directly from the community via elections (also known as a member NFP). While the specifics need to be determined, in a broad sense, I'd like to see where the board can nominate candidates, and if need be, the community can also elect and appoint its own representatives. Once established, the PBC would "sell itself" to the not-for-profit, giving majority control of the company to the board of directors, creating in effect a two level system.
* The SoylentNews PBC will continue to manage and oversee site operations, as well as being self-financed, and continue to operate as an independent entity, The NFP board will be able to "pull rank" via shareholder meetings if need be should the PBC board get out of line, providing the necessary community oversight, while still allowing the staff and directors of PBC a relatively free hand in managing site operations. To help fund the PBC, a method of allowing some of PBC's revenue to migrate into the NFP will be established to allow the NFP to function.
* The NFP itself will be tasked with broader objectives as defined by the manifesto, such as public awareness on freedom of speech, etc. Depending on the circumstances, the NFP may or may not pursue 501(c)(3) status, as well as helping to establish other projects in the name of freedom of press.
As some may have noticed, this is a somewhat different position than I had been pitching before; the reason being is in many of the discussions that arose since completing incorporation, it has become clear that we need to be accountable in some fashion. While many people have stated that we could just fork the site, the fact is that would splinter the community and cause a huge repetition of effort. Our best line of defense is to allow the community to, if need be, take action should they feel the need to do so.
Bootstrap the NFP umbrella from the B-corp's funds
As described above, this is where we make the step to community governance. Although the exact timing of this may vary, it is likely worthwhile to have such oversight in place long before we are handing any significant amount of money (though then again, it may be worth waiting until after our first crowd-sourcing campaign. TBD)
Define a framework for which original content will be used on SoylentNews
I've touched on this aspect before, but it bears repeating. We need a clear, defined interface between the site and independent authors/journalists. This involves the following aspects:
- Identifying and proving a mechanism for prospective writers to step forward
- Identify a method of trial and confirmation, allowing new authors to "cut their teeth" so to speak
- Define a method of compensation; likely starting on a per-article basis, and perhaps migrating to salaried depending on available assets + long term contribution
- Modification of SN itself to better accommodate original articles (clearer integration of media, easier to use admin tools, etc.)
This framework will become the basis of how we generate original content, and from here, work on moving to an actual news organization.
Identify people with journalistic experience to act as an overseer/guide/guru
The fact of the matter is though, at the end of the day, none of us are journalists. There are standards held to members of the associated press, and other media organizations, and if we're going to be seen as a serious attempt in not-for-profit journalism, we need to meet and exceed these standards; what we need is someone who knows this field to help us get the rest of our groundwork in place, and who we can hand "this is what we've done, how do we take it that final step".
Our guru (for want of a better term) should be able to go through our now-compiled policy manual, perhaps interview some of our early picks for paid writers, and help get things rolling in reporting news and information from around the world.
An important aspect here, though, is figuring out what we're covering in tight detail. I recommend we start with a narrowish focus, starting in tech news, and then bubbling out, using the advantage of the nexus feature to subdivide the site on a topic basis. With a tighter focus on original content, we should be able to limit costs and keep things tight and on track. If we're successful in this, on future crowd-funding campaigns, we can slowly begin to expand the focus of original content. Our initial funding goals should allow us to send one individual to a few conferences (perhaps linux.com.au, etc), while others can attend and report on local events in the tech world.
I'll admit, this one might be the most difficult item on this list, but I'm in it to win it, and I know that none of us have the necessary experience on the media side of things to succeed here. We've already had some impressive contact with folks from around the world, so I'm certain we can at least get advice if nothing else, but we need to learn everything we can.
With the framework in place, fundraise
Within the next six months, by having fulfilled our goals and thus proved we know what we're doing, we go forth to the world, and ask for funding. By this time, we should have a reasonable idea of what expenses and goals w.r.t. original content will be, and thus know what dollar amount we have to hit to succeed.
With that in mind, we set our goals, run the campaign, and see if we can raise enough money to change history. Or in other words, profit.
Original Content (Officially) Launch
Exactly what it says on the tin.
EDITOR'S NOTE: Comments have just ben enabled for this story. Also added the missing revenue figure. Sorry for any inconvenience.
(Score: 2, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Monday September 15 2014, @11:09PM
> That's not the vibe that I get from that AC's comment.
Really? The fact that he thinks "social justice warrior" is a real thing ought to be a big enough viber to fully disqualify the post.
Would you have preferred he use the term "femi-nazi" or libtard? SJW is just the latest incarnation of those, brought to you by the same butthurt people.
> Wanting all viewpoints to be fairly represented is not whining.
Dude is clearly whining that his "thug" posts got modded up and then got modded down. He got fair representation, what he wants is the false balance of equal representation. [wikipedia.org]
> All comments would be shown in full by default.
Set your preferences and you can have that.
(Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Tuesday September 16 2014, @12:03AM
Nah, sunshine, SJWs are the butthurt ones. They go absolutely bug-eyed lib-rage any time anyone has an opinion that differs from how they think the world should be. Then they Troll, Flamebait, Overrated mod your last ten comments because the folks in charge in their lack of utter foolishness didn't see fit to put in a Disagree downmod.
They preach tolerance of everything, as long as it's something they approve of. Independent thought or opposing viewpoints? Those can never be tolerated. Aren't in favor of gun control? You must be insane and are worse than Hitler. Don't agree with socialized medicine? You're a greedy fuckwad and they hope you get shot and the hospital won't treat you.
No, my cowardly friend, SJWs are very real and utterly vile. You'll find more intolerance and hate in one SJW than you will in an entire Klan meeting.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday September 16 2014, @12:08AM
> Nah, sunshine, SJWs are the butthurt ones.
Yeah, you are so butt-strong that you had to respond to an AC flaming someone else with a big ole "nuh-uhhhh."
Totally not butthurt at all.
(Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Tuesday September 16 2014, @12:15AM
My butt is rock-like in its pain immunity. I rip on people who insist on bring wrong out loud because it's fun and it's a public service in case anyone might be tempted to think they knew what they were talking about.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday September 16 2014, @01:02AM
haha and now you are doing that thing where you just insist you are right, so butt-strong, so, so, so butt-strong.
(Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Tuesday September 16 2014, @01:12AM
Your troll-fu is weak, young one. Stay the patient course/Of little worth is your ire/The network is down.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday September 16 2014, @01:18AM
> Your troll-fu is weak,
And yet you couldn't help but respond 3 times now.
Your words say one thing, but your actions say butthurt 100x louder.
(Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Tuesday September 16 2014, @01:51AM
That's "bored" that they're saying. Nothing good on TV? Waste a troll's time. All you have to do to win is not get angry.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday September 16 2014, @02:05AM
And we have #4 - now with the ego-saving "I'm so bored by all this" claim.
You are really doing the public a service here.
(Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Tuesday September 16 2014, @02:23AM
Why thank you, I thought so. Wasting your time with me means you're not annoying anyone who's actually trying to have a conversation. The longer I keep you occupied the better.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday September 16 2014, @02:25AM
And we have #5 on the doth protest too much train.
Because, clearly you keeping some random anonymous coward -- who posts with a score of 0 -- occupied is the greatest contribution you have to offer to the world.
(Score: 2) by keplr on Tuesday September 16 2014, @06:46PM
Many of us on the left are equally frustrated and disgusted by SJW political correctness run amuck. I'm tired of real liberal values being subverted by these professional victims. I'm very far left on most issues, I'm either a Social Democrat or a Libertarian Socialist depending on the system you're using to analyze politics, and I tend to vote Green Party. Nowhere in any of these platforms will you find the "right" to not be offended--and that's essentially what SJWs stand for at their core. "Your rights stop where my feelings begin" is not a liberal value. All opinions are NOT equal. Fairness does NOT mean evenhandedness.
Being left-wing used to mean anti-totalitarian, and that meant standing up to bigots, no matter what their particular ideology. SJW are just the latest kind of bigot.
I don't respond to ACs.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday September 16 2014, @07:13PM
> I'm tired of real liberal values being subverted by these professional victims.
Like who? Can you name even one such SJW that can comes close to deserving the title of being a "professional victim?"
And how many of them are here?
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday September 16 2014, @09:06PM
Anita Sarkasian comes to mind. For a parade of examples you might try browsing this subreddit [reddit.com], which is dedicated to documenting cases of that delusional worldview.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday September 17 2014, @02:33AM
> Anita Sarkasian comes to mind.
Holy shit. If you consider Sarkasian [theverge.com] a "professional victim" then you've just confirmed every stereotype and criticism of anti-SJW crusaders ever.
(Score: 2) by keplr on Wednesday September 17 2014, @05:27AM
It's also possible that you are one (SJW) yourself and are currently engaged in the exact same behavior. I am willing to give you the benefit of the doubt. You might just be ignorant that she's a con-woman, a thief who swindled people out of Kickstarter money, a confessed non-gamer merely focusing on this subculture because that's where she can make hay with her brand of outrage, and to top it all off, a bald-faced liar who falsely claimed to have received death threats which lead her to file a police report (which never happened).
If she's someone you admire, you're really being lead off the righteous path by a charlatan and her army of white knights.
I don't respond to ACs.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday September 16 2014, @12:51AM
I take it you have never been to college. The so-called SJWs do exist, and they do go out of their way to limit the free expression of others. For people who claim to be all about tolerance, freedom and so forth, they sure put in a lot of effort trying to censor and shut down opinions they happen to disagree with. They thrive on the Internet because a lot of web sites do have broken moderation systems that allow for abuse to take place much too easily. I personally hope that this site isn't one of them.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday September 16 2014, @01:06AM
> The so-called SJWs do exist, and they do go out of their way to limit the free expression of others.
And since it is impossible to delete a post on soylent, not only do such people not exist here, they can't.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday September 16 2014, @09:27PM
You can downvote people to -1, which effectively censors them by removing them from the default comment view. Most people never change the default settings, so they never see those posts. It's a problem with any system that allows downvotes and has a view threshold.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday September 16 2014, @01:01AM
I just read through all of the comments for that submission, and I didn't see any trace of racism. And I think the use of the word thug was reasonable. Thug isn't a race specific word. It applies equally well to anyone of any skin color who would, say, shove a shop keeper while engaging in robbery. After all, the definition of thug [reference.com] is "a cruel or vicious ruffian, robber, or murderer." That totally describes the person in the surveillance video who was shown attacking the shop keeper. If any comment here using the word thug was modded down then I have to agree that there is something wrong going on. Comments that are correct shouldn't be downmodded. They should be upmodded. Anyone who engaged in the bad modding should totally lose their modding privileges. They clearly don't know what they're doing.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday September 16 2014, @01:14AM
> Thug isn't a race specific word.
And fag did not used be a derogatory term. Language evolves, and if you are legitimately unaware of the modern usage then you really aren't qualified to comment. I suppose it is possible to live in such a bubble, but I'm not going to give you the benefit of that doubt.
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Ethanol-fueled on Tuesday September 16 2014, @03:06AM
That's why the fight against creeping political correctness is a never-ending one -- because assholes like you try to make more and more words forbidden and disappeared down the memory hole.
And who declared you arbiter of which words should and should not be spoken? No, fuck you. I'm not gonna let an asshole like you tell me what I can and can't say. I'm not "living in a bubble," I'm actively pushing back against control-freak assholes like you both online and in real-life.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday September 16 2014, @05:37AM
That's why the fight against creeping political correctness is a never-ending one -- because assholes like you try to make more and more words forbidden and disappeared down the memory hole.
No one here is making words "forbidden" - no post has ever been deleted here for any reason, much less for the use of any particular word.
But freedom of expression does not mean freedom from consequences.
Personally I love it when people self-identify as racist by their language. It is a valuable heuristic. It lets me know right up front that their perception of the world is so skewed that whatever other opinions they might hold have a good chance of being the opposite of reality.
(Score: 1) by Ethanol-fueled on Tuesday September 16 2014, @01:23PM
So, then, will you include being religious as part of that heuristic? Because in my opinion being religious has less basis in reality than being racist. Being religious is a valuable heuristic. It lets me know right up front that their belief in an imaginary being is so insane that whatever other opinions they might hold have a good change of being out of touch with reality.
Or do they get a free pass from you?
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday September 16 2014, @03:40PM
Being fundamentalist gets them same treatment. Fundamentalism and racism are on about the same level of stupid. The thing about racism is that it always boils down to bad math - primarily selection bias - and math is inherently knowable. A general belief in the divine is unknownable - neither provable nor disprovable. I don't have a problem with faith in something that can't be disproved (and a god of the gaps doesn't count). I do have a problem with people who wilfully choose to believe in something that can and has repeatedly been disproven in various ways in various cases over the long history of civilization - and that is something that fundamentalists and racists have in common.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by Reziac on Tuesday September 16 2014, @02:55AM
There's no good way to get rid of bad downmods ... and I say this even tho I think the majority of downmods are unwarranted, outside of the obvious spammy posts.
But I'd suggest making downmods more "expensive" -- so for every downmod, you use three mod points instead of one. If you really feel strongly enough to spend three points to take a post down by one rating, then you can still do it, but you can't spend ten points downmodding ten posts; you'd only be able to downmod three posts (with one point left over which you can still use to upmod).
Also, the "when you get mod points again" thing could be skewed so anyone who gives a lot of downmods gets mod points less often.
And there is no Alkibiades to come back and save us from ourselves.
(Score: 2) by Kell on Tuesday September 16 2014, @07:08AM
This is a very interesting idea - it encourages good comments but still allows trolls to be addressed. The only problem might be that sockpuppets can cheaply keep trollish posts afloat, basically reducing the community's ability to fight them. It's a balancing act. Perhaps it should instead be a cumulative thing within a batch of points: cost 1 point for the first downmod in a single thread, 2 for the second downmod, and 3 points for the third and so on.
Scientists ask questions. Engineers solve problems.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by Reziac on Tuesday September 16 2014, @11:50AM
That's a good thought too -- make downmodding progressively expensive, so there's not too much penalty for killing junk. Or maybe it could depend on your up to down ratio -- the more downmods you give, the more expensive it gets.
But I don't think the sockpuppets are too much of a problem unless they get upmodded, and who's going to do that? other sockpuppets? how are they going to acquire the karma to be given that many mod points?
Whatever we try here, we're not married to it -- if it doesn't work, revert it.
Another thought is to add "Disagree" (and maybe a couple variants) and not have it affect the post's score, but make the tally of "disagrees" show next to the score, or let the user set it as a downmod in their personal view (much like the friend/foe plus-minus option).
And a further thought is to make downmods non-anonymous -- if you downmod, your username goes in the score. That could produce some pride in zealously downmodding spam, while making it embarrassing to downmod just because you don't like or disagree with the post.
Myself, I find that even with my threshold set to 0, there just aren't that many garbage comments here. We've seem to have a much higher proportion of ACs than that other site, and quite often they have something worthwhile to say.
And there is no Alkibiades to come back and save us from ourselves.
(Score: 2) by Kell on Tuesday September 16 2014, @12:46PM
Another thought is to add "Disagree" (and maybe a couple variants) and not have it affect the post's score, but make the tally of "disagrees" show next to the score, or let the user set it as a downmod in their personal view (much like the friend/foe plus-minus option).
Heeeey, that's a really good idea! I absolutely adore the idea of post 'metrics' displayed next to the score that indicate level of agreement and moderation. I wonder how it would affect moderation if you could simple click a + or - button for 'I agree with this" that is simply consensus building, vs "offtopic" that affects visibility. This can hook into some of the points made in previous posts here about how minority views are often silenced - why not take the politics out of moderating and use it as a quality control instead of the ersatz political commentary that it has become.
Sir or madam, thank you for your interesting and helpful post! I hope your idea is implemented.
Scientists ask questions. Engineers solve problems.
(Score: 3, Funny) by Reziac on Tuesday September 16 2014, @01:17PM
Kinda like the Like and Dislike buttons on Youtube... doesn't affect visibility but tells you how many people agree or disagree with your tastes and opinions. OTOH, a good many thinking folks might just bail entirely if it became overly clear that their opinions were considered garbage by the majority.
Personally I think anything that encourages "consensus" should be discouraged, because all that does is contribute to groupthink. And that's why I don't think "I disagree" should be any sort of downmod for the post's visibility.
On thinking more about it, I'm not sure I like my own suggestions. :(
And there is no Alkibiades to come back and save us from ourselves.
(Score: 2) by Kell on Tuesday September 16 2014, @02:25PM
-1 disagree. :)
Scientists ask questions. Engineers solve problems.
(Score: 2) by Reziac on Tuesday September 16 2014, @03:40PM
+1 Insightful :)
And there is no Alkibiades to come back and save us from ourselves.