Daily Kos

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  •  This post is an excellent example (none / 0)

    of the rampant misuse of zero ratings on DailyKos. The guy screwed up, and apologized for it, but both his screwup and apology gets hidden although not coming anywhere close to the requirements for a zero rating, which are:

    0 is a "super-troll" comment.  Generally speaking, 0s are reserved for auto-generated comments, or for comments that serve no other purpose than to sow hurt, confusion and dissent among the posters.  Only Trusted Users may give 0s.

    Honest screwups aren't intended to sow hurt, confusion or dissent among posters. Please, people, be more careful with your zero ratings.

    by digdugboy on Thu Mar 24, 2005 at 03:50:21 PM PDT

    [ Parent ]

    •  Read the followup (none / 0)

      He asks for zeros to make the post disappear.  If the average drops below one, the post and its followups are hidden.  The zero-raters don't think the Admiral is a troll, but since he can't delete his brain-fart, this is the best alternative.

      So have YOU checked your tire pressure?

      by George on Thu Mar 24, 2005 at 04:19:59 PM PDT

      [ Parent ]

      •  Not really (none / 1)

        Best to just leave it. Those of use who peruse the hidden comments for improper use of zeroes to censor don't have much context except the post itself to go on. There's a reason we can't delete our own posts.

        by digdugboy on Thu Mar 24, 2005 at 05:09:33 PM PDT

        [ Parent ]

        •  That's moronic (none / 0)

          I don't see any point in keeping this ridiculously long thread of comments on a procedural point where the commenter made a mistake.  Please, everyone let's zero this thread out.

          by ortcutt on Thu Mar 24, 2005 at 05:59:03 PM PDT

          [ Parent ]

          •  digdugboy not saying that (none / 0)

            I believe you misunderstood digdugboy's comment. He's not saying this thread should not be eliminated; he's pointing out that as a practical matter what we're trying to do here can be difficult (something I hadn't realized either):

            Trusted Users who are providing the service of up-rating unfairly super-troll rated comments so that they reappear are checking these from their Hidden Comments page, not this diary. So they only see the individual comment, not the thread.

            So these Trusted Users correcting abuse of the super-troll rating don't see FleetAdmiralJ's request to disappear this, nor do they realize his original comment has grown into a 16+ comment completely useless and distracting subthread that we're trying to delete; they're seeing only his original comment, and since it by itself doesn't merit a zero-rating, they're correcting that by 4-ratings, continually reversing our attempts to delete this thread.

            Hopefully 31+ ratings on that comment should now trigger most Trusted Users to look at the context before reversing the 0s with 4s.

            But unless what is happening here is very unusual, imho digdugboy is correct that attempting to delete threads in this way is more trouble than it's worth.

            ImpeachBush.org

            by JohnT on Thu Mar 24, 2005 at 08:43:01 PM PDT

            [ Parent ]

            •  Yeah but... (none / 0)

              He still wanted to keep this ridiculous thread around after he saw how useless it was.  The ratings police should probably be a little more discriminating if they are going to browse the hidden comments and upgrade things wily-nily without looking at the context.  

              I think he is just a too caught up with following Kos' advice on ratings.  People have been zeroing out useless threads here forever.  There's nothing wrong with it, especially when what is being zeroed out is a purely procedural point, i.e. making the mistaken point about more than two diaries in a day.

              by ortcutt on Thu Mar 24, 2005 at 10:13:17 PM PDT

              [ Parent ]

              •  I don't want to keep the thread around (none / 0)

                I just don't want to see the time of trusted users wasted by seeing posts like this zeroed out without any facially apparent reason, to be resurrected, zeroed out, resurrected and zeroed out again.

                by digdugboy on Thu Mar 24, 2005 at 10:25:48 PM PDT

                [ Parent ]

                •  Facially apparent reason? (2.00 / 2)

                  I'm not sure what a "facially apparent reason" is, but there is a very good reason for zeroing this thread out.  It's pointless and keeps people from getting to the real comments.  It wouldn't have been resurrected if little shits like yourself hadn't resurrected it.  If your goal is to not make the site work, then go to redstate.org or freerepublic.org.  I'm sure they would appreciate your services.

                  by ortcutt on Thu Mar 24, 2005 at 11:29:29 PM PDT

                  [ Parent ]

                  •  A facially apparent reason (none / 0)

                    would be a reason that is consistent with explicit community standards for using zeroes.  I expressed those explicit standards in a post above.

                    My goal isn't to gum up the site. One of my goals is to make sure that zeroes aren't used inappropriately to censor comments. I'm sorry that makes you so angry. Maybe you could use a little work on your state control?

                    by digdugboy on Fri Mar 25, 2005 at 09:04:26 AM PDT

                    [ Parent ]

              •  Again, that's not what he said. (3.00 / 2)

                You wrote:

                He still wanted to keep this ridiculous thread around after he saw how useless it was.

                Again, unless you're referring to another digdugboy post than this one...

                Best to just leave it. Those of use who peruse the hidden comments for improper use of zeroes to censor don't have much context except the post itself to go on. There's a reason we can't delete our own posts.

                ....digdugboy IS NOT SAYING what you are claiming he is saying.

                Best to just leave it. does not equal: I THINK it should remain. Especially in the context of his sentence which immediately follows, it's clear his meaning is as I elaborated in my longer comment above.

                I have no argument with your statement: The ratings police should probably be a little more discriminating if they are going to browse the hidden comments and upgrade things wily-nily without looking at the context. 

                (Except POSSIBLY with your use of the word police, IF you intended to imply a negative connotation in referring to Trusted Users who are volunteering a useful service by doing this.)

                ImpeachBush.org

                by JohnT on Fri Mar 25, 2005 at 08:16:04 AM PDT

                [ Parent ]

          •  When you continue to zero the thread out, (none / 0)

            trusted users will continue to go through the hidden comments and resurrect it. That's happened at least a half dozen times or so now, hasn't it?

            by digdugboy on Thu Mar 24, 2005 at 10:23:35 PM PDT

            [ Parent ]

        •  people who appoint themselves community policemen (none / 0)

          should be more aware of the law of the land.  

          All the people on KOS who are so ready to spout out rules to people, usually not in a nice way, take away from community spirit.  

          Obama lost me when his shills started calling Hillary a racist.

          by Tom P on Thu Mar 24, 2005 at 06:04:17 PM PDT

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        •  Sure we do. (none / 0)

          Those of use who peruse the hidden comments for improper use of zeroes to censor don't have much context except the post itself to go on.

           That's why I'm here reading this very long subthread. It appears to have worked out equitably and little or no loss of mojo for FleetAdmiral. The top post in this sub thread is at .93. The subthread provides all the context

          by colleen on Thu Mar 24, 2005 at 08:48:38 PM PDT

          [ Parent ]

          •  Not from the hidden comment itself (none / 0)

            Sure it's there if you want to thread through. But with so many posts being zeroed out these days, it's a lot of work to track down the context of all of them.  For what it's worth, I did go back and check the thread at the time, and read three or four posts down. I missed the poster's request to zero out his comment.

            by digdugboy on Thu Mar 24, 2005 at 10:21:24 PM PDT

            [ Parent ]

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