Hunter's Diary on Ratings brought a lot of questions as to the why we have them. DavidNYC has an answer that I like so I'll excerpt him:
...With community moderation, Markos can spend more time writing posts and making this site a better place. In order to have community moderation . . . you need a means for creating trusted users . . . and you need a means for those trusted users to do what Markos formerly had to do manually . . . .
There are three options:
A totally unmoderated site. In my opinion, this would become quickly unusable.
A site where Markos is solely and entirely responsible for moderation. Markos, as I alluded above, has indicated that this was no longer a viable option once the site reached a certain size.
A community-moderated site. This is what we have now. . . .
Link. Why does this matter? Let's look at some hidden comments on the flip.
Fundies" in a rage? (0.25 / 4)
I think not. I am a "fundie", which is the equivalent of calling black people "darkies", and I think it is smart to keep Specter.
Ever heard of Hugh Hewitt? Ever heard of Rush Limbaugh? You all need to get out of the echo chamber. We evangelical "darkies" are a little more savvy than you think.
And we're winning ... at what matters.
Phil 1:3 ...
A post intended to inflame. The basic point might be acceptable, but the method of expression is trollish. Properly hidden in my view. Do we want this person in the community? Not based on this post.
I don't (0.42 / 7)
You must be an H1-B visa holder.
You can return to your country of origin at any time and get a good job there.
Self explanatory.
Waiting for a reply. Get to it. (0.28 / 7)
Scroll up and reply to my post. Christ, you Israelis need Americans to tell you to do everything, don't you? I expect an answer within 12 hours.
Self explanatory.
Shi man dat sure is funny, I feez bad fer you (0.50 / 6)
That kind a crrrrrazyness never happen down here in Alabammy. Just plain wierds I tell ya!
Self explanatory.
You get the drift. The Hidden Comments are generally offensive content or offensive delivery of content. The ratings accomplish 3 things - (1) keep offensive content out; (2) encourage civil communication; and (3) weed out trolls.
What's the most troubling? To me the part that seems a no brainer - keeping offensive content out.
The posts above are no brainers. This is not a First Amendment issue. This is kos' blog. This is kos' Dem Blog (it is primarily a Latino Blog but also a Dem Blog). We do not tolerate racists, homophobes, sexism - in short, dkos does not cater to "values" voters. We do welcome values voters. We can discuss both sides of the abortion question civilly. We can discuss the Iraq Debacle - maybe not civilly - but we won't troll rate war supporters for their views.
Here's the hard part - we are not very tolerant of criticism of our favorite Dems - and this is, of course, a mixed bag. Dean was and is the favorite here. Nothing wrong with that. I was and am a Clark man myself. We were for Kerry after the nomination.
But the election is over. And I think, from the perspective of troll ratings, the time for troll rating Kerry bashers or Dean bashers or Clark bashers, if there ever was one (I thought a limit on Kerry and Edwards bashing during the GE was appropriate) is over.
Disagree. Fight. That is all fair game. 2 ratings based on vitriol and content seems ok. I don't rate those posts myself anymore. But troll ratings? I think that should stop.
GenF comes to mind. I disagree with most everything GenF writes. But GenF is not a troll. And GenF does not engage in personal attacks on fellow kossacks unless first attacked. I think it is time to stow away the 0s in these cases.
So, IMO, ratings are important to moderate the site and I think it is obvious why.
But moderation does not mean stopping Dem bashing. We stop that when reason is on our side.