Personally, I like the system just the way it is.

The star syster lets you know where you stand related to other people. When you move down a star, either it's because someone in the forums doesn't like you, or your comics have been going downhill. Usually it's pretty easy to tell. When you move up, it gives you a sense of accomplishment.

And with comments, the choice of having them anonymous or not is helpful, I think. People may ignore comments if they are from people they don't like, regardless of the veracity of the statement.

I find the comments in general helpful. I used to have 3 stars, and comments like "possibly retarded," so I did my best to stop making retarded comics, and now I have 4 stars. Coincidence?

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I think, therefore I make comments on a forum.

I gotta say I agree with Evil_D and Drexle about the anonymous aspect of voting. If suddenly everything were public, donors might be afraid to cast bad votes out of fear of retribution by the user they were voting bad, or a flock of donors who disagree. I think it would lead to more drama and flaming in the forums and actually create "logrolling" and "backscratching" where it doesn't seem it exist now. You might actually see non-donors donating just so they can throw a dozen bad votes at regulars who don't like them--suddenly, the only users who will have 5 stars will be those who keep their mouths shut and vote everyone good.

I'd like to vote someone bad every now and then without a dozen pm's, a thread started in my honor, or a bad vote cast my way (unless i truly deserve it based on my strips or behavior in the donor's eyes).

I recently lost a star in my rating, so I am no longer in favor of the current rating system.

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Legend, oh legend, the third wheel legend...always in the way.

I remain skeptical of the rating system when it comes to providing useful feedback. If I were new here, say, I think that as opposed to a terse line of anonymous feedback telling me my comics blow, I'd much rather someone step up and take the time to tell me why they think my comics blow, and how I could improve them. In fact, we have a forum for just that purpose ("Read My Damn Comics").

If we continue to have the rating system, I'd rather we lose the anonymous comment feature. I realize people would then have to face the horrifying possibility of negative reactions to the things they say about one another, but I don't think I have a big problem with that, either here or in real life.

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I was gonna send a robot back in time, but I got high.

Well, I was riding high on four stars for a few weeks there, FINALLY, and now some assclutter dropped me a star again.

Fuck the ratings system.

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The giant three-phallused phallus of Uzbekistan will one day squirt the cosmic jizz of revenge all over Canada.

I don't care if we have a rating system or not, but I like the comments.

I like mine.

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possible savior probable SEX MACHINE

As a means of obtaining useful feedback, I agree with Zaster about the utility of the star system. When you're rated well, all's fine, but when you're a newbie or in the pits, it's hard to know what *exactly* you need to improve based upon a 'You suck'.

As a means of sorting out who is and who isn't funny, it's actually not too bad. Humour is as subjective as a person's musical tastes.

I think that if one would like to comment upon someone's comics, one should have the bravery (and a solid rationale) to stand beside those comments. Otherwise it's just snarkiness, which should stay exactly where it does, out of the public domain.

If I may also comment upon the Read My Damn Comics forum, it has been useful to obtain general 'I like/ I don't like' feedback. However, I have found it difficult (thus far) to obtain critical feedback, but maybe that's really not possible for something as nebulous as humour. Or for a newcomer.

IMHO, anyways.

-Q

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If you can't beat your computer at chess, try kickboxing.

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xx( o Y o. )xx

Maybe getting rid of the stars would be fine, but I like (most of) my comments. I really feel that stars don't mean anything. One of my least favorite strippers has four stars, and one of my favorites has a measly one (yet more people seem to like him than that).

Uh, right. Brad did away with donors voting with more than one account looooong time ago (back when we got rid of IRC for a spell).

What about Kajun/Chooby? Both are donors and the same person.

Suggestion....

Leave the ratings system the way it is, but maybe implement a system where each individual comic can also be given some sort of thumbs up by anyone (even non-donors). Any individual comic that has X number of thumbs up appears on a special list somewhere OR in a special place (link-wise) in the user's profile, maybe under their favorite users. OR, make it so that it is specially marked (or colored) on the drop-down list of a users comics. This way, people who really like a single comic, can "thumbs up" it, but can't do anything negative to it (unless they want to make a donor vote and be negative or something). Then if, say, 10 people really dig a certain strip, the user is given the small reward of having a highlighted post in their profile/comics list or something which kind of highlights their best work. I realize this probably sounds like a ton of work, but I think it would be a very cool feature for regular users who actually care about mutual support of fellow users and, like I said, it would be a system that couldn't be abused to demote someone's status or rating or whatever.

pslock, I like ideas that involve the ratings of individual strips. Thing is, we kind of sort of have that already. http://www.stripcreator.com/toprated.php isn't exactly visible in everyone's comic list, and it's not publicised, but is our built-in system as it stands. The only problem I can forsee with what you have suggested is that getting ten people to vote on one single strip is fairly difficult. In order for a lot of those strips to get on that toprated list, they had to be posted to a special "Let's everyone rate some strips" thread. No strip with less than five votes shows up on that toprated list, by the way. So strips I have voted for long ago may never see the light of day simply because the users here would have to find it out of the 250000+ strips already on the site. That same issue could exist with your idea.

Of course, if even non-donors could vote, it might make voting more common, if for no other reason than all the random users clicking "random" and voting for the random strips.

quote:

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What about Kajun/Chooby? Both are donors and the same person.

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I would be willing to be held accountable for any comments I've made, positive or negative. Those people earned my wrath. And I'd really miss "Waffle Iron" if it were to disappear.

I also kind of enjoy having the negative comments on my info. I don't take crap from anyone, and I doubt everyone loves that about me.

However, if the system were to go, I don't think I'd be curled up in the corner crying. I could be wrong.

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Mediocrity at its most average.

Fuck 'em if they can't take a joke, that's what I say.

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The giant three-phallused phallus of Uzbekistan will one day squirt the cosmic jizz of revenge all over Canada.

I always thought you said "More, boorite, MORE!!!"

Sometimes, and sometimes I say "possums, watch the teeth."

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The giant three-phallused phallus of Uzbekistan will one day squirt the cosmic jizz of revenge all over Canada.

Sometimes, and sometimes I say "possums, watch the teeth."

Fangs, bro, fangs.