Maybe it would be cool if the thread originator could have weighted thumbs-up. Maybe 5:1 or 10:1 or some other weight. Maybe forum MVP's votes could have 3:1 or 5:1 weights. Everyone else would be 1:1. Then when I'm busy I could just read everything with +10 rating or better, absorbing in 20 hits in 5 minutes what otherwise currently costs me 200 hits in an hour while missing 85% of it.

I feel the essential problem with most threaded environments is everything reverberates at the same volume forever. There is no way to draw attention to particularly insightful or funny or otherwise valuable posts. When browsing, the next thing you read is as likely to be brilliant as it is to be silly or dumb.

Right now some people don't care if they trim their auto quotes, requiring every sucker who clicks the message to scroll down-down-down to find nothing valuable at the bottom. Many people don't care if they post untested code in their messages. Some people don't care if they send someone on a wild goose chase with an off-the-cuff answer. Understandably so; there's almost zero incentive.

The probability that the next message you read, and the 10-15 seconds you invest in it, and brings forth zero value whatsoever is, in my estimation, 0.5 or greater. Imagine, in contrast, if the all the messages you click in the next 20 minutes had a 90% or better probability of being truly valuable to most readers.

In business terms, that's the difference between a website worth seven figures or better, and a website worth about the same amount as the greeting-card franchise located in any strip mall in your town.


**--** Steve


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>>No, that's not what I'm saying or suggesting.
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>>I'm suggesting if the UT had a sensible content rating system, then most of us could be in-and-out of here in a fraction of the time drawing way more value in the process. This also frees time for otherwise busy people which will benefit the overall quality of responses. Moreover people will tend to think a little more deeply before responding given that peer-review is to be expected.
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>>What's more, when John Petersen comes back and posts another soggy-logic message, then a few hundred thumbs-down later he's effectively and unambiguously snubbed, which is a great service to everyone.
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>>**--** Steve
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>This and your other post about thumbs up/thumbs down rating sound very reasonable, I can live with that. Certainly a better argument than simple distrust of thread originators knowing which answers are best for the problem at hand, a common complaint of folks that dislike the old points system.
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>Although I think the current points system has some value, however limited, for those questions simple or complex that are narrowly focused and very specific. The type of questions that can be answered in one or two lines of text or code, or with a reference to an MSKB article. If you are doing a search on these topics the messages with points will allow for faster access to a potentially helpful response. For other questions where the answer is not so clear-cut the value of a response might ultimately lie on the eyes of the beholder.
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>Maybe a good solution for the UT is a combination of thumbs up/thumbs down and the current points system, where the reader is left with the task of choosing the rating that suits the question or maybe even their level of comfort. For sure the thumbs up/thumbs down approach would have more value on the chatter-opinion-clairvoyant type threads :)
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>Just my 2¢
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>DISCLAIMER: Any hint that my support for the proposed change is in any way related to what might happen to JP's posts after its implementation is entirely coincidental.. :)