[Bubba]

If somebody gives you bad karma, that doesn't mean it's a reason for you to return it.

Also, there must be a proper reason given for dishing out karma.

I have deleted some recent entries and adjusted the scores accordingly.

[Adam Lincoln]

Thanks Bubba. There is not way i am going to take bad Karma off people that give it to me just for the hell of it.

If deserved, i will take it on the chin.

[unclesomebody]

hmmmm... this is interesting. Personally, I don't think Karma should be policed. That's the whole point of Karma isn't it? If you do something bad to someone then one day something bad will happen to you. ie. Sum total of all good imparted will equal sum total of all good recieved. I think if people want to be petty then let them, because it's all recorded and it will give an insight into such matters.

I can understand your concern about it getting out of hand, but perhaps just let it slide...

can you hear me big brother?? CAN YOU!!?!?!   

[Bubba]

Yes, I can hear you, calm down

If it's not policed then it would end up like it was before which was just mayhem.

This is only the 2nd time I've ever edited it, so it's not exactly big brother.

If somebody gives me a "-" because I was posting like a twat, that doesn't mean I should automatically give them a "-" back. If it always works like that then nobody would ever give negative karma and it would just read like one big love-in all the time.

But, I do take your point about petty behaviour being highlighted and maybe you're right on that score.

My main problem are with votes that don't give a real reason. If you don't like somebody that's not enough of a reason to "-" them - they've actually got to have done something wrong.

[SA Chris]

Is karma broken at the moment?

[BenF]

I've not noticed any tit for tat voting, but then I don't look at the karma stats very often.  I do find the way its working at the moment fairly okay though and we shouldn''t get too hung up about getting a bit of -ve karma (or indeed some +ve karma).  It's not life and death, just a prompt to remind us that maybe we should take more care when posting. 

[Bubba]

Is karma broken at the moment?

No, it's ok, but the server was being a bit weird overnight and stopped some links from working.

I've restarted everything now. I'm hoping it's not the new php cache that's misbehaving.

[Bubba]

I've no idea what it means, but at least it was for a reason.

Perhaps Dense can enlighten us.

[soapy]

twopenneth


karma sux

[Bubba]

Well, you can never please everyone.

[butters]

Could be completely unrelated but it might be something to do with the comments on this UKC thread:

http://www.ukclimbing.com/forums/t.php?n=207929

bluebrad

[Adam Lincoln]

I've no idea what it means, but at least it was for a reason.

Perhaps Dense can enlighten us.

I dont think Dense liked me refering to Ben Bransby as "The Bransby" Maybe only he is allowed to do that?

I was providing useful input to the thread, and got slated for it....

[Johnny Brown]

I think he was more bothered about your statement that he always open hands

[Adam Lincoln]

I think he was more bothered about your statement that he always open hands

And doesnt he? (mostly) Whenever ive seen him climb he does, and i know people (Am i allowed to say this?) who climb with him lots, and they have commented on it in the past.....

[Bubba]

Ok, ok - please forget whether Bransby open hands or not - it's really not *that* important, is it. I'll remove denses vote and adjust your score Adam.

Karma is also here as part of my great plan to get the community to be self-policing. I will be introducing a "karma ban" which will be something along the lines of:

If your karma balance hits -25 then you'll get banned from the community.

I don't have time to read every topic across this board, ukcaving.com and the other board I run, so it's an easy way of weeding out troublemakers. That's why I have to occasionally police the karma logs to see that nobody is being being given bad karma for invalid or stupid reasons.

[Johnny Brown]

The problem with Karma is that it highlights the whole problem with forums - folk always misconstrue or misinterpret because text is a very undemonstrative way of communicating. Likewise folk will make assumptions about others without any evidence. Hence I get dissed for 'making tedious yorkshire remarks' which the beefee assumes (i can only assume) stem from sheffield prejudice rather than living and climbing in leeds for 2 years...
Start correcting stuff and it'll never end.
Plus, in Dense's, Idol eyes and other's defences, its far more fun to have folk posting stuff which greatly amuses some even if it may offend others. Its all a question of context, if you don't understand don't be too quick to judge, otherwise we lose all the characters. I don't like the idea of karma-generated auto-bans, its bad enough at present and it doesn't mean anything...

[Doylo]

anyone who takes to heart something written on the internet shouldn't bother reading or posting on forums

[Johnny Brown]

Quite, its not as if we're sat round in a pub where everyone knows what is a joke and what is serious, is it? Or is it?

[unclesomebody]

Quite, its not as if we're sat round in a pub where everyone knows what is a joke and what is serious, is it? Or is it?

ha ha ha ha ha ha... genius.

[Johnny Brown]

Which is exactly the point - what appears to be a straightforward statement to a stranger may in fact be a hilarious joke. I know this kind of thing can seem frustratingly cliquey to others but can you really expect to know folk you haven't met? Anyway isn't UKB filling the void left by the lack of a good sheffield-orientated rag like The Thing or OTE? Hands up who hasn't yet heard the story of Buoux being ordered to stop 'starting' on Dense by Moon?

[Doylo]

yeah your right, its easy in person to work out when people are joking and when they're not.

[andy_e]

Hands up who hasn't yet heard the story of Buoux being ordered to stop 'starting' on Dense by Moon?

[Paul B]

i'm not so sure about this automatic ban either, if the karma isnt reset say once every now and again long time users who pick up the odd negative point may be banned?
I agree that if people take whatever is said on here or other forums to heart it REALLY isn't the place for them, it is extremely difficult to tell sarcasm from a dig on the internet, just take all buoux's postings that have been widely misconstrued and led to some quite heated debates.

[Bubba]

I know the karma system isn't perfect. It's never going to please everyone and as JB says, it's easy to misinterpret banter and take it the wrong way.

I'm only talking about bans if your karma balance get's too out of line. Eg, suppose user a) had -100 and +25. I might then consider a temporary ban...but then I might not...it was only a suggestion.

Fuck knows, it's hard to get the balance right with these things. Maybe like gruff says, it should just run and forget about it, then it's just a bit of fun and it can be a source of amusement for somebody who's bored to read the karma comments.

And of course, it could just be scrapped, but I'm quite fond of it personally so I'm keen to leave it in place a while longer.

All thoughts welcome of course...

[unclesomebody]

I think that when times are good and the food supply is plentiful that karma should just be left to run and it shouldn't be policed in any way. If people want to give negative karma for a daft reason then let them. However, when winter settles in and the days draw short, when food becomes scarce and the tundra is frozen several inches deep it becomes a different matter. If someone appears on ukb and is clearly making a prick of themselves or abusing people then I'm sure the members of ukb will rise like a pack of wilderbeast and all rise to get rid of the bad seed. This could be done in the form of x amount of negative karma in y time frame. Say if someone got -10 in 12 hours then it's a passage to being banned. That way it would essentially be self policing but it would also run on it's own and people who might rack up a lot of negative karma over a long period are in no danger...