It was pointed out to me that I probably vote a bit wrong on posts.
I generally just up and downvote how I feel, but occasionally if I think a post is very overrated or underrated I will strong upvote or downvote even though I feel less strong than that.
But this is I think the wrong behaviour and a defection. Since if we all did that then we’d all be manipulating the post to where we think it ought to be and we’d lose the information held in the median of where all our votes leave it.
Withholding the current score of a post till after a vote is cast (but the casting is committal) should be enough to prevent strategic behavior. But it comes with many downsides (I think feed ordering / recsys could work with private information, so the scores may be in principle inferrable from patterns in your feed, but you probably won’t actually do it. The worse problem is commitment, I do like to edit my votes quite a bit after initial impressions).
I imagine there’s a more subtle instrument, withholding the current score until committal votes have been cast seems almost like a limit case.
Although this isn’t in response to your specific case (correcting for overrated or underrated posts), but in response to
Since if we all did that then we’d all be manipulating the post to where we think it ought to be and we’d lose the information held in the median of where all our votes leave it.
I think it’s okay to “defect” to correct the results of others’ apparent defection or to keep important information from being hidden. I’ve used upvotes correctively when I think people are too harsh with downvotes or when the downvotes will make important information/discussion much less visible. To elaborate, I’ve sometimes done this for cases like these:
When a comment or post is at low or negative karma due to downvotes, despite being made in good faith (especially if it makes plausible, relevant and useful claims), and without being uncivil or breaking other norms, even if it expresses an unpopular view (e.g. opinion or ethical view) or makes some significant errors in reasoning. I don’t think we should disincentivize or censor such comments, and I think that’s what disagreement voting and explanations should be used for. I find when people use downvotes like this without explanation to be especially unfair. This also includes when downvotes crush well-intentioned and civil but poorly executed newbie posts/comments, which I think is unkind and unwelcoming. (I’ve used upvotes correctively like this even before we had disagree voting.)
For posts with low or negative karma due to downvotes, if they contain (imo) important information, possibly even if poorly framed, with bad argument in them or made in apparently bad faith, if there’s substantial valuable discussion on the issue or it isn’t being discussed visibly somewhere else on the EA Forum. Low karma risks effectively hiding (making much less visible) that information and surrounding discussion through the ranking algorithm. This is usually for community controversies and criticism.
I very rarely downvote at all, but maybe I’d refrain from downvoting something I would otherwise downvote because its karma is already low or negative.
Right—in my view, net-negative karma conveys a particular message (something like “this post would be better off not existing”) that is meaningfully stronger than the median voter’s standard for downvoting. It can therefore easily exist in circumstances where the median voter would not have endorsed that conclusion.
FWIW, I don’t think this is against the explicit EA Forum norms around voting, and using upvotes and strong upvotes this way seems in line with some of their “suggestions” in the table from that section. In particular, they suggest it’s appropriate to strong upvote if
You think many more people might benefit from seeing it.
You want to signal that this sort of behavior adds a lot of value.
These could be more or less true depending on the karma of the post or comment and how visible you think it is.
I don’t think using downvotes against overrated posts or comments falls under the suggestions, though, but doing it only for upvotes and not downvotes could bias the karma.
It was pointed out to me that I probably vote a bit wrong on posts.
I generally just up and downvote how I feel, but occasionally if I think a post is very overrated or underrated I will strong upvote or downvote even though I feel less strong than that.
But this is I think the wrong behaviour and a defection. Since if we all did that then we’d all be manipulating the post to where we think it ought to be and we’d lose the information held in the median of where all our votes leave it.
Sorry.
Withholding the current score of a post till after a vote is cast (but the casting is committal) should be enough to prevent strategic behavior. But it comes with many downsides (I think feed ordering / recsys could work with private information, so the scores may be in principle inferrable from patterns in your feed, but you probably won’t actually do it. The worse problem is commitment, I do like to edit my votes quite a bit after initial impressions).
I imagine there’s a more subtle instrument, withholding the current score until committal votes have been cast seems almost like a limit case.
Although this isn’t in response to your specific case (correcting for overrated or underrated posts), but in response to
I think it’s okay to “defect” to correct the results of others’ apparent defection or to keep important information from being hidden. I’ve used upvotes correctively when I think people are too harsh with downvotes or when the downvotes will make important information/discussion much less visible. To elaborate, I’ve sometimes done this for cases like these:
When a comment or post is at low or negative karma due to downvotes, despite being made in good faith (especially if it makes plausible, relevant and useful claims), and without being uncivil or breaking other norms, even if it expresses an unpopular view (e.g. opinion or ethical view) or makes some significant errors in reasoning. I don’t think we should disincentivize or censor such comments, and I think that’s what disagreement voting and explanations should be used for. I find when people use downvotes like this without explanation to be especially unfair. This also includes when downvotes crush well-intentioned and civil but poorly executed newbie posts/comments, which I think is unkind and unwelcoming. (I’ve used upvotes correctively like this even before we had disagree voting.)
For posts with low or negative karma due to downvotes, if they contain (imo) important information, possibly even if poorly framed, with bad argument in them or made in apparently bad faith, if there’s substantial valuable discussion on the issue or it isn’t being discussed visibly somewhere else on the EA Forum. Low karma risks effectively hiding (making much less visible) that information and surrounding discussion through the ranking algorithm. This is usually for community controversies and criticism.
I very rarely downvote at all, but maybe I’d refrain from downvoting something I would otherwise downvote because its karma is already low or negative.
Right—in my view, net-negative karma conveys a particular message (something like “this post would be better off not existing”) that is meaningfully stronger than the median voter’s standard for downvoting. It can therefore easily exist in circumstances where the median voter would not have endorsed that conclusion.
FWIW, I don’t think this is against the explicit EA Forum norms around voting, and using upvotes and strong upvotes this way seems in line with some of their “suggestions” in the table from that section. In particular, they suggest it’s appropriate to strong upvote if
These could be more or less true depending on the karma of the post or comment and how visible you think it is.
I don’t think using downvotes against overrated posts or comments falls under the suggestions, though, but doing it only for upvotes and not downvotes could bias the karma.