Reddit's solution

[Ninjafap]

So today I found out Reddit.com normalizes submissions scores (those numbers you see on the front page), by applying an increasing amount of fake downvotes to approach real upvotes. The reason why? Apparently it's to accommodate for the increasing popularity of the site and avoid grade inflation.

While it seems unnatural and unfair, it works on the long-term, and for the best of everyone. We didn't do this here, and look what happened. 94% of the top 50 submissions were submitted within the last two years. Users seek it unseen content, and simply can't, because it's been buried underneath mountains of grade inflation. Indeed this treatment of older flashes alienated most of our old user base, causing a chain reaction.

[Ninjafap]

At 7/2/11 04:45 PM, Newgrundling wrote: I'm skeptical. You say users want unseen content, so why's it a problem that our top 50 reflects newer stuff rather than older?

Because the largest portion of our user base joined within the last 2 years. It gives the site a very narrow scope to those who view it through the flash portal (despite the years past box, which is the only one currently displaying early submissions)

And even if someone were to support automatic fake downvotes because of some sense of "unfairness to older submissions," what would that formula be, and how could it possibly not create MORE unfairness to either newer submissions or others more generally?

Lets start with the core assumption that the actual quality of submissions doesn't change over time. This is true for Reddit, but debatable for Newgrounds (generally I hold that production values increased, but technical and storytelling values decreased). What would betruly fair is that scores don't change also.

Reddit does this by normalizing scores. For example, if a new submission gets a certain number of upvotes relative to other current submissions, then it will be made to have the same total score as a submissions which had a similar ratio in 2010. That way, the rankings on the front page and what content gets to it stays the same, but the scores stay fair to past precedent.

[PeterM]

Reddit has got it right.

Newgrounds faces the risk of new (and ultimately good) submissions being catapulted to the top un-necessarily.

"Kneejerk reactions"

[citricsquid]

What reddit does to scores (fudging) is not anything to do with scores over time. Also the reddit model can't be compared with Newgrounds, the front page of reddit is *never* older than 24 hours, whereas the Newgrounds top50 has no time restrictions.

Also reddit changes scores so that people (eg: spammers) can't look at the scores and work out how they're affecting scores. The actual scores used for ranking are based on the actual votes, the only fudging reddit does is what you see listed under total votes.

also reddit is shit don't go there.

[Ninjafap]

At 7/2/11 07:45 PM, citricsquid wrote: What reddit does to scores (fudging) is not anything to do with scores over time. Also the reddit model can't be compared with Newgrounds, the front page of reddit is *never* older than 24 hours, whereas the Newgrounds top50 has no time restrictions.

The all time top scoring front page also has no time restrictions, and yet it represents submissions from every year since the site's conception. Newgrounds' portal represents submissions almost exclusively from the last two years, and greatly inflates their quality.

Also reddit changes scores so that people (eg: spammers) can't look at the scores and work out how they're affecting scores. The actual scores used for ranking are based on the actual votes, the only fudging reddit does is what you see listed under total votes.

You know what you're basing this on. The FAQ, right? It's all false.

[Lintire]

Hey.

The top 50 Newgrounds Flashes have stayed good. They haven't gotten any worse or anything. They still represent the utmost quality on Newgrounds, and will continue to do so for a while. Good flashes stay good, sloppy flashes stay shit.

Dunno how reddit works, don't care beyond that there's a few of the users helping me out in UrbanDead right now.

[citricsquid]

At 7/2/11 08:13 PM, Ninjafap wrote: You know what you're basing this on. The FAQ, right? It's all false.

if there's one thing you'll learn if you use reddit for a while is that users constantly jump to wild conclusions without any real backing. you know reddit is open source right? feel free to go through the sourcecode and locate the normalization; all they hide is the spam prevention methods and that != normalization of karma.

it doesn't exist

[Ninjafap]

At 7/2/11 08:27 PM, citricsquid wrote: all they hide is the spam prevention methods and that != normalization of karma.

Could very well be. All they have to do is apply an increasing number of downvotes to an increasing number of upvotes, as the bar graph demonstrated.