Addendum to Reviewing Rules

[TheDeekon]

I am a believer of people getting what they deserve. Good artists should be protected from random blams and mindless gibberish. However, as anyone who has lurked on NG for more than a few minutes can tell you, much of what is submitted amounts to nothing more than animated (sometime poorly) gibberish.

So I say that reviews should be permitted to reflect the quality of the submission. That is to say, you don't have to provide eloquent and cerebral commentary for what some drool-bag dribbled out in a couple of minutes.

Now I know the smart thing to do would be to simply close the window, blam the piece, and move on -- but I never claimed such smartitude. By the same reasoning that permits chuckle-heads to submit utter garbage, we as fellow chuckle-beans should be allowed to respond in kind.

I make this rather ranty post because just the other day I was banned from reviewing for saying:

Subject: Pointless
Body: An easy zero.

This was for a submission that was hanging somewhere around the 1.8 range, and honestly should have probably been sent to the graveyard before its conception.

Now I know that's a useless review. I wasn't trying to expand the mind of the author or further his skills with my words, but let's face it... I don't think the dude was too concerned about entertaining me with his garbage either.

In short a serious review for a serious submission; a self-gratifying review for a self-gratifying submission! In other words, if the submission is under a 2.5, 2.2, or whatever you think is fair, it should be less protected by the guidelines.

(Note - This does not mean that if an 8 year old posts his first stick animation it gives everyone the right to call his mother's virtue into question and wish for him the bloodiest of deaths, but merely that the reviews would no longer need to be constructive.)

Thanks for reading

[Little-Rena]

Your review was shit, it doesn't matter if the flash is shit or even a spam submission, you can't just leave a review that doesn't say much about the flash. It's lazy and well, stupid, you didn't even put much time into that review, it doesn't tell me anything about the flash you reviewed for a start. As well as you can't say anything in your review that are along the lines of "Blam this", saying it's an easy 0 in my view is the same as saying blam this.

Just because your review got deleted for violating the rules, doesn't mean the rules need changing to suit your needs. The review body isn't for you to leave any mindless comment to the author, it's to help them and even to tell others what to expect in the flash. If it was bad, say why it was bad, you can't just insult a flash without saying why, your review doesn't even say why it's an easy 0.

It seems you put a lot of thought into making an argument around how you want reviewing to change because you personally don't think people should give decent reviews on what you think are rubbish flash. Well you are wrong, if Newgrounds allowed reviews like "easy 0" or the like then well, what would the point be in having a review system? People would just leave short and shitty comments to build up their review stats.

In short, your review was shit, stop complaining.

[Corky52]

Looking through your other reviews I notice that you have a lot of border line reviews or just reviews that make you look like an asshole. For example you voted 0 on a submission just because it had a large loading file and you didn't want to wait for it to load? You do know that you are suppose to give reasons why you don't like a submission and things that you think should be changed in a constructive manner so the author can get tips on what people want to see and what people would like to see. I would say many of your reviews are useless and offer no help whatsoever. A good reviewer reviews a bad movie and a good movie in a helpful manner no matter what and if you have nothing to say except for "10MB didn't watch it, 0." Then you shouldn't leave a review at all.

[YoungAndWise]

There is a difference between a crappy submission and a crappy review. When a person submits a shitty work to the portal, said person has the freedom to show whatever he/she wants, as long as it doesn't breaks any of the rules. It's his/her personal work, it's there for whoever wants to see it or not.

Reviews, however, have a single purpose: communicating with the author. If your review does not meet the criteria for doing this, then it will simply get deleted. Reviews were made to give an opinion to the author, and no matter how shitty the submission is, you can't make a shit review.

[kidray76]

At 7/15/08 06:38 AM, TheDeekon wrote: So I say that reviews should be permitted to reflect the quality of the submission. That is to say, you don't have to provide eloquent and cerebral commentary for what some drool-bag dribbled out in a couple of minutes.

Problem here, "Who is the person that decides what is quality and what is crap? Some people think alot of flashes on the top 50 are crap. At the same time, I've seen some totw that weren't all that bad. Again, you can't standardize quality since aethestics is subjective and varies from person to person.

Don't say anything about the score, because voters sometimes zero just because of the artist, not the work. Pretty sure if you ahead over to the audio forum, see plenty of examples of that.

So, to have some level of standard for writing reviews, follow the set guidelines.

[TheDeekon]

Well Kidray, since you are the only one who responded in an intelligent manner, I'll reply to you.

You're completely right about the subjectivity of art. However, since this site is a democracy, one person can think that a submission in the top 50 is crap, but it does not make it a crappy submission. On the other hand, if everyone thinks a submission is crap, and one person thinks it is great, it doesn't make it a great submission.

It's a sad truth about art that is directly reflected in the "ratings" system of both this site and any other reviewing medium.

You, unlike most of the other tickle-toes in this thread, are thinking in the right direction, and I completely understand why the guidelines exist as is; all I am saying is that if the author clearly put no work into the submission -- and the score will typically reflect that -- why should a reviewer be expected to put any work into their review? I know it's not an argument of reason, for the reasonable thing would be to give the piece a zero and move on, but 0s get submissions deleted, reviews like the one I included in the original post do not. They do convey a message to the author -- as much or more than a 0 does. To me it says, "You didn't do enough work. If you want to litter the site with garbage, expect people to respond in kind."

I know that the rules will likely not change because uniformed rules are much easier to enforce and make for less grey-area decisions. I suppose I was really just venting. Still, I have always viewed Newgrounds (having lurked here from the start) as more of a midnight cult-movie screening, a la Ed Wood, than a serious and formal medium for professional artists; in fact, that is what I love about it so much.

I just hope the trend towards "professionalization" doesn't continue, because although there are some fantastic artists and game designers on this site, the vast majority are not.

P.S.

To the rest of you starry-eyed kiddies...

The real world is far harder than you may think. If a mediocre artist gets on here and all he hears is "Uh mah Gud! Arrsum! Dis 1z s000 k3wl!" he may not be motivated to improve. Bad or negative reviews can be just as valuable as a good review -- especially since 90% of good reviews don't say anything constructive at all and simply amount to, "it was great."

I'm also not saying that they don't need to hear good reviews, as that is an essential part of motivation as well. But your arguments against "bad" reviews are misguided. The fact that they "are the rules" is what this post brings into contention. And just because a person creates something does not in any way preclude another from responding as they please. In reality, you can and should be able to say whatever you please about someone else's work. In other words, just because I say I like apples doesn't mean you need to give me one -- that is your choice.

I am very rarely derisive in a pointed fashion. I normally choose to be rather lighthearted in my negative reviews because they are easier to shrug off. I can write at least half the people on this site a very convincing essay (whether true or not) that states why they will never be a successful artist, but I never even hint at that.

In short, I'm on here for the same reason as most people: to enjoy myself. And I'm not going to let an artist decide whether I get to do that or not. If the submission is good, I will enjoy it; if it is bad, I will enjoy it anyway. It's the same concept behind watching B-movies or throwing pickles and popcorn at a howler of a film.

I love NG, so I am all in favor of keeping it how it is -- and even restoring it to how it was.

Thanks for reading; sorry about the length.

[idiot-buster]

At 7/15/08 06:09 PM, TheDeekon wrote: Well Kidray, since you are the only one who responded in an intelligent manner, I'll reply to you.

The rest of them were just trying to help you and YoungAndWise, Little-Rena and Corky52 are all wi/ht fourm regulars and to me seemed to be very helpfull. they were not trying to criticize you they were just trying to help you........

[Corky52]

At 7/15/08 06:15 PM, idiot-buster wrote:

At 7/15/08 06:09 PM, TheDeekon wrote: Well Kidray, since you are the only one who responded in an intelligent manner, I'll reply to you.

The rest of them were just trying to help you and YoungAndWise, Little-Rena and Corky52 are all wi/ht fourm regulars and to me seemed to be very helpfull. they were not trying to criticize you they were just trying to help you........

Thank you for the support man. Like he said none of us were trying to be mean or criticize you in any way. We were just trying to be helpful. We may be regulars in a matter of speaking, but we aren't regulars on a list yet.

[TheDeekon]

I can appreciate your intentions, but I didn't come on here for help. I came on here to express an opinion that the old rules (very old) of NG are better and more "realistic" than the new rules.

NG used to be a place that felt a lot like digital hood. Some artists would come on here spray their tags, post their work like graffiti (which is not without merit), and the people could reply as they wished.

I'm not saying people should be vulgar in their reviews -- I seldom am -- but tell me how saying "Wow that's awesome" is any more constructive than saying "That was completely pointless."

It's not any more constructive. The only difference is one is positive and the other is negative, yet both are valid opinions. Squelching the negative does a disservice to would-be artists by imbuing them with a wholly unrealistic opinion of their work. I know from experience that nothing is harder to work with than a mediocre artist that thinks they're great.

[Corky52]

At 7/15/08 10:41 PM, TheDeekon wrote:

I'm not saying people should be vulgar in their reviews -- I seldom am -- but tell me how saying "Wow that's awesome" is any more constructive than saying "That was completely pointless."

Neither are helpful at all. I would mark both of them as useless, but the review of yours that got deleted stated An easy 0, which can cause other people to down vote the movie without even watching it. You don't think it was a good idea to have it deleted?

It's not any more constructive. The only difference is one is positive and the other is negative, yet both are valid opinions. Squelching the negative does a disservice to would-be artists by imbuing them with a wholly unrealistic opinion of their work. I know from experience that nothing is harder to work with than a mediocre artist that thinks they're great.

Do you know how hard it is to actually make a flash animation though? After I attempted flash I found out how hard it was and that sometimes it really is the best they can do.

[NEVR]

At 7/15/08 10:41 PM, TheDeekon wrote: It's not any more constructive. The only difference is one is positive and the other is negative, yet both are valid opinions.

You're absolutely right. As far as I've seen, most reviews these days that say something along the lines of "that sucked" won't have their reviews deleted, but honestly it's down to the mod team. Some mods (Malachy for example) seem to be of the opinion that the review guidelines are exactly that: GUIDELINES, whilst others will take the guidelines as solid rules and delete reviews that violate them in any way.

That's just a difference between styles of moderation though, and TBH, if the site admins trust them with the responsibility, then I guess there's not a whole lot of room for objection, being that they run the site.

Squelching the negative does a disservice to would-be artists by imbuing them with a wholly unrealistic opinion of their work. I know from experience that nothing is harder to work with than a mediocre artist that thinks they're great.

I think the idea is that when offering a negative opinion, there's supposed to be some kind of feedback as to what needs to be done in the way of improvement. Obviously it's easy to say "Wow this rocks" without offering any advice, because if someone really does think that a submission is perfect, then what else can they really say?

I mean, obviously these people who give out a 10 and just say the bare minimum COULD probably try and say a bit more (I know I always do), but you have to agree that those who criticize a flash will have more specific things to say, because a negative opinion lends itself to constructive criticism, whereas a positive opinion is basically saying that you're doing things right, and therefore no improvement is needed.

/pontification

I think this has drifted from the original thoughts behind this thread, forgive me.

[TheDeekon]

Do you know how hard it is to actually make a flash animation though? After I attempted flash I found out how hard it was and that sometimes it really is the best they can do.

To answer your question: yes, I do.

I'm normally not in favor of deleting anything, but I understand it must be done to cut back on rampant server bloat. Honestly, I didn't mean for others to give it a 0. I usually find it difficult to decide whether I want to give a submission a 0 or a 2 (when they are God awful). I want to give them a chance, but some of them truly don't deserve it. I fully admit to the fact that I certainly could have expressed myself better and more clearly in that review, but not needing to do so is kind of the original purpose of this post.

Anyway, on the topic of review quality, here is a shining example of what's wrong with the reviewing of reviews: http://www.newgrounds.com/portal/reviews /449089/3

As you will notice, I gave this wonderful submission a 9. Why? Because it is lacking an entire element of art and entertainment: a point. It has no discernable plot, but plays more like a technical demo for a portfolio piece, which is fine, but is also why it can't be considered "perfect" -- even by NG standards.

If you notice, the review is marked as "Useless," as is any other review that isn't a perfect 10. It's an example of a young artist getting hot headed because he studied a bit of ATEC (Arts and Tech). I can tell you from experience this isn't likely to win any awards at any real competitions because it lacks that key element of design.

Ultimately, there is nothing you can do to help people who have chosen to blind themselves to their own shortcommings, but the least we can do is not foment that predisposition by curtailing negative reviews in any way.

I know this is a different subject altogether, since this is definately a quality submission and should be protected by review rules, but it further illustrates the underlying problem of curbing free speech.

Thanks for reading, I appreciate your insightful responses.

[TheDeekon]

I think the idea is that when offering a negative opinion, there's supposed to be some kind of feedback as to what needs to be done in the way of improvement. Obviously it's easy to say "Wow this rocks" without offering any advice, because if someone really does think that a submission is perfect, then what else can they really say?

I mean, obviously these people who give out a 10 and just say the bare minimum COULD probably try and say a bit more (I know I always do), but you have to agree that those who criticize a flash will have more specific things to say, because a negative opinion lends itself to constructive criticism, whereas a positive opinion is basically saying that you're doing things right, and therefore no improvement is needed.

/pontification

I think this has drifted from the original thoughts behind this thread, forgive me.

I do appreciate you giving the matter real thought, and you are right about negative feedback being conducive to constructive criticism. Of course, if you didn't like it there must be a reason. That reason itself can often times be, though is not always, constructive criticism. Saying anything more would be going into detail; from there you can also offer suggestions on how to improve (if you have sufficient knowledge to do so).

However, positive reviews can also go into more detail than "I like it." Telling me, for instance, that you didn't like my animation style or that you did like it is equally beneficial. From there you can tell me why you liked it or why you didn't.

In other words, learning why people liked your game/movie is just as important as learning why people didn't like it. Although I concede to you that when something is bad it can be more easily told how to improve.

The original point, however -- and I drifted off subject too -- is that someone who put no effort into their work may not deserve such consideration. A lot of these "useless" reviews I've written are for submissions under 2.0.

If you are going to write a review for such submissions, it's likely to be negative. Sometimes there is something glaring about it, such as terrible audio, it may be a copy, or it doesn't work correctly, in which case that should be stated. But many times the whole thing is a stinker.

So the issue becomes you can either not review these movies at all, randomly chose any aspect of art and design and say you didn't like that aspect of it, or have a cookie-cutter response that reads something like:

Subject: Needs Improvement
Body: Everything about this submission was terrible. You need to improve in every aspect...

Then follow it up with a random compliment like:

... but I like that you took the 1 mintue or so that it takes to put a loader into your movie.

Like I said, however, many submissions seem like they took their authors less time to make than this post! =O

Or perhaps even less time than it would take to read it! ;P

[Corky52]

To the remark about how your review got marked as useless it could of honestly been a lot of things. It could of been someone who really thought your review was useless, the author marking it as useless because you either upset him or he really didn't find it useless, or even as much as someone missing the button and marking it as useless. I actually do that sometimes when marking reviews and accidentally mark them as abusive because of the way may mouse like to click when I'm dragging my finger across it. I've noticed some of the most helpful reviews ever get marked useless for some reason.

[TheDeekon]

Yeah, it can be pretty random at times. Sometimes I purposefully write a comical review and it gets marked helpful, and a serious, positive one gets marked useless. Oh well, teh internetz will be teh internetz, I suppose.

[Coop83]

At 7/16/08 01:10 AM, TheDeekon wrote: Yeah, it can be pretty random at times. Sometimes I purposefully write a comical review and it gets marked helpful, and a serious, positive one gets marked useless. Oh well, teh internetz will be teh internetz, I suppose.

I never really bother to pay much attention to the marking system for if people find my reviews helpful or not. You will get dickheads who come along and randomly vote on them that screws up that system. What I pay attention to is any responses I get for my reviews, which I think show you exactly what the author thought. OF course, I have had some disagreements with the authors over the responses they have given me, so the discussion has moved into the PM system, giving us a chance to bounce stuff off each other, which I'm always happy to do.

Stick to the guidelines and if the flash is that dumb that it doesn't warrant a review, don't review it. If it's worth your time to comment on, put some thought in and tell the author how you think they can improve.

Simple steps and you'll find it much more rewarding. Some of the series that I've reviewed, I've seen blossom as a direct result of my own feedback. Jim & Pals for example have really made some great progress since I started reviewing his work

[Little-Rena]

At 7/15/08 06:09 PM, TheDeekon wrote: Well Kidray, since you are the only moderator who responded, I'll reply to you.

Fixed, don't thank me.

I don't even see why I should further this argument, you obviously don't care what any member has to say other than if they agree with you or are a moderator.

If a review is a 10 and says "OMG! 5!" then it also says nothing about the flash and I'd flag it, the review system is for leaving your thoughts about the content of the flash and that doesn't include giving a 0 because it took too long to load so you didn't watch it, how can you review something you haven't seen? You can't.

The only way leaving comments would be added is if they had both a review system and a comment system, for comments you could leave stupid little half-wit messages and witty comments about the flash but for a review, I would say stick to talking about the flash, what parts of it you liked and what you thought could be improved.

I've read some of your reviews and really, a lot of them are trying to be witty in someway, which to me seems more like you are trying to be offencive and funny rather than helpful, Newgrounds might have had diffrent rules before but times change and really, it's better without the short comments that say nothing about the flash.

[idle]

Hahaha.

The Deekon.

Hopefully you learn from this experience and don't review flash which is nonsense, for fear of swift, merciless street justice; It comes like a lightening bolt in a clear, blue sky.

Thanks for the sirmon.

[gfoxcook]

At 7/15/08 06:09 PM, TheDeekon wrote: Well Kidray, since you are the only one who responded in an intelligent manner, I'll reply to you.

Passive aggressive much? #;-}>

You, unlike most of the other tickle-toes in this thread, are thinking in the right direction, and I completely understand why the guidelines exist as is; all I am saying is that if the author clearly put no work into the submission -- and the score will typically reflect that -- why should a reviewer be expected to put any work into their review?

Because the site is about flash, not about reviewing flash. Flash authors are a "protected species" on NG, and reviewers never will be. This is why reviews OF FLASHES are moderated. But responses by authors (sometimes very abusive, hateful authors) to those reviewers... ARE NOT MODERATED.

Additionally, because the tit for tat "fitting punishment" system of reviewing crap with crap is right up there with "an eye for an eye" justice systems that would have humanity destroy itself.

Yes, that's a bit of an exaggeration, but my point is simply that a reviewer doesn't have to sink to the crapflash-maker's level. IOW, instead of saying "you didn't do shit, so I ain't gonna do shit, either," putting effort into a review, even of a flash with 0 effort in it... should be a standard we can all meet.

Can, but won't, of course.