In the community details, we have a note about “Vote the opposite of the norm”:

If you agree that the opinion is unpopular give it an arrow up. If it’s something that’s widely accepted, give it an arrow down.

I’ve read lots of comments here that amount to that being confusing. There’s also the fact that not everyone votes like that, so it’s hard to really tell from the votes if something is widely considered unpopular or not. Plus, I don’t really want to tell people how to vote.

I also just realized that it’s slightly unfair to people running with downvotes disabled.

So, should we get rid of that guidance and just assume posts are voted based on their overall merit / agreement? I’ll leave that up to you all.

There are two distinguished comments below which will be used as the poll. Upvote the one you wish to vote in favor of. You can downvote the opposing option if you want, but it won’t affect the results; I’m only going to look at the upvote counts. I’ll leave this up until next Friday to give everyone time to voice their opinions.

I’m not going to lock the post so that you can comment with any opinions or thoughts. Hopefully the ‘distinguish comment’ action federates out so those remain visible. If not, look for the two top level comments from me that start with [POLL]

  • southsamuraiEnglish
    3•19 days ago

    If the voting guideline isn’t there (whether or not it gets followed), then this just becomes a vent/random post/whatever community. The unifying principle is about whether or not the opinion is popular or not, and having the policy there makes it clear what the focus out the discussion should be on.

    Things like that voting policy are subtle, but they really do work to keep a community more coherent and on track than it would be otherwise.

    • Admiral PatrickOPMEnglish
      2•18 days ago

      Thanks for the feedback; that was our thought as well. Though as far as becoming a vent/random post community, there are soft ways to deal with that which would have a similar effect.

      That said, we do want the community to reflect the wishes of its members (and to not be overly confusing). I’ve heard enough mentions of “I don’t know whether to upvote or downvote this” that I thought it was worth getting some input and opinions from the community at large.

      I’m abstaining from the vote (removed the default upvotes from my comments), but I’m also in favor of keeping them.

  • BearEnglish
    2•18 days ago

    The rule has always been good content go up, bad content go down. The same pattern as every other community.