Leaving the vote scoring, up and down, is perfectly fine. What isn't is the possibility for anyone to dismiss someone's comments to everyone else because he doesn't like/agree with it.

Imagine if the comment score system would be in place for uploaded pictures too. The possibility for people to hide any uploads they don't happen to like to everyone else with a single downvote (Well okay 2, but close enough) The voting system would pretty much only be used as a mean of tug of war to keep some pictures from being hidden by people having different tastes and kinks. Luckily, the score system on pictures doesn't work that way, and that's for the better.

It should go the same for comments. People have the right to find your comment pointless, wrong or stupid for any reason they want, but for them to have the power to hide it to everyone else shouldn't be possible

Because the link that says "x comments below threshold" (or similar) doesn't exist, and because the ability to change the threshold in your settings doesn't exist either.

werewolfscanbegaytoo said:
If I think your art was disgusting (like scat, bestiality, or cub) I downvote.

I only upvote if I really like your art or comment. I'll also sometimes vote up or down if I think a picture had too high/low a rating.

Use the blacklist and put those on it. Saves your eyes, saves you time having to down vote and saves the bitching from both haters and lovers of those kinds of art.

Also, today I learnt a picture can have a rating that is "too high".

Because there's a link to "uncensore" comments, and there is a function that very likely +95% of the userbase doesn't bother with exist, doesn't excuse that comments have the possibility to get hidden from everybody, and that some people actually downvote comments just for the sole purpose of having them out of their and everyone else's sight

If anything maybe the auto-hide should be raised (possibly -5... though -10 would make it harder for people with multiple accounts to do it), so there has to be a bigger consensus to silence someone.

I turned my auto-hide off. While most of them are just stupid or creepy comments, there's enough legitimate ones that people simply disagreed with that I'd rather just see everything.

Honestly the comments are no place to have arguments anyway. Does anyone really think they're going to change someone's mind that strongly disagrees with them no matter how well reasoned/written your side is? Disagreements on tagging should probably move to the forum.

Yeah, raising the default treshold to something that's not as ridiculously easily reached as -2 or 3 would solve most of that problem, I feel. Just put it at -7 or so, that should be enough to keep most people with multiple accounts from single-handedly being able to obscure someone's comment, or at least deter them.

The way it works now, even when the system's not being abused by one spiteful sack of crap, every comment that's disliked by only a few people gets hidden _{(until you click the link but who actually does that very often?)}, and that's a bit too punishing for what may not even be a truly bad comment. Perhaps even a decent one that's just been misinterpreted, which can and does happen.

However, with something like seven individual dislikes that's starting to become less ambiguous. Perhaps five would suffice, but I'm factoring in possible abuse.

Multi-account vote abuse is not commonplace (even though some users think so), and the negative vote threshold exists to stop this site from turning into Rule34.

If you think that -2 is not low enough, you can change it from the settings. Most users who've been here longer than a couple of days know how to do that, although some choose to raise it to 0 or even higher instead. Which shows that users in general have very low tolerance for verbal diarrhea.

The current threshold is good for reducing the amount of comment drama: you can simply downvote a comment you don't like, instead of writing an angry reply.

Neitsuke said:
Because there's a link to "uncensore" comments, and there is a function that very likely +95% of the userbase doesn't bother with exist, doesn't excuse that comments have the possibility to get hidden from everybody, and that some people actually downvote comments just for the sole purpose of having them out of their and everyone else's sight

Are you kidding? The link is obviously there, and I'm pretty sure at least 95% of the userbase DOES click on it.

I think there's some serious underestimation for how vindictive (taking the effort to mask IP addresses so as not to give away multiple accounts or have multiple people gang up on someone they don't like) or lazy (ignoring hidden comments instead of clicking on them) people are. (Vindictiveness usually beats laziness)

Actually it's not even laziness. People will automatically /assume/ that a hidden comment is not worth reading even if 2 people simply didn't /like/ what it said even if it wasn't offensive. -2 seems like way too low a number to hide a comment. It only takes 2 spiteful people (or 1 spiteful person with 2 accounts) to permanently censor someone forever.

If you never click on hidden comments take some time and read a few, then ask yourself whether or not it was really fair that it was forced to be hidden. And if you -did- think it was fair, did it have -2, or more?

KevSnowcat said:
I think there's some serious underestimation for how vindictive (taking the effort to mask IP addresses so as not to give away multiple accounts or have multiple people gang up on someone they don't like) or lazy (ignoring hidden comments instead of clicking on them) people are. (Vindictiveness usually beats laziness)

Actually it's not even laziness. People will automatically /assume/ that a hidden comment is not worth reading even if 2 people simply didn't /like/ what it said even if it wasn't offensive. -2 seems like way too low a number to hide a comment. It only takes 2 spiteful people (or 1 spiteful person with 2 accounts) to permanently censor someone forever.

If you never click on hidden comments take some time and read a few, then ask yourself whether or not it was really fair that it was forced to be hidden. And if you -did- think it was fair, did it have -2, or more?

Nobody gets "permanently censored forever". Once again, the show comments below threshold link is just below the picture. And I've seen comments that get 1 or 2 downvotes because of spiteful people and then get upvoted later on.

I have set my comment score threshold to -999 because I got annoyed by having to click on the "n comments below threshold" link.

Downvoting an image? Literally any reason i want.
Downvoting a comment? Usually because it's stupid, but not enough to warrant a proper STFU.

Why have them at all?

Online (semi-)anonymous voting systems have always been a pretty pointless feature, but some people find them cathartic, so at least they do something productive for somebody. Sadly, those same people often end up taking the opinions of those they've never met, and probably will never meet, a little too seriously.

But otherwise, no, these systems do nothing in a practical sense. If you have an opinion regarding something, such that you feel it's worth acknowledging either positively or negatively, why wouldn't you justify it with context? Why not elaborate? Give feedback, give substance others can respond to; there is no solution in simply presenting the idea that something is good or bad.

Calcutta said:
Why have them at all?

Online (semi-)anonymous voting systems have always been a pretty pointless feature, but some people find them cathartic, so at least they do something productive for somebody. Sadly, those same people often end up taking the opinions of those they've never met, and probably will never meet, a little too seriously.

But otherwise, no, these systems do nothing in a practical sense. If you have an opinion regarding something, such that you feel it's worth acknowledging either positively or negatively, why wouldn't you justify it with context? Why not elaborate? Give feedback, give substance others can respond to; there is no solution in simply presenting the idea that something is good or bad.

Because I and probably many others use them for search purposes. I am profoundly grateful that things like snuff and castration get downvoted into oblivion and whiny people who shout things like "kinkshaming!" and "blacklist or die!" can do nothing about it. I'm not going to blacklist blood just because idiots think their shitty, unpopular fetishes will suddenly become popular if they can force everyone to only say nice things about them. Fucking fascists.

Beanjam said:
Because I and probably many others use them for search purposes. I am profoundly grateful that things like snuff and castration get downvoted into oblivion and whiny people who shout things like "kinkshaming!" and "blacklist or die!" can do nothing about it. I'm not going to blacklist blood just because idiots think their shitty, unpopular fetishes will suddenly become popular if they can force everyone to only say nice things about them. Fucking fascists.

People telling you to blacklist content you find distasteful and people forcing you to be nice to said content are two completely different things. The latter, I disapprove of. Downvoting something just because it contains a fetish you find personally distasteful means decent artwork gets lower scores that it deserves.

If you have a legitimate reason to downvote something then go ahead and downvote it, but if the only reason you have is "I don't like the subject matter", blacklist that subject matter and move on. Same deal with commenting. If you have a legitimate reason to criticise something (bad proportions, anatomical errors, etc.), go for it. If all you're going to do is hate on it, click the back button instead. Hell, sometimes legit criticisms have tags related to them (eg. hyper artwork is nothing but disproportionate characters) so that may be worth looking into as well.

BlueDingo said:
The latter, I disapprove of. Downvoting something just because it contains a fetish you find personally distasteful means decent artwork gets lower scores that it deserves.

This isn't a professional art gallery so objective measures of quality are completely irrelevant. Only the subjective measurement of enjoyment the average person is going to get out of an image matters.

Beanjam said:
Because I and probably many others use them for search purposes. I am profoundly grateful that things like snuff and castration get downvoted into oblivion and whiny people who shout things like "kinkshaming!" and "blacklist or die!" can do nothing about it. I'm not going to blacklist blood just because idiots think their shitty, unpopular fetishes will suddenly become popular if they can force everyone to only say nice things about them. Fucking fascists.

Are you saying you DON'T want a hugbox, and that differing opinions should be allowed even if they're toxic? Holy FUCK, you absolute animal.

Honestly, if it were my choice, I'd just let the comments go uncensored, remove the voting system, and that would be that.

But in the interest of playing devil's advocate, following through on my original train of thought: downvoting doesn't accomplish what you're describing any more efficiently than looking at the image thumbnail beforehand, or using the blacklist, in my experience. Which means that its only function is still catharsis: meaningless, unproductive approval, or passive-aggressiveness. What is the purpose of either, aside from one being much more fun than the other?

I'm not gonna jump whole hog into this, but I will leave my two € about downvotes:

€ the first: while not always, I do use both the hidden comments (I keep mine at > -3 score visible) and the downvoted posts before using e621 for pleasure, instead of business. I may not want to jump into a shitstorm and ruin a good day, so I judge the comments section by artist rep and by amount of hidden comments; I never want to see bad animations because of my method of loading them (VLC for webm, Penguin mobile browser for flash), so I gander at the score it has before deciding to try and view it.

My second € is that having a voting system ultimately serves a double edged purpose: the ability to perform any judgement needed before, during, and after the viewed can be used beneficially, IE blacklisting, whitelisting, manual searching, precognition before acting, praising, and I can list more if my vocabulary isn't limited right now...; it also serves a negative purpose, usually because judgement can force people, be it artists, commenters, the viewer of the judged, etc., into positions of discomfort, especially because it can be done anonymously. Both of these things can be ignored, arguably, so my opinion on having a voting system in general is that it is nothing more than a tool to use, if one wants to.

... aaand I just went whole hog on this.

Siral_Exan said:
...my opinion on having a voting system in general is that it is nothing more than a tool to use, if one wants to.

And like any tool, it's all down to how you use it. Like I've said previously, I use it for private favourites and infinite blacklist.

Calcutta said:
But in the interest of playing devil's advocate, following through on my original train of thought: downvoting doesn't accomplish what you're describing any more efficiently than looking at the image thumbnail beforehand, or using the blacklist, in my experience. Which means that its only function is still catharsis: meaningless, unproductive approval, or passive-aggressiveness. What is the purpose of either, aside from one being much more fun than the other?

I respectfully decline to look through all 1,000,000 thumbnails of every image that has ever been posted on this site just to narrow down my search. Granted, I'm usually searching for something specific, so it's more in the order of hundreds or thousands. But I still refuse.

And, no, blacklists are just extra - tags. They are just as rigid and inflexible and situationally useless for search purposes as tags. I can enjoy a little gore in anthropomorphic animal porn every once in a while, but that doesn't mean I want to see any cheesegraters. My taste in high quality cartoon porn just isn't simple enough to be summarized by one-word binaries.

Beanjam said:
And, no, blacklists are just extra - tags. They are just as rigid and inflexible and situationally useless for search purposes as tags. I can enjoy a little gore in anthropomorphic animal porn every once in a while, but that doesn't mean I want to see any cheesegraters. My taste in high quality cartoon porn just isn't simple enough to be summarized by one-word binaries.

Good thing you can make conditional blacklist entries. For example, "gore cheese_grater" will block images with both gore and cheese_grater tagged, but not block images containing only one of those tags.

BlueDingo said:
Good thing you can make conditional blacklist entries. For example, "gore cheese_grater" will block images with both gore and cheese_grater tagged, but not block images containing only one of those tags.

What do you not understand about not wanting to sort through thousands of things? There are almost a quarter million tags and even if I went through them all, that still wouldn't be nearly as good as having a nice simple number that statistically represents how likely I am to enjoy a thing. If you want to control for people not using blacklists you can search by number of favorites.

I only downvote ironically, like on historical posts that already have hundreds of downvotes, it's a duty of sorts. I know they will never be removed, especially the grate ones.

Beanjam said:
I respectfully decline to look through all 1,000,000 thumbnails of every image that has ever been posted on this site just to narrow down my search. Granted, I'm usually searching for something specific, so it's more in the order of hundreds or thousands. But I still refuse.

And, no, blacklists are just extra - tags. They are just as rigid and inflexible and situationally useless for search purposes as tags. I can enjoy a little gore in anthropomorphic animal porn every once in a while, but that doesn't mean I want to see any cheesegraters. My taste in high quality cartoon porn just isn't simple enough to be summarized by one-word binaries.