Ideas for a compromise
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To combat the impression that moderator geographer is a douchebag that doesn't like uploaders and doesn't appreciate their contribution to GT.ru, I've been brainstorming this night about some ways to maintain a balance between rewarding uploaders for their torrents and dumping the site with trash. And I've come up with some ideas which lead to a steady compromise, and also solve a few other problems.
Idea #1: Staff torrent rating
I've been thinking a lot on how to make the rewarding scheme machine-based (meaning excluding the direct human factor), and at the same time make it distinguish between the quality of the upload.
To those of you who still don't know, the site has a 5 star torrent rating system. Though we have to face facts - it is dead, no-one, or very few and very seldom, rates torrents and no-one takes into account that rating when choosing a torrent to download. Therefore my idea … to make 5 star torrent rating a staff prerogative, meaning only the moderator who reviews the torrent will be able to rate it.
A quick sketch of the idea:
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The rating option will be visible only to staff
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A torrent will be rated only by the moderator that reviews/approves the torrent
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A torrent will be rated with 0, 1, 2, 3, 4 or 5 stars; the quantity of stars will be visible to others like any other torrent information
Maybe we can also make it possible to rate with a half star, which will give 0, 0.5, 1, 1.5 etc.
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Depending on the number of stars, the uploader receives a specific amount of seed bonus points (SBP) and reputation points (a concept which will be discussed below). That amount needs to be discussed, but in my opinion it should be something like Stars x 10. This way, an uploader gets 50 SPB for a 5* torrents, 40 - for 4* etc. A similar formula should apply to the reputation points
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To avoid subjective approach of the moderators when it comes to rating, there will be set up a clear and fixed guide with a list of criteria a torrent needs to follow to get the specific amount of stars. This remains subject to discussions.
This way, we have a proportional dependency between the quality of the torrent and the reward it generates to its uploader. Good uploaders will be rewarded according to their torrents, and thus be motivated to upload more, while the not so good uploaders will have a real motivation to improve the quality of their uploads.
Note: I still don't know whether the Auto Approval torrents would fit in this system or not… This also needs to be discussed.
Idea #2: Reputation points
I think we need to bring the concept of Reputation Power from our Forum to the tracker. I see it as a good solution for solving many problems and extend some new possibilities. Unlike the SBP, which can be earned and exchanged for other things, the reputation points will be linked with the account, earned, but not exchanged, it will be, if you like, a numerical representation of the experience a member has on the site, his contribution, his behavior etc.
So:
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each new member who signs up starts with 0 reputation points
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members earn reputation points when they upload torrents (the rating scheme described above)
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members earn reputation points if their uploaded torrent is being "thank you"'d by other members
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there may be a possible linkage to the reputation from the Forum as well, that way members active on the Forum also gets reputation points on the tracker
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staff can withdraw an amount of reputation points once the member has broken rules, like uploading a banned content, aggressive behavior in PMs etc.
Also, the reputation points can be an answer to the Auto Approval problem. Once users earn points for uploads, the "10 clean uploads" uncertainty becomes obsolete: now the reputation points will show exactly if the user is "ready" for AA or not. For example, a 5* torrent is worth 50 reputation points, following the "10 clean uploads" rule gives us 500 points - this can be a starting criteria to grant AA rights. Granting, of course, will still be done by the staff and will require other factors, but at least this will give the user a sort of aim to reach if they want to become Auto Approval users. The concrete numbers, as well, need to be discussed.
Also, based on the reputation points, we can establish ascending to new user class. The current pyramid of User -> Power User -> Staff is too poor IMHO, we need something more.
Idea #3: "Thank you" button
Since I'm taking away the privilege to rate torrents from users, I was thinking of an alternative. And once again, our Forum inspired me. I know some staff members expressed the idea of making something similar to the Forum's possibility to add reputation to a user by a mouse click also on the tracker. I think it's a great idea and wish to develop it further. Now, along the possibility to donate some personal seed bonus points to the uploader on the torrent details page, one can also increase its reputation points just pressing the Thank you button. This means each "Thank you" will increment the uploader's reputation points by 1 (or maybe by 2? opinions?).
Idea #4: Transferable seed bonus points
Once a user asked us if he can donate some SPB directly to another user, without waiting him to upload something. I suggest we make this thing happen. If we have users with a big bank of SPB and a good heart, willing to help others in need, I don't see why it shouldn't be possible. Although this can generate a mass wave of beggary for seed points…
This is just about all I can think of for now. Ideas, suggestions, comments and constructive criticism is welcomed
P.S. I'm fully aware this will be hard to implement, but... Some ideas are better than nothing
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Geographer,
I like your ideas! All of them :cheers: Great brainstorming.
You're right: the rating system doesn't work in it's current implementation. There are a few people on the tracker who rate 1 Star just because they don't like the type of porn. And they rate before the file is even uploaded. That's distorting and might others prevent from downloading a torrent they might actually like.
Adding to reputation by using Thank You is a good idea too. Just don't give members the right to give bad reputation. On the forum I got a negative reputation by a member who just has a different taste in porn. I thought that his action was not warranted. Just because you're into muscle guys shouldn't give you the right to give a bad rep to somebody who's into twinks.
All in all: great work geographer!
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:thx:
Well, no, I didn't even think about a negative reputation for torrents… In my theory only staff can take away reputation, and only when rules are broken. I assume if a user doesn't like your torrent, he will just ignore the Thank You button. Or make a bad comment
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To combat the impression that moderator geographer is a douchebag that doesn't like uploaders and doesn't appreciate their contribution to GT.ru, I've been brainstorming this night about some ways to maintain a balance between rewarding uploaders for their torrents and dumping the site with trash. And I've come up with some ideas which lead to a steady compromise, and also solve a few other problems.
Now who would say something like that? It would truly take either an act of douchebaggery or an act of f***ery to make such a comment. I'd sure like to know the user who made that implication because they're wrong wrong wrong about it.
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;D Don't take it too seriously MrMazda, it was a little sarcasm from my side. But I do think my recent posts on this topic made a wrong impression of me.
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I've been thinking a lot on how to make the rewarding scheme machine-based (meaning excluding the direct human factor), and at the same time make it distinguish between the quality of the upload.
-
The rating option will be visible only to staff
-
A torrent will be rated only by the moderator that reviews/approves the torrent
-
A torrent will be rated with 0, 1, 2, 3, 4 or 5 stars; the quantity of stars will be visible to others like any other torrent information
Maybe we can also make it possible to rate with a half star, which will give 0, 0.5, 1, 1.5 etc.
"so you are saying moderators are not human. i KNEW it!," said XENU eliminating his possibility of ever getting a 5-star review or auto-approve status.
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Really that was a joke.
I appreciate that you, geographer, thought about it at all.
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Why is Xenu always thinking we are after his butt ?
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A good question.
But if xenu's butt is rather attractive, I wouldn't mind being after it. (Oh my… did I say that? :-[)
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A good question.
But if xenu's butt is rather attractive, I wouldn't mind being after it. (Oh my… did I say that? :-[)
[/quote]look, my avatar turned over for you geographer
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;D Good one
But seriously, why do you behave like we're trying to annihilate you?
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the site has a 5 star torrent rating system.
Though we have to face facts - it is dead, no-one, or very few and very seldom, rates torrentsComplete agreement here
But I'd say the same thing about the torrent "Comments" section toono-one takes into account that rating when choosing a torrent to download.
How do you know?
Since I'm taking away the privilege to rate torrents from users
Hooray!
(but you're still a douchebag) >:D -
- To avoid subjective approach of the moderators when it comes to rating, there will be set up a clear and fixed guide with a list of criteria a torrent needs to follow to get the specific amount of stars. This remains subject to discussions.
This way, we have a proportional dependency between the quality of the torrent and the reward it generates to its uploader. Good uploaders will be rewarded according to their torrents, and thus be motivated to upload more, while the not so good uploaders will have a real motivation to improve the quality of their uploads.
Note: I still don't know whether the Auto Approval torrents would fit in this system or not… This also needs to be discussed.
Idea #4: Transferable seed bonus points
Once a user asked us if he can donate some SPB directly to another user, without waiting him to upload something. I suggest we make this thing happen. If we have users with a big bank of SPB and a good heart, willing to help others in need, I don't see why it shouldn't be possible. Although this can generate a mass wave of beggary for seed points…
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With respect to the quality of the torrent, there is one thing that I see coming into play here. A lot of our users don't seem to necessarily understand the difference in the quality of the torrent (e.g. video compression, frame size, frame rate, sound quality, etc) versus whether or not the content of the torrent is appealing to them personally. This in and of itself creates the potential for a flawed rating system just for the simple fact that there are a number of users who will give a torrent a bad rating simply because the content of the torrent doesn't appeal to them, rather than rating it based on the actual quality and technical standards of the torrent.
Perhaps this point is something that also needs to be addressed when taking the whole rating system into account. For example, if I were to rate torrents based on their personal appeal to me, all torrents from censored for example would receive a rather low rating, whereas a torrent that for example may be a VHS rip (with obvious lower quality) may receive a higher rating based on its content. Where exactly does one draw the line with respect to the rating system?
As well, the other thing to take into account when rating a torrent is the file format. A flash video file (.flv) generally would tend to have a lower overall quality (especially if ripped from a tube site such as XTube) than a torrent that is either in DVD-R format (.iso or .vob) or was converted directly to a video file such as a less compressed AVI file or a better compressed MPEG video for example. Perhaps if this rating system is left to moderators, a definitive answer with respect to the technical standards needs to be set. If the rating system that is currently in place remains in effect, this is something for all users to take into account when rating a torrent for its quality.
Just my two cents on the topic of the rating system.
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I may not be into…let's say "spanking torrents" but based on the ideas here I would "rate" that torrent highly is it just had the following information in it:
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Studio Name
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Video\Book Name(or Actor name in the event of a picture post)
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Year Produced
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Director(if any)
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Actors list
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Film description(NOT "hot twinks f**cking" or "good latino sex video")
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Video specs(codecs, resolution, etc…)
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Lots of preview pics(at least one should be a contact sheet of the entire film)
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Video catalog name(i.e. IGH7476 for an It's Gonna Hurt video)
The more of this I see in a torrent upload the more I am willing to reward the uploaders hard work. I approve many torrents that I am not "interested" in but my job is to verify they are not a duplicate and that they are relevant to this tracker(or banned). Of course any rating system all but excludes users with AA rights as their torrents go live right away.
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How do you know?
Because I'm a moderator, it's my job to know more ;D
Hooray!
(but you're still a douchebag) >:DThank'ya sir, you are very kind
Just so I'm on the same page here…when you say "quality of the torrent", safe to assume you mean what's included in the original upload, ie: good narrative, number of pictures included in original upload, supplying a url (more info field), etc? Basically, quality to the extent it conforms to providing a downloader enough info to encourage a download?
Yep. cumeaternc described the idea very clearly. I just want to add to the list the torrent title: it has to be concise, precise, contain the studio name (if any). Also regarding this topic: for a better rating users will have to manually fix QTM's little problem of adding periods between words - that makes the title less attractive INMHO.
I would also include a passage about how the actual torrent file is formed. You will all agree with me that it's much better when the video file that is included in the torrent has a decent name, like "Staxus - Bareback Fucking.mp4" than "_bareback_db_fucking_demonoid(xvid).mp4", or what's even worse "wkoweigngnlwnoef.mp4".
Another thought regards the companion pictures to the video. I really hate when people include 500 image files along the main video in the same directory. Isn't it better to include them in an archive, or at least in a separate folder? The same ideas about collections.
The actual content of the video is definitely out of the question (if it's not something from the banned list or course). Moderators are here to watch over the rule compliance, not to discuss personal tastes. I, personally, don't like scat videos, it's repelling to me, but that didn't stop me from approving 2 or 3 torrents of this kind
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So just to make sure that I'm understanding this correctly, the quality, resolution, etc of the video does not necessarily account for the rating of the torrent, rather the technical nature behind the way it is compiled, named, listed, etc., yes?
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Exactly. Everybody likes good quality, but I wouldn't want to start a mass discrimination
Although… Not sure if it would be fair to rate equally a DVD and an xtube collection, assuming they both match the theoretical standards... Opinions?
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Exactly. Everybody likes good quality, but I wouldn't want to start a mass discrimination
Although… Not sure if it would be fair to rate equally a DVD and an xtube collection, assuming they both match the theoretical standards... Opinions?
Well, if the exclusivity and originality of the material outweigh the technical quality, then the upload should get either extra "points" for that to make up for the missing points in the technical quality department or don't rate the picture quality at all.
It's not the uploader's fault that the source material is bad. Except if he filmed it himself and made it into a crappy file;)
But we can't expect too much from webcam material and I guess everybody is aware of that. It might be lacking in the video department but it can be rare and very hot nonetheless.
Like most of the Maverickmen vids really have a shitty video quality . But it's fun stuff and I think it should be rewarded if somebody gets his dirty little fingers on some new vids. -
So just to make sure that I'm understanding this correctly, the quality, resolution, etc of the video does not necessarily account for the rating of the torrent, rather the technical nature behind the way it is compiled, named, listed, etc., yes?
If the rating is purely a staff job (which is how I understand this proposal), evaluating the audio/video quality of the rip and encode would require you to download the torrented media before assigning a rating.
Sure, I suppose you could do that, but making it part of your job description to download possibly copyrighted material is just asking for trouble (I think I've said so in another topic somewhere, sometime…)
Video resolution is not a guarantee for good quality, and neither is file size, or bitrate (though, that tends to be a reasonable indicator).
And... the video (or audio) being of poor quality isn't necessarily the uploader's fault; it could be this is merely the best rip/encode available to him, or at all.Reward the uploader for his part of the upload: that means, the data made available on the torrent page.
If the audio or video quality stinks for no good reason, it'll be in the comments from a zillion annoyed members. That's what the comments are for, isn't it?
