On Tue, 17 Apr 2007 13:58:23 -0700, Walter Bright wrote:

> Knud Soerensen wrote:
>> What I don't like with these type of moderation systems is
>> that a expert option very often is down moderated by what I call
>> school kids.  (People which blindly believe what they learned in school.)
> 
> Sure, that's the big problem with democracy. On the other hand, every other system tried is worse.

First I don't think that you should uncritical compare a comment moderation system with a system for electing government.

When I comments on slashdot.org i like to read good comments from expert
on the subject not the most comment option on the subject
because that option I properly know already. The same way the
ranking/rating on dsource I see as tool to discover good software not just
popular software.

When making decisions for a whole group the option of the majority is the best way to go.

But to make a good decision about a problem it is important that the good solutions is discovered and analysed and it is this discovery part we are trying to solve.

And last if we should compare the ranking system to democracy it is not a
question of for or against but a question about what type of
voting system. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Voting_system
And my suggestion would be a systems that allow one
to capture the voters option about each candidate
and then allow one to calculate the result of a plurality, runoff, approval
or ranked vote.

Knud Soerensen escribió:
> In the tread DSSS, Dsource and cpan it have been suggested that dsource should
> implement a rating system like on the matlab site and the firefox extension site. 
> 
> I would like to suggest a ranking system instead of the rating system.
> 
> In a ranking system every user have a list with rankings,
> when ranking a new project the user add it into the ranking between two other projects.
> 
> Some of the problem i see with a rating system is:
> 
>   * Different users might use different bases.
>   One user might examine code quality, user interface, documentation etc.
>   and give 3 points on basis on this analyses.
>   Another might just give 5 point to every project he likes.
>   That a ranking system compare the project with each other help make a
>   common basis for reference.  
> 
> 
>   * It difficult for a user to change his base.
>   Imagine a user discover a new brilliant project   that is much better than the project he already
>   have rated with max points.   To rate the new project fairly he would have   to go back and re-rate all his rated projects.   With ranking he can just put it at the top.
> 
>   * Low differentiation between top projects.
>   Given most users only rating the projects they like.
>   As a result,an extremely good and a very good project will have almost the same average score and   the total sum will tell more about the popularity than how good it is.      
> 
> A advantages of the ranking system is that it provide much more data for data mining.
> 
> Your can extract a value and make a simple average like with a ranking.
> Your can run most voting system on the data, but you also have data which can tell you that n users think that project x is better than project y. etc.

What would be more important in such a system, the absolute position or the relative position?

Say I have rated 5 projects (A-E), and someone else has rated 10 (F-O). Has E been ranked the same as J or as O?

-- 
Carlos Santander Bernal

Carlos Santander wrote
> What would be more important in such a system, the absolute position or the relative position?

There exists a bunch of characteristica that might be of interest:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kemeny-Young_method#Characteristics

Sorrily I could not find any evaluations of these characteristica for Knud's ranking method "eigenpoll".

-manfred

Knud Soerensen wrote

> Sorry, of cause you can also put the project at the top or at the bottom of you list.

That is still overly restrictive.

In essence you require voters to impose a total ordering on the set of items they choose to vote on.

But voters usually only have a partial knowledge of any such set and therefore only a partial ordering available. Every imposed total ordering then forces the voter to give out already distorted data.

The evaluator of such a poll then goes off with this distorted data and some algorithm that is believed to produce a reliable result on undistorted data.

The evaluator then preents some pseudo acribic ranking/rating like "item1 has score 0.393, item2 has score 0.374, ..." and requires the audience to conclude that item1 should be their choice.

But Walter got it right when he wrote in this thread:
| By and large, they are successful at separating the ones worth a
| second look from the ones not.

Everyone who is able to improve this outcome has found a philosopher's stone---and a future without qualms.

-manfred