Bye bye Negativity

[60yo]

@superessedi

That's a tough one. I saw -- and experienced -- all that downvoting on Duolingo and it is certainly discouraging in all sort of ways. I will argue that it is a form of trolling, and we sure don't want any trolling, do we?. Trouble is, I'm not sure that having (some kind of) upvoting without downvoting is viable. Not saying that I cannot live without downvoting. In the end, it all falls on the mods: their work and time (or lack of) makes or breaks a forum.

[GrahamW]

@superessedi: I sure hope that you are correct! I was initially dismayed when I saw that the Duolingo forums were being deleted, but when I saw that duome was filling the void, I was excited. Duome does so many things very well that I'm hoping that these forums will be one of them. At some point in the future, I'm hoping that we can look back and realize that it was a good thing for Duolingo to close its forums, since it's resulted in the creation of a language community over here. Hmm, I see that I've used the word "hope" too much for my liking

[panyamnyenyekevu]

What will duolingo look like ten, twenty years in the future? They’ve done away with their forum for now, but they may start a new one in the future or acquire another. Like this one perhaps. One never knows!

[panyamnyenyekevu]

If Graham is right and downvoting has an important role at some point - when volume gets intense - perhaps one might require someone to at least go through an additional hurdle before downrating. Like: Write a comment about why you are downrating this. Then a mod could rate a downrating based on the comment and the users abusing downrating could have less influence to downrate.

Just me thinking aloud basically.

Also, on certain other internet forums, I notice some people acquire “trusted user” status based on good will they’ve generated over time (in this case, gratitude expressed by “thanks” maybe) and such people have greater moderating privileges than people fresh to the site.

[panyamnyenyekevu]

And just fyi i did go through the disillusioning experience myself of posting something objectively innocuous on duolingo forum and seeing it downrated absurdly. It was indeed off-putting.

[Seiryuu]

The reasons behind downvoting many of the threads that I'd see sorted under "new" elude me. Likely to be trolls, but hard to say.

[Corinnebelle]

If Graham is right and downvoting has an important role at some point - when volume gets intense - perhaps one might require someone to at least go through an additional hurdle before downrating. Like: Write a comment about why you are downrating this. Then a mod could rate a downrating based on the comment and the users abusing downrating could have less influence to downrate.

Just me thinking aloud basically.

Also, on certain other internet forums, I notice some people acquire “trusted user” status based on good will they’ve generated over time (in this case, gratitude expressed by “thanks” maybe) and such people have greater moderating privileges than people fresh to the site.

We have more forums here to hopefully alleviate some of that flood and categorize things so people don't get sick of the wrong stuff. Maybe we need a newbie forum at some point if we have a lot of new people coming here that don't know the ropes yet.

For now we have language discussions, general discussion, random questions and achievements, troubleshooting, requests, and announcements. That should keep the streams flowing nicely.

[panyamnyenyekevu]

“Newby” forum sounds cool with a sticky or two and maybe a thread called “Introductions” for those who want to share a bit about their journey. (Perhaps we already have such a thread going somewhere.)

[Deleted User 279]

Newbie forum with a thread called "Introductions"

A whole long list of "Hi" posts maybe?

But actually it could work.

Not really...I'm just saying that to appear open minded...

[Kelikaku]

... there is not even a single thread with more upvotes than downvotes. Not even one positive thread! That is, not counting the "-5"'s, which are made invisible. ... on Duome we don't have anonymous downvoting, ...

There was a rumor from years ago, after the TV show 'Millionaire' went to Russia. They had problems.

It was a quiz show, in which the contestant had three "lifelines" to use in case the answer to a question was not known by the contestant. The contestant could pass on one question (1), or phone a friend (2), or the contestant could poll the audience and when the contestant would choose, "ask the audience," the audience would electronically choose answers from a keypad at their seats, so that the number of answers would display on a screen, so the most popular answer could be seen by the contestant (3).

When a contestant would "ask the audience," normally, the contestant could use the most popular answer and succeed in providing the correct response (even though the audience wasn't always correct, mostly the polled answer was correct). In Russia, this didn't work the same way. In Russia the audience consistently would vote on every wrong answer. So, contestants were forced to choose the answer with the lowest score, when asking the audience. Russians were deliberately trying to make the contestant lose. There's a joke there somewhere. You can fill in the blanks.

What does this have to do with the old Duolingo forum? I'm going to draw my own conclusions, and I hope you'll do the same. I suspect that it has less to do with legitimate users, such as you or I, though, and more to do with an alternative explanation.

[Ali-Kat]

Sorry if I come off as too emotional here, but yeah Duolingo's forums became unappealing to me for a few reasons:

1. People endlessly complaining to admins, programmers, volunteers, etc. who are fed up and don't care anymore
2. A Reddit-style upvote and downvote + hide system that's inherently toxic and discourages people from saying anything unpopular, especially over the last year where everyone's been getting more downvotes and hides than usual (maybe trolls using scripts? maybe the forums were just not designed to handle as many people as they have now?)
3. The old activity stream culture where people just chilled out and talked to each other fizzled out and the last of those people jumped ship to Discord in around 2019 or so, making any positivity on the forums disappear while people just started going there to complain and be rude to people who don't agree
4. Kids using the forums as a way to talk to their classmates or ask for lingots only to get scolded by older users (to be honest this isn't a big problem, but watching kids get lectured over and over again...eh....)

It feels like I'm making a lot of complaints about such a boring part of the site, but as a young teen I used to think the forums and activity streams were cool and they didn't feel boring back then. Maybe I'm being overly nostalgic.

[HeyMarlana]

The beauty about starting over is that the users who establish the culture usually are the ones who set the tone and keep it up. Forum culture varies from forum to forum, or platform to platform. Sometimes the right mix of people who gather together can create a good culture and maintain it just by staying true to what they want.

The nice thing is that this site offers a functioning block feature. No one has the right to interrupt your enjoyment of any site or platform you use. If they do, one click and you can have some peace and quiet. That alone should be a relief to many here.

So far, everyone here seems to be on the same page. We all wanted positive change and now we all have an opportunity to make it happen from scratch.

[Basler Biker]

If Graham is right and downvoting has an important role at some point - when volume gets intense - perhaps one might require someone to at least go through an additional hurdle before downrating. Like: Write a comment about why you are downrating this. Then a mod could rate a downrating based on the comment and the users abusing downrating could have less influence to downrate.

Just me thinking aloud basically.

Also, on certain other internet forums, I notice some people acquire “trusted user” status based on good will they’ve generated over time (in this case, gratitude expressed by “thanks” maybe) and such people have greater moderating privileges than people fresh to the site.

Thats why the current "positive" setup here on duome is, for those who don't agree with a topic or post

• don't push THANKS
• just post a reply , quote the debatable lines, and give your alternative positive minded view on the topic.

The most THANKED posts will stay on top, the "less appreciated" ones stay on zero.
And anonymous downvoting has no reason of existence, not here, not anywhere.

If google may be an example, there are only "likes"...and they are doing fine, and noone complains about a missing minus-button.

---

BB - Basler Biker

[HeyMarlana]

The most THANKED posts will stay on top, the "less appreciated" ones stay on zero.

The way I'm viewing this thread so far is that Superessedi posted, but the posts that follow are all chronological. I am not seeing the posts going in order of most thanked. Unless I've missed if it's a setting to prefer to see it that way?

[pawndemic]

I think the big chance for this forum is that until now the wast of majority are actually interested in language learning. Most probably we will not fight about lost hearts or complain the whole day long why my super creepy sentence is not part of the solution set and therefore will not be accepted.

And in abscence of the downvote button we can't express our politcal feelings in downvoting mechanicely all comments of someone who belongs to the other side, the evil side; no matter if they are right or wrong.

What I observed here until now left me with the optimistic presentiment.

[Basler Biker]

The most THANKED posts will stay on top, the "less appreciated" ones stay on zero.

The way I'm viewing this thread so far is that Superessedi posted, but the posts that follow are all chronological. I am not seeing the posts going in order of most thanked. Unless I've missed if it's a setting to prefer to see it that way?

nono, it's a virtual ranking, or a real one if you want, in your head ... I've seen no "sort by THANKS" so far here.

[HeyMarlana]

Thanks, BB. I just checked my display options and I see it's not anything I can change. Chronological works for me anyway.

[IceVajal]

Actually it was confusing that due to downvotes the order got changed, coz discussions were disturbed / destroyed. I'm glad here the order of posts is kept.

[unterhausen]

I used to go to the "new" tab on the duo forum and upvote threads. I rarely saw any reason why many of those threads were hidden. In most forum software, inactive threads just slide off of the front page, that's more than enough negativity for most people.

[Izzy]

I completely agree! I saw so many hostile forum post in the old ones, and most if not all of mine were met with hostility too. I really hope this new one is different too

[Hallumir]

I don't mind downvotes. Sometimes they are useful for burying spam and offensive content. What do you think of this proposed compromise?: You may downvote, but the displayed score will not go below 0.

[wayfarer]

I don't mind downvotes. Sometimes they are useful for burying spam and offensive content. What do you think of this proposed compromise?: You may downvote, but the displayed score will not go below 0.

No, IMO there's zero reason for downvoting, or for having posts/threads ranked by user voting. It's just a quirk initially used on a few big, popular sites and copied by others, but without meriting it.

I've used, and moderated, many forums across the internet over the years, usually ones related to some interest or hobby of mine, set up and run by enthusiasts (like this one). None of them have had an upvote/downvote feature and none of them had any issues because of that lack.

A sensible, well moderated forum needs no user voting system. If a post is spam or offensive use the report button and moderators will be able to check and deal with it. In particular don't engage with offensive or spamming posts and trolls. Report them and they'll be dealt with.

This does need a team of moderators, and I don't know whether this forum has such a team yet, but I'm sure that's something that can evolve as the forum evolves and gets busier.

Good forum ettiquette works both ways. Nobody should troll or spam or post offensve content, but equally no-one should expect to go into a thread about a subject that doesn't interest them, and then complain that it is uninteresting. Not every thread is aimed at everyone. Good ettiquete requires that we be selective and sensible and leave those threads that aren't for us to those whom they are for. That way we all get the best out of a forum.

[luo-ning]

Yeah downvoting on Duolingo forums was out of control. I had multiple threads that I spent significant time and effort on that were almost immediately downvoted to -5 and removed from the listings, without receiving a single negative comment explaining what people didn't like about them. It sometimes seemed like the only threads that could survive the relentless downvoting were "look at my 365-day streak" ones, which for some reason people seemed to love.

[Basler Biker]

I don't mind downvotes. Sometimes they are useful for burying spam and offensive content. What do you think of this proposed compromise?: You may downvote, but the displayed score will not go below 0.

The idea and spirit which we try to promote is "THANKS" for supporting a positive constructive on-topic post.
Else, for those who don't fully agree or want to add/correct something, is just to Reply and explain your view on things.
There is no anonymous unexplained behaviour to be expected here.

[HeyMarlana]

I don't mind downvotes. Sometimes they are useful for burying spam and offensive content. What do you think of this proposed compromise?: You may downvote, but the displayed score will not go below 0.

That's the Duolingo-way. This isn't Duolingo anymore. Even though this forum pulls from information Duolingo has, the forum is completely independent and can have a new look, functions, and culture.

We also have dedicated moderators here who are often present and happy to make sure the problems we saw on Duolingo don't replicate themselves here. I doubt any self-respecting troll is going to find solace here.

[Corinnebelle]

Yeah downvoting on Duolingo forums was out of control. I had multiple threads that I spent significant time and effort on that were almost immediately downvoted to -5 and removed from the listings, without receiving a single negative comment explaining what people didn't like about them. It sometimes seemed like the only threads that could survive the relentless downvoting were "look at my 365-day streak" ones, which for some reason people seemed to love.

Downvoting was so bad, we had to rescue posts with the DailyDuo. Anything you found interesting you followed or you'd lose it. You couldn't search for anything if it was downvoted. The search features here are a LOT better than DL.