There's a lot I could cover here, but let's just touch on the very basics: First, I'm happy to report that I've discovered that Nabble is able to act both as a gateway and an archive for Mailman (which is the software that this listserv runs). This effectively means that we don't have to come to any sort of consensus whatsoever. It's this simple: if anyone believes Nabble adds value to the way they interact with this list, then they're free to sign up & start ranking posts.
The url for the mirror of this group is: http://www.nabble.com/Election-Methods-f18342.html They also support RSS for the feed-addicted among us.. though you give up the ability to rank posts when using that that interface. The feed link for EM is: http://www.nabble.com/Election-Methods-f18342.xml Second, it's unfortunate that this chain had to start in response to a particular post. These comments aren't intended to be a diatribe against a particular post, thread, or person. Additionally, and more importantly, it's not just 'poor' posts that could be singled out for attention with a good rating system -- ranking the good posts is infinitely more useful. There have been many times when I've been frustrated trying to answer questions of the form 'which posts are particularly informative on topic X?' I don't pretend that any proposal yet made will solve this problem completely, but it's one that so fundamental that even a gradual improvement would be a big boon. Third, please don't take this line of emails as an unequivocal endorsement of Nabble. I've haven't used the system much, and have several concerns about it, even what's in the FAQ, (as quoted by Abd ul-Rahman Lomax earlier in this thread). If I had infinite time I'd create a similar service with lots of additional features. Time isn't infinite, however, and they're the best such service I've run across (so far). If such a service can improve my experience with this list even just slightly, however, I'm all in. So... see you on the other side.. (or not). -Ken On 1/20/07, Abd ul-Rahman Lomax <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > >SPAM and bad posts are common problems for forums. Traditionally, > >users send e-mails to the moderator to report bad or offensive > >posts. However, with Nabble, you manage a bad post by rating it down > >to 1-star. If other users also rate down this post, its average > >rating will fall below the 2-star minimum and it will disappear from > >the default view. > > ... > I will note that this is used with free on-line forums at nabble.com. > I have not yet determined what happens to posts below the 2-star > rating, beyond being "filtered out from the view." Can someone set > their preferences to view 1-star posts? Yes.. it's on the list page. Simply select a different filter level from the drop-down. > Note that Nabble substitutes a presumably trusted administration for > the owner function on this list. Normally, this administration acts > with respect to posts through a system which aggregates user input, > which requires that users take specific action to rate posts. From > what I can tell, any registered user may quickly rate a post, reading > it on-line. I don't know if there is an off-line rating method, i.e., > rating by email. My guess would be not, though. I'll say more, > presumably, if we have an actual motion and it is seconded. I believe you're correct here regarding email, but so far I've just read things through-the-web, not via a digest mail. Since the service can act as a gateway, use of it can be transparent. That being the case, I don't see a need for a formal proposal. Take or leave the suggestion at your leisure. ---- election-methods mailing list - see http://electorama.com/em for list info
