Replacing DefaultTrust

[BadBear]

How can we view the results or is it just admins?

Must be, oops. Looks like any other poll to me.

[MadZ]

It's not better than Default Trust, so I voted for No. Forcing newbies to pick people to add to their trust list isn't the way to go.

This. Default Trust might not be perfect, but I don't believe the proposed changes would be an improvement.

[EFS]

Newbies already forced with Default Trust depth 2 if they don't change it, that's why its default. How couldn't it be better?

[hilariousandco]

Interesting that default trust has over twice as many votes so far.

How can we view the results or is it just admins?

Must be, oops. Looks like any other poll to me.

Ha, nice try covering your tracks  . Seriously, was wondering whether you didn't realise everyone else couldn't see it.

It's not better than Default Trust, so I voted for No. Forcing newbies to pick people to add to their trust list isn't the way to go.

This. Default Trust might not be perfect, but I don't believe the proposed changes would be an improvement.

Same. I am all for suggestions for improvements or even an entirely new system, but I don't think this is it. I commend theymos for trying though. It's not an easy task to try create a new system workable/ideal or not but even with its few flaws the current system is probably the best solution.

Newbies already forced with Default Trust depth 2 if they don't change it, that's why its default. How couldn't it be better?

But the list is already compiled of (largely) trustable people from the community so it's hard to go wrong. Newbs just joining wont know who to add at all, but once they get the gist of the current system they can add and remove people as they like.

[SaltySpitoon]

I'd just make it simpler, and remove all scores and numbers and trust lists, and just have it as a feedback system. Before you deal with someone, you check what people have to say, be it that they are a jerk, or that they aren't trustworthy with money. A huge problem is that people don't read what people were left feedback for. If I have a -1 for scamming someone and a -1 for being an unpleasant businessperson those two things shouldn't hold equal weight. With the numeric system, people see that -1 that someone recieved for a personality issue, and internalize that they are a scammer. If its just a list of feedback with trusted/untrusted gone, people will have to read through the list, see what feedback they find important to their situation, and judge based on the person leaving the feedback.

Or perhaps have a default trust system until members have X activity so newbies can be somewhat protected, but people will be forced to get off of the default trust system by the time they know how things work around here. I am pretty indifferent about the trust system as it is, because I use it entirely differently than most people. But, it has been pretty effective for its original intentions thusfar in helping out new members and allow early warning of scammy behavior for those that might not see the signs themselves. The majority of issues that have arose are with lists, how large/small they should be, how often they should be updated, who should do the updating, etc. Get rid of all trusted lists, and its not a problem.

[TECSHARE]

I'd just make it simpler, and remove all scores and numbers and trust lists, and just have it as a feedback system. Before you deal with someone, you check what people have to say, be it that they are a jerk, or that they aren't trustworthy with money. A huge problem is that people don't read what people were left feedback for. If I have a -1 for scamming someone and a -1 for being an unpleasant businessperson those two things shouldn't hold equal weight. With the numeric system, people see that -1 that someone recieved for a personality issue, and internalize that they are a scammer. If its just a list of feedback with trusted/untrusted gone, people will have to read through the list, see what feedback they find important to their situation, and judge based on the person leaving the feedback.

Or perhaps have a default trust system until members have X activity so newbies can be somewhat protected, but people will be forced to get off of the default trust system by the time they know how things work around here. I am pretty indifferent about the trust system as it is, because I use it entirely differently than most people. But, it has been pretty effective for its original intentions thusfar in helping out new members and allow early warning of scammy behavior for those that might not see the signs themselves. The majority of issues that have arose are with lists, how large/small they should be, how often they should be updated, who should do the updating, etc. Get rid of all trusted lists, and its not a problem.

This

[medUSA]

I think trust depth should always be zero. I trust one member, it doesn't mean other members he trusts are trustworthy to me.

There is a new concept I wish to propose, not sure if it is possible: Trust can expire
(Updated like the activity score every 2 weeks)

Let's say some member is trusted 2 years ago for doing one trade and have not completed another trade since. He is no longer active on the forum. Should this member still be trusted? and those he trusted are still trustworthy? I believe there are problems when members are trusted once, becomes trusted "forever".

[redsn0w]

I think the new improvement of theymos will be better than the actual , and maybe all the users will learn to "compile" their own list.

[dogie]

It's not the best solution but still better than Default Trust. I voted for Yes.

Why don't we / others brainstorm different models and vote on all of them? There doesn't have to be just one alternative.

[Parazyd]

I think the new improvement of theymos will be better than the actual , and maybe all the users will learn to "compile" their own list.

That said, members should be reminded of the trust system with a sticky or an announcement in the trust-enabled sections.

[hilariousandco]

It's not the best solution but still better than Default Trust. I voted for Yes.

Why don't we / others brainstorm different models and vote on all of them? There doesn't have to be just one alternative.

Nothing to stop you or anyone else. I encourage the discussion of alternative models but people will ever agree on one and there will always be issues. I can't envision any feedback system that will work anywhere near perfectly here.

[TECSHARE]

It's not the best solution but still better than Default Trust. I voted for Yes.

Why don't we / others brainstorm different models and vote on all of them? There doesn't have to be just one alternative.

This is why I haven't voted for the current system as it is. I like the suggestion of removing default trust lists completely. The whole trust system was a partial success but is causing more problems in other ways that must be addressed. I think a step backward is what we need , and then remind users they are responsible for vetting their own trading partners. Red and green numbers oversimplify things and make it easy to abuse the system in many ways.

[dogie]

It's not the best solution but still better than Default Trust. I voted for Yes.

Why don't we / others brainstorm different models and vote on all of them? There doesn't have to be just one alternative.

Nothing to stop you or anyone else. I encourage the discussion of alternative models but people will ever agree on one and there will always be issues. I can't envision any feedback system that will work anywhere near perfectly here.

Yeah I'll make up some ratings so we can evaluate the ideas we currently have, to see what they do well and what they do badly. Then we can modularise some of those elements to come up with more ideas.

[MadZ]

Newbies already forced with Default Trust depth 2 if they don't change it, that's why its default. How couldn't it be better?

There are two main reasons why I think Default Trust is the better alternative. First of all, it is fairly transparent, and this provides for accountability. The trust lists of everyone at depth 1 are public, which has historically kept Default Trust mostly comprised of reputable members. This is not the case with the "suggested trust" list under the new system. People are added onto this list based on the trust lists of everyone over full member. These lists are entirely private and anonymous, unlike direct positive/negative feedback, which I think is dangerous. It would be fairly easy to manipulate the "suggested trust" list as an individual, and even easier as a group. One could essentially buy their way onto the "suggested trust" list by purchasing or creating a decent number of accounts and adding themselves to the accounts' trust lists/negatively trusting other accounts to lower their comparable trust values. People complain that Default Trust is an "old boys network", this will be even more true under the proposed system. It will be very easy for a group of high activity accounts to trust one another and solidify their places in the trust network without actually earning them. Activity has nothing to do with trading and should not be the basis for the underlying trust values accounts hold, which this system seems to suggest it should.

The other issue I see is how difficult it is to actually build one's own trust network from scratch. This isn't an issue to most people debating over the two systems, since we already have a good idea of who we do and do not trust on the forums, regardless of which system is used. This isn't true of a new user. Take a look at someone like Vod's trust without anyone on your trust list (everyone's feedback is untrusted and they are at +0/-0) and no knowledge of the users' histories who have left him trust. I would not add Vod to my personal trust list if I was a new user, since the majority of his feedback is negative, and I have no reason to believe that his positive feedback carries a lot of weight. Obviously, Vod is a very trustworthy user, but you wouldn't know that if you didn't have a history on the forums.

My point here is that Default Trust gives a new user a good starting point about who to trust and who not to trust, while this new system asks them to pick their own "Default Trust" pretty much at random, since they will probably have little reason to pick one name over another. After a few months here, most people have decided in their own minds who they trust and who they don't, whether they have bothered to edit their trust list or not. Forcing people to edit their trust list (which is what the proposed system essentially does) will hurt new users and change nothing for longtime users, so why make this change?

[dogie]

Okay, modified some code I had so we can compare different ideas as they arrive. Its a pretty arbitrary system to pick up on 9 points we may want to optimise for. Every criteria is "No" =1, "Sort of" =5 or "Yes" =10 - I don't believe we need to go deeper. Titles should be self explanatory but let me know if they're not.

Please DON'T quote the code as it will keep changing and there will be confusing fragments and ratings everywhere.

___________________________________________________________________________	_______________________________________________________________________________ _______________________________________________________________________________ _______________________________________________________________________________ _______________________________________________________________________________ _
Default Trust

___________________________________________________________________________
Rating: 58	Decentralised Power? Varied Weighting? Feedback Comments?	No No Yes	1/10 1/10 10/10	Prevents Alt Abuse? Prevents Trusted Abuse? Displays Ratings?	Sort of Yes Yes	5/10 10/10 10/10	Uses All Ratings? Newbie Friendly? No Snowball?	No Yes Yes	1/10 10/10 10/10

___________________________________________________________________________	_______________________________________________________________________________ _______________________________________________________________________________ _______________________________________________________________________________ _______________________________________________________________________________ _

___________________________________________________________________________	_______________________________________________________________________________ _______________________________________________________________________________ _______________________________________________________________________________ _______________________________________________________________________________ _
Theymos #1

___________________________________________________________________________
Rating: 44	Decentralised Power? Varied Weighting? Feedback Comments?	Sort of Yes Yes	5/10 10/10 10/10	Prevents Alt Abuse? Prevents Trusted Abuse? Displays Ratings?	No No Yes	1/10 1/10 10/10	Uses All Ratings? Newbie Friendly? No Snowball?	Sort of No No	5/10 1/10 1/10

___________________________________________________________________________	_______________________________________________________________________________ _______________________________________________________________________________ _______________________________________________________________________________ _______________________________________________________________________________ _

[rugrats]

I was thinking about replacing DefaultTrust in the following way:

<snip>

What do you think of this?

Theymos, why do we need a DefaultTrust list in the first place, either the existing one or the proposed modified one?
Why do we need to create a class of users who are more equal than the rest?
What practical purpose does it serve? Shouldn't all of our ratings be equal?
I can understand (and in fact support) if you and BadBear are given extra trust privileges.
But for everyone else, shouldn't we have a level playing field?

Simplify the trust system. Let all trust ratings be equal.
'Trade with extreme caution' should appear only when members accumulate more negative than positive ratings.
Don't leave the power in the hands of a few select individuals.

[Mitchell]

Theymos, why do we need a DefaultTrust list in the first place, either the existing one or the proposed modified one?
Why do we need to create a class of users who are more equal than the rest?
What practical purpose does it serve? Shouldn't all of our ratings be equal?
I can understand (and in fact support) if you and BadBear are given extra trust privileges.
But for everyone else, shouldn't we have a level playing field?

Simplify the trust system. Let all trust ratings be equal.
'Trade with extreme caution' should appear only when members accumulate more negative than positive ratings.
Don't leave the power in the hands of a few select individuals.

Welp, I'm off creating a puppet army to give everyone that I don't like a negative rating!

[Beastlymac]

@dogie

That looks like a good idea but how would it be automatically implemented? And if people know how it is automatically inputted they can alter past feedback use to bluster their score. It is a good idea but it looks like a lot of it you have implemented manually and is determined by a person on criteria that will be hard to implement automatically as they take a person to determine things such as:
Prevents Alt Abuse?
Prevents Trusted Abuse?
Newbie Friendly?

These things are dependent (unless you have criteria for them) on the person giving the score and make it hard to implement automatically.


Although i think it is a great idea it may just need to adjust some of the criteria to make it easier to implement.

Just my view

[rugrats]

Theymos, why do we need a DefaultTrust list in the first place, either the existing one or the proposed modified one?
Why do we need to create a class of users who are more equal than the rest?
What practical purpose does it serve? Shouldn't all of our ratings be equal?
I can understand (and in fact support) if you and BadBear are given extra trust privileges.
But for everyone else, shouldn't we have a level playing field?

Simplify the trust system. Let all trust ratings be equal.
'Trade with extreme caution' should appear only when members accumulate more negative than positive ratings.
Don't leave the power in the hands of a few select individuals.

Welp, I'm off creating a puppet army to give everyone that I don't like a negative rating!

What makes you think its not happening now - but instead of an army, only involving a handful of people? Because that's all it takes.

[Mitchell]

What makes you think its not happening now - but instead of an army, only involving a handful of people? Because that's all it takes.

The same reason why having a puppet army wouldn't work for me. It gets noticed and people that abusive their ratings will be removed from the Default Trustlist (and most of the positive feedback they have gets removed).