When new users receive multiple downvotes for questions/answers, their rep obviously doesn't fall below the minimum i.e. 1. Are all those accumulated downvotes taken into account (without a manual recalc) when new Qs/As from them are subsequently upvoted?
2 Answers
No. The first up vote will always bring them to 6 or 11 reputation, no matter how many down votes came before.
Related: Users hitting the daily reputation limit can no longer gain reputation, but can lose it through down votes. Earlier up votes don't somehow offset the down votes.
answered Mar 20, 2013 at 8:04
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1So if bad answers can be posted with impunity by new users, why should downvoters be penalised for the same?– KaranMar 20, 2013 at 8:06
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I'm guessing here, but introducing new exceptions to these edge cases will make reputation even harder to understand than it is now.– Daniel Beck ModMar 20, 2013 at 8:09
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Hard to understand, perhaps, but as long as it works reliably... Would it be hard to fix though? Have suggestions regarding these cases been made already? Didn't find anything so far on MSU or MSO.– KaranMar 20, 2013 at 8:11
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Regarding the reputation cap limit. I like the water bucket analogy, because this is how it works (mostly).– Daniel Beck ModMar 20, 2013 at 8:11
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Ah, thanks. I understand now how that bit works, but still don't see why it would be all that difficult to fix. Any hits regarding the first bit? (See my first comment above.) Do you think it's justified?– KaranMar 20, 2013 at 8:16
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This would make the entire voting system more complex. Right now, it doesn't matter on who or what you vote. Next thing you know, someone wants up votes on posts by people who reached the daily rep cap not count towards the daily voting limit.– Daniel Beck ModMar 20, 2013 at 8:16
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Remember that there are enough basic questions on basic reputation and voting rules on meta sites as it is. Introducing exceptions like this will only increase the volume because people don't understand what they're seeing: "I down votes this crap answer, and I lost rep? This has never happened before!". Remember, you're voting on the posts, not the people. It shouldn't matter who the author is.– Daniel Beck ModMar 20, 2013 at 8:19
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w.r.t. "I down votes this crap answer, and I lost rep?", this is always the case? @Karan Keep in mind that downvoting bad answers should result in getting them deleted anyway, so you'd get your reputation back. Or the answer is fixed, so you can remove your downvote.– slhckMar 20, 2013 at 8:30
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@slhck: I don't understand, when is it not the case that downvoting answers costs the downvoter rep? Also, what's the downvote threshold for an answer to be deleted? What about answers that don't reach that threshold because users want to preserve their own rep? I've seen lots of answers by new users that are plain incorrect, but flagging is not possible because no flagging allowed for incorrect answers. I fail to see why those answers should persist on the site even if they don't receive lots of downvotes.– KaranMar 20, 2013 at 8:36
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@Karan Yes, that's why I mentioned it. You always lose rep for downvoting an answer – I just didn't understand why Daniel mentioned it as an edge case. Maybe a misunderstanding. Anyway, there's no threshold: You have to delete it yourself (you get a badge for that), or users with 20k rep vote to delete it. As for wrong, but not deleted answers: Remember that these can also act as a signpost of what not to do (this has often been cited as the rationale for keeping them around, at least for a while).– slhckMar 20, 2013 at 8:58
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@slhck I was thinking about the support requests that would come if this request were implemented. This was intended as an example of the kind of request we might need to deal with if the cost of down voting answers depended on who the downvotee is.– Daniel Beck ModMar 20, 2013 at 11:07
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@slhck People would think that if all their previous downvotes had been on 1-rep users. The first time they downvote a user with >1 rep, they'd wonder why this downvote cost them.– cpastMar 20, 2013 at 19:55
If they post too many bad questions they get question banned (and this happens often enough on SO that I remember questions on it in MSO), and they need to work it off - there's no real reason to ban someone for making mistakes, unless they keep doing it, and that sort of folk are an exception.
I think that if they got the idea, and tried to make good, the negative incentive that's a downvote should not outweight the positive incentive of the answer, assuming it deserved the downvote. It kind of makes sense, from a roundabout point of view.
answered Mar 20, 2013 at 8:24
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If I understand your last paragraph correctly, you're against negative rep. Fine. But what I want to discuss now is, if bad answers have no consequence for new users, why should downvoters (who are doing the site a service by helping to separate the bad from the good) be penalised for their actions?– KaranMar 20, 2013 at 8:45
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@Karan You are not really penalised. That 1 rep lost shouldn't make a huge difference – at least at some point I stopped worrying about that. Bad answers do have a consequence, namely that when you post too many of that kind, you're banned from posting any more.– slhckMar 20, 2013 at 9:01
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I'm not saying there's no concequence - I'm saying a downvote is basically telling someone their answer isn't great, but the mechanism for more serious actions is seperate. One mistake is acceptable, heck a few are. A pattern of mistakes ends up resulting in a ban - but making the effort to post better answers will sort that out. At the end of the day I don't downvote users, I downvote answers in the hope that either the answer, or user will change for the better.– Journeyman Geek ModMar 20, 2013 at 9:10
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@slhck: Of course -1 rep makes no difference at all after a point, which is why I am perfectly happy to expend it. But what's the philosophy behind -2 for the downvotee (to coin a term)? IMO it should have a psychological effect and be an incentive for the answer to be improved. When this effect is negated for the votee, why should only the voter be penalised for actually helping out, even if the penalty's not a large one (in real terms, although it often does prevent people from downvoting)?– KaranMar 20, 2013 at 9:11
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@Karan Under that light I agree it'd make more sense, e.g. with an invisible negative reputation for each user. The real issue I'm seeing is – like Daniel mentioned – that now you could have no way to know how much in the negative you are, and it'd be confusing to have upvotes not give you any visible reputation anymore.– slhckMar 20, 2013 at 12:19
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@slhck: "you could have no way to know how much in the negative you are" - Isn't that easily resolved by showing negative rep only to the user, and 1 to others till the user moves into the positive zone? Kinda like how downvoting and consequent rep hit is hidden from others. Anyway, even if negative rep is not advisable, I'm still not seeing how penalising downvoters in such cases is. ...– KaranMar 20, 2013 at 18:16
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... @slhck: I mean, forget registered users, what's the incentive for anyone to downvote bad answers by unregistered users who will most likely never return? Only the downvoter loses rep (however minuscule the amount the loss does affect and is meant to affect people, we all know that), so I see no real incentive for people to help clean up the site and prevent bad answers by such users from sticking around.– KaranMar 20, 2013 at 18:16
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@Karan Yes, I see the problem. I agree with you that this could be handled differently. Maybe I'm personally not as affected as I don't care about the rep (anymore), but I can see how many users would refrain from downvoting posts to keep their reputation. But this is a more general issue I guess.– slhckMar 20, 2013 at 18:27