Get rid of the thanks button

Biggles

Witless wrote: »

Dunno - does it happen every time someone votes perhaps?

Yes, it does now. This was a change notified by MSE Andrea in a post in August https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/5693414.

I did respond, saying it would do nothing useful but would create confusion, but nobody else seemed bothered.

[Deleted User]

I can never make up my mind where the dividing line lies between offending by under-thanking, and devaluing by over-thanking.

MSE_Andrea wrote: »

We are aiming to upgrade or replatform next year

Groan.......

piano_tuna_2

People are posting on the discussion boards in order to get some kind of validation for their (at best) unorthodox views. If they write something disrespectful about religion, for example and get 25 thanks, it justifies (to them) their opinions.

It also gets used when people are ganging up on a particular forum user, people all pile in and thank posts which are unpleasant towards the chosen victim.




In short, yes the thanks button is being mis-used on the non-money saving boards like Discussion Time and the Marriages board. Get rid of it and you'll probably get rid of 75% of the spats that break out on there (and by doing so, save MSE forum team resources)

Reaper

As mentioned some boards hand out thanks like confetti while on others you have to work hard to get any.

There is a simple solution - thanks should be per board. In other words when you post on a particular board it shows the number of thanks you have been given on that board only.

So if I were to post on a new board my thanks total would be zero, as it should because I have contributed nothing to it yet.

Malthusian

Reaper wrote: »

There is a simple solution - thanks should be per board. In other words when you post on a particular board it shows the number of thanks you have been given on that board only.

Slightly unfair - inasfar as it actually matters - if someone who has been a long-standing contributor to the Savings & Investments forum starts posting on the Pensions forum. If 90% of your posts were on Savings and 10% on Pensions, it would appear on the Pensions forum as if most of your posts went un-thanked.

The best solution, if it's technically simple, is simply to remove the thanks button from the MoneySavers Arms and associated forums.

martinthebandit

I wish we had a ‘stop being a snowflake’ button

john539

MSE_Andrea wrote: »

Hi everyone

We don't plan to remove the thanks button at the moment. We are aiming to upgrade or replatform next year so we can't promise what the Forum will or won't have when we do but we're not actively aiming to get rid of it.

Andrea

Be careful you don't destroy your forums with fancy redesigns.

I still use the old skin layout.

It's very easy to make changes without understanding why old design evolved over years is still the best.

BobQ

MSE_Andrea wrote: »

All good ideas that we'll consider for a replatform when it happens

Any guidance on what this is all about?

Former_MSE_Andrea

BobQ wrote: »

Any guidance on what this is all about?

Hi BobQ

The forum currently runs on a very old version of Vbulletin which we need to upgrade either to a newer version or to a completely different platform.

For example, we're seeing some long term forum users having their IP addresses blocked because their internet providers use a newer style IP which this Vbulletin version can't handle. Obviously that's not good.

JimmyTheWig

bushbaby1103 wrote: »

We should have a 'thumbs down' type of button for balance if we have to have a thanks button.

If people are concerned about how the Thanks button is being used for bullying, how bad would things get with a thumbs down button?

iammumtoone wrote: »

It going to sound really petty if someone complains that a post gets too many thanks!

But that is what happens, nasty posts are thanked multiple times, as others have pointed out it wouldn't be so bad if there was an 'unthanks/disagree' button or similar so those who felt the thanks were uncalled for could click that.

MSE have asked for them to be reported, so report them.
If the post is that unpleasant then someone should write a post saying so. That would be the best way to reassure the person being bullied that they are not alone. Then the others (the majority, I would like to think) who think the comment was mean can thank the rebuttal and the victim can see all the support they are receiving.