X-Message-Number: 23989 Date: Sun, 25 Apr 2004 20:49:50 -0400 From: "Kevin Q. Brown" <> Subject: Ratings, Spam, and Politics First, thanks to everyone who has used the message rating system and offered feedback. It's still maturing, but, thanks to your suggestions, it already is significantly more stream-lined and user-friendly than when first announced. In particular, the Prev/Next hyperlinks greatly improve navigation through the messages, you now can assign multiple categories to a rating, and the "rater code" is much shorter. I'll continue making enhancements, but won't announce every little detail on CryoNet. In Message #23980 Randy <> suggested that political bias may have motivated creation of the CryoNet message ratings (and upcoming poster reputations). I rated his message both Insightful and Flamebait for (1) raising an interesting issue and then (2) ignoring obvious counterarguments. Randy is correct that previous Libertarian-oriented postings did _not_ inspire a message rating system, but this recent case distinguishes itself by the extent of the poster's robotic, spammer-like behavior: (1) Normal people respond to complaints. He never does. (2) Normal people usually write their own messages, or explain the relevance of a message they are forwarding if the relevance is not obvious. He just repeatedly forwards offtopic material. (3) Normal people engage in conversation. He just keeps spewing. The "conversation" is one-way. (4) Normal people eventually tire of their offtopic conversations. Their effect is like random noise. His persistence in promoting an agenda unrelated to the purpose of the mailing list, despite many private and public complaints, has become a systemic problem, no longer random noise. It also confirms his lack of regard for the mailing list and the people who contribute to it. Here is another way to understand the situation. Suppose that an adult human had just been cryopreserved ("frozen") and then 100% successfully restored to normal life, thereby proving that cryonics really works. Suppose also that you started sending email about that wonderful success to everyone on the Internet, not just once, but many times. Many people complain about all that unsolicited email, but you realize that this news is so important that you keep sending your message to everyone you can. After all, it can save lives! Is that spam? I say "Yes!". Kevin Q. Brown PS: I just noticed a side-effect of the rating system. By not posting my reply quickly enough, some of my points duplicate those of an earlier message in the same digest, making this message somewhat Redundant. :-( Rate This Message: http://www.cryonet.org/cgi-bin/rate.cgi?msg=23989