Rating Reminder
We all love being able to ask questions and get answers about any topic and share knowledge and experiences with a simple click. Whether you’re answering questions or just browsing, there are many ways to contribute to improving the content on Answers.
How can I rate great questions?
Do you like some of the questions out there? Why not star them? Giving a star to good questions helps Answers promote the best content on the site.
When a question gets a star, it gets nominated to appear in the “Popular” list on the Answers homepage. The list showcases what users find the most interesting. To “un-star” a question, simply click the star icon.
How can I rate bad questions or answers?
Sometimes you see answers you either really like or find totally unhelpful. Once you reach Level 2, you have the power to rate answers by clicking the thumbs-up or thumbs-down icons below each answer.
Give an answer a thumbs-down if you feel it is not helpful to the asker. When you thumbs-down an answer, we will hide it from your view. Click Show to display it again.
To report abusive questions and answers that violate the Community Guidelines, click Report Abuse, not the thumbs-down icon.
How can I comment on an answer?
When a Best Answer is chosen, you have the option of rating the best answer and adding comments about it. Every time someone gives a thumbs-up to your Best Answer, you automatically get an extra point. The maximum bonus points a Best Answer can accumulate is 50.
Have more questions? Leave us a comment and let us know!
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And where exactly would I find Y!A’s thumbs down button? Because I’m sure you’d get plenty for all of the false reports and undeserved suspensions.
But how can I really rate bad questions?
You’ve said how to rate bad answers. You’ve said how to report questions that violate the Community Guidelines. You have not said how to rate a bad question, and IMO, this would be one of the most intelligent upgrades (downgrades, actually) that you might implement.
There are so many horrible questions on this site. We used to be able to give thumbs-up and thumbs-down to questions, and I don’t understand why you took away that option.
It’s a violation of the Community Guidelines to answer with “This is such a stupid question that I’m not even going to answer it”, so how do we answerers otherwise provide input on the bad questions?
Ahh. I already know this..
I agree 100% with the poster who said “bring back the thumbs down for questions”.
I agree with Jenny! Some questions hardly make sense!
this is all bs, you dont want to make this a better site, you allow people from answers to email and harrrass and tell others to kill themselves etc, its just an extension of answers yet you do nothing when its reported…the questions that are allowed to stay up at times can be horrible. you seriously need to reconsider the you make a difference in the boards bs that started about two years ago, because that is when the boards became a nightmare because you have answer bullies..great job
I like it when an answer that I have posted gets a TU.
It is like a virtual pat on the back from one of my peers.
And when I receive a TD, it makes me go back and re-read my answer for errors.
If I see no error, I just take it as an indication that someone disagrees with me…. so what (?)….~*shrugs*~…its no big deal.
I also appreciate being acknowledged on leaderboards and with TC badges when I deserve it.
For me It(answering questions) is an honorable endeavor.
But I can see that some people abuse (many of) the very features that make Y!A unique
I have always stated that I believe it would be better to get rid of abuse and abusers, instead of getting rid of the features that can be abused… after all … ALL the features have a “potential” to be abused. But without ANY of the features the site would never have become as popular as it is.
There are millions upon millions of global Y!A users.
Many of those millions of users are not abusers.
I agree with a user at the Y!A suggestion board that renaming the TU/TD feature could lessen the abuse but still provide the opportunity for users to express their opinions in an anonymous_way.
Some of the ideas for renaming the “thumbs up / thumbs down” are (from the suggestion board forum) :
/ ;(
agree/disagree
+/-
star/X
smile/frown
or even just a smile and a question_mark.
I also think that new users, graduating from level 1 to level 2, should have a tutorial that shows them how to use the feature(s) responsibly so as not to go hog-wild with their new ability and possibly abuse it or hurt someones feelings.
There needs to be much more emphasis placed on distinguishing “Thumbs” as having little impact, other than visual.
Way too many Answers Users labor under the mistaken beliefs that a Thumb Up is a “Vote” for “Best Answer”, and a Thumb Down is an Abuse Report. I see, daily, the worst of TOS Violations with TD’s numbering in the high teens on them, and added comments to other Answers indicating the posters of those Answers thought they had reported the abusive Answer. Yet, there it still shows in public view. If the TDers had used the Report Abuse link, as they thought they were doing, it would have been gone long before I got there. Or, at least it would have prior to the current over week long “Community Moderation” outage.
Thumbs could use pop-up bubbles on mouseover, reading, “If you want to Report Abuse, use the Report Abuse Button!” for TD, and, “You are not voting for BA! This Q is not yet in Voting!” for TU, with “Don’t show this again.” checkboxes.
BTW, why is this blog’s clock still on PST, rather than PDT?
Agreed, more quality questions should be starred. However I notice a lot of starred questions are by people who answer the question. Perhaps to be able to vote on it if it is unresolved?
Jenny has an excellent point. A great many questions are posted by trolls who don’t want answers, they just want to play. They waste time and space and displace legitimate questions before they have a chance to be seen.
If you point out that the person is a troll, they cry to the admins and get you deleted. If you report them as a troll, you’re usually ignored, even though the questions are clearly against the rules.
I realize this is a free-to-use service, but it would be a much better site if the admins cracked down on the trolls. At least give users an “ignore” option like IMDb and some other sites. You click the ignore button, and that user’s posts are no longer visible to you. It’s not as good as getting rid of them, but at least you don’t have to see their nonsense if you don’t want to.
I never knew I got a point for each thumbs up… So If I get a good answer that others liked, that’s another point? Sweet!
Oh wait, that was only if it was best answer, then thumbs up…
How about a 2nd best answer option as well ? Maybe 2 pts..? Sometimes the answers are so good and the choice is difficult to make, one feels it deserving to give credit to the answerer.
When an answer is reported, it is automatically deleted. This leads, of course, to reporting abuse. Reporting is used by some interest groups as a mean of censorship. They report the answers they dont like, even though these answers don’t violate the community guidelines. That’s very common in the “Religion and Spirituality section where a group of fundies tries to censor every answer that chalenges their beliefs.
There is certainly a way to take into consideration the score of the person that provided that answer and the score of the reporters. This would limit greatly the number af abusive reports…
Y/A really needs to have a way to separate the “for fun” questions from the “deadly serious” questions. Also, for me, Y/A will not have any real credibility until it adopts guidelines to keep atheist trolls from having a field day “believer bashing” in the Religion and Spirituality section.
Why is there so many suspensions and removal of questions, for no reason at all? I had a question removed , and all i was talking about was a book i wanted to read, and asked what stores i could find it in. Next think you know, im suspended, for no reason, and my account got deleted with all my hard earned points….u should rlly start monitering the system guys….
Why do you allow people to report questions which are not violations? They do it out of spite or ‘revenge’.
This has often happened to me, and when I appeal
I get no reply.
Thanks a lot for these tips. This is a great website.
You know, in a courtroom, when one attorney asks a witness, ‘And when did you stop beating your wife?’, the other attorney usually lodges an objection, and the judge decides if that question is even askable. I rarely visit some of the categories because I see “Why are libs/neocons/etc. such execrable, stupid, blasted fools who should have their dogs repossessed?”, and nothing happens when I report it.
GET RID OF THE THUMBS DOWN,TOO MANY PEOPLE ARE COMPLAINING!!!!!!!
Unfortunately, due to some vagary of the handicapped settings of my browser, the icons do not show up.
I don’t suppose you (Y/A) could put a readable label for the star, and thumbs up and thumbs down?
Thank you.
Mmm the sub-headings of this blog entry are a bit confusing IMHO.
“How can I rate great questions?” is misleading: you can’t actually rate questions (good or bad), there’s only the Star feature.
Similarly, the text under “How can I rate bad questions or answers?” only deals with rating bad As – because Qs can’t be rated!
And like Anoneemuuse wrote earlier, some main basics need to be emphasized:
RATING IS NOT VOTING
RATING IS NOT REPORTING
FOR ASKERS, NEITHER RATING NOR VOTING ARE THE SAME AS DIRECTLY SELECTING THE BEST ANSWER
The way the system is set up, it seems to emphasize quantity rather than quality. Two points are given for answering a question regardless of whether that answer is helpful, but only a best answer is rewarded through additional points for thumbs up.
I’m in favor of not giving points at all for answers themselves, but instead giving points for all quality answers which recieve a certain number of thumbs up. This may discourage trolls who answer questions by just saying “Two points!” and making a mockery of those who try to give quality answers.
hey guys i’m new so could you help me out thanks!!!!!
To the one asking how to rate questions. It is very simple. Protest the question by not answering it.
The problem with the thumbs down is that people use it when they don’t want to hear the answer. For example, they will ask, “I have a 2.1 GPA in high school. What are my chances of getting into Harvard?” And no matter how gently I try to say that you have to be a very top student to get into Harvard, they will give me a thumbs-down because that isn’t what they wanted me to say.
I think the thumbs down is a good thing because sometimes there are wrong answers. Just my opinion.
I think you guys do a fantastic job of keeping Yahoo Answers a wonderful site. I really enjoy using YA, and I appreciate the reminder about the features. Keep up the good work and thanks for all you do.
The fact that you deleted my posts clearly showed that you are not interested in your customers. I work in customer service so take my advice, if you don’t start listening to your customers, they leave, if they leave you don’t get paid.
i agree that alot of my questions were delete for no reason just because they were reported by trolls or people that didn’t like my question especially when it’s a political subject and especially if you’re a conservative then they want to shut you down. it really needs to be monitored better because people are getting answers and questions reported for no valid reason.
It would be nice if you could actually use the report abuse button and not have it take 4 days for content to be removed, if it gets removed at all.
Great blog!
Can we please get the hide-an-answer with thumbs down on non-Best Answers too, so the better answers will be seen?
This really is a great site. Don’t change anything. Nothing needs to be changed.
The rating system is overrated. People don’t just give thumbs down b/c of a bad answer. They also give a thumbs down b/c they hate a particular person. To me, that’s abuse.
Hundreds of thousands of answers remain in tiebreak status – unvoted on – for several months, even years. The most powerful way to eliminate the junk (stupid, insulting, just plain unhelpful) questions, is to VOTE and vote NO BEST ANSWER.
The best way to reward the good answers and insure they end up in the knowledgebase is once again to VOTE and vote often.
Well used, the thumbs are a good feature.
But I suggest two changes.
1) Level 1 should be able to use them, too. We let beginners vote and report, why not use thumbs?
2) There ARE abuses of this feature, especially the thumbs DOWN. They are mis-used by groups “harrassing” others by giving them thumbs down on every answer.
3) Abuses could be controlled by placing a QUOTA on thumbing….maybe one UP and one DOWN allowed per every two answers allowed at the level. SO a Level 2 with a quota of 40 answers would have 10 UP and 10 DOWN thumbs to use. This would make users ration their thumbing activity and avoid “revenge” thumbing.
The rating system is a farce. People use the thumbs down punitively. They see a user whose name they recognize, and give THAT a bad rating, without reading the answer. Of course, there are trolls on answers, especially the politics and religion sections, who deserve to have every answer they give deleted. But as a gauge of the merit of answer content, which is what it is supposed to be, the rating system is a joke.
Your own comments reveal the flaw: “Give an answer a thumbs-down if you feel it is not helpful to the asker.” No one can judge that. No one cares sufficiently about that. Only the asker should be allowed to vote “helpful”.
I just wanted to openly apologize for answering a question incorrectly in the Religion department. When I scroll down this bog page, I see proof that our first ammendment is working nicely and it is what makes us American!!!!! Good and Bad I like what everyone says and diverisity helps change and focus happen!!! Good job to every single one of ya, trolls as well!!!!
Why can’t you have the spell checker so people can use it till they do a final submission even after editing, yoiu know some people have disabilities and the spell checker helps them.
I have historically researched many answers and been there when certain events occured yet yoiu don’t post answers if the responder doesn’t give a short useless answer.With no back up facts or historical background this takes time i don’t make money doing this and you post silly jerky answers and won’t post one where a person spends time to detail a response.
Unfair discrimination.
The argument going on here is really funny. Y!A policy is that you have ONE opportunity to appeal a deletion, but the first response you get is always the same: read the terms and conditions–yadda–yadda–yadda–
So the jerks are free to run wild. There are people out there making malicious reports and if just ONE person would spot them and suspend their account, this site would be so much better. This isn’t a freedom of speech issue as much as it is laziness or just plain cowardice.
BTW, I want to give Metaphor two thumbs up.
I have a comment, and an observation. The religion/spirituality and politics/current events forums are cutthroat. I avoid them, although I have some good contributions that I could make if I could do so freely.
I see Christians asking theology questions of other Christians, only to be bashed by Athiests who only contribute hate towards Christians.
I see Mormans asking theology questions of other Mormans, saying: “Please only serious answers, no Morman hater responses”, only to have Morman haters go nuts insulting them and damning them to hell.
I see Neo-Nazi’s in this very forum claiming the holocaust never happened, and insulting any honest response to their hate, including family members of the people who escaped the concentration camps.
This is very, very, distasteful, and insults the intgrety of the Religious and Spirituality forum, and all the decent peole who actually believe in spirituality.
Forget free speech in politics or current events, Democrats are telling Republicans if they don’t agee with Obama they should get the hell out of the country.
Muslims post questions that insult American soldiers, and the American government, and all American people, then gang up on any people who try to defend their honor.
I should not fear being gang raped here for being a Christian, or defending a Jew, or defending a Morman, or loving my country, especially for excercising my free speech in a forum born in America.
Athiests are free to practice their non religion, but they shoud stay the hell away from harrassing Christians or Jews, or any other religion here, if they feel compelled to harrass Christians or Jews, you should not condone it in any way.
Over-looking insulting posts by people who hate Americans, Christians, or Jews should not be condoned, It is the very same thing as encouraging it.
Don’t be surprised if American patriots, Christians, Jews, and others lose patience and react to the damn discrimination we suffer here, but remember it is your place to moderate hate here first.
Do you allow “Gay Bashing” in Y!A?
If not, then why us?
.
I appreciate the fact that I can decide IF an answer is worth a TU or TD. I will usually only do a TD if I am certain that the answer is absolutely incorrect, though. I otherwise feel that it is up to the poster of the question to decide. Only they know how helpful any given answer is to them.
I LOVE the idea of allowing a “2nd Place B/A” EVEN if it gives NO Points. Or allow the option to divide the 10 points between 2 answers, whether it be 5 points each or say you decide 1 is worth eight and the other gets the balance of 2 points. I often find it difficult to choose a B/A, and find myself apologizing to others that have also answered with excellent answers. It a horrible feeling.
NO WONDER we have such a back log of unsolved questions, cu’z, how does one choose some times. They would rather let the community pick, then pick themselves, in order to spare the feelings of all that answered!
(Which is why I joined “YahOOTieBusters”, btw)
{{{{{{{{{{{{{{{{{{{{ shameless plug }}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}
I wonder some times if that’s what creates a troll. A member that is trying to give their all and knows they have given a perfect answer, only to be overlooked cu’z the person that posted chooses a B/A based on who answered 1st, or a member they recognize or cu’z the answer is from a TC, yet in the back of their mind, they would REALLY like to split that vote.
Then the member that is over looked becomes bitter and a troll is born.
“REPORTING”…
I understand why trust must be built up before our one (1) report alone is enough to have a question or answer removed. BUT…It would be nice IF when we report an answer that has already been picked as, “BEST ANSWER”….. IF IT WERE, be looked at by a Y!/A staffer right away, without the need for a 2nd report
.
Here’s why…
I was looking for an answer to a question…I Google it…Up pops a link to Yahoo Answers…I click on it…And the answer (Best Answer) to this question is… **** ” W+# …You are an idiot!” **** WHAT!?
So please understand, Any one that Googles the same question whether a member or not, will have the option to see this answer & that is a reflection on Y!/A. It was picked by voters, but….c’mon. I DID report this yet it’s still there. I don’t blame Y!/A, as sometimes we don’t know there is a problem until we are told about it. So I’m telling you about it.
** All-in-all, I LOVE This Sight, & the only way I am leaving is if you kick me off. I also think that there is nothing wrong with a’lil critique. Y!/A has “critiqued” me (violation) and although I have won appeals, I am the better for it!
Thank you for allowing me to share my opinion.
______~_~.
.
I think a lot of people abuse the rating system, for ridiculous reasons. I think something should be done about this, because I’m sick of really good, contributing answers getting rated down because someone shared their opinion. For example, I told a man who got a pedicure that if that’s what he wanted his nails to look like, then that is perfectly OK, and I got rated down! And answers like ‘omg ur gay weirdo’ got rated up!
Now I’m not trying to say they’re WRONG for sharing their opinion, but those people didn’t even contribute and answer the question, but instead decided to gay-bash! The guy wasn’t asking for opinions on his sexual orientation, he was asking for an opinion on his nails.
Come on people, grow up.
What if it’s NOT a bad question? What if it’s a GREAT question and I’m the first replier and I give a GREAT answer, but then the asker DELETES the question once he figures out the answer?
That’s not FAIR. I could have a ton more points, but this happened to me, TODAY. Do I actually LOSE points for having my question deleted? That would be even worse! Do you keep records of deleted questions and the answers given?
I seriously consider this an abuse of the community. Can we penalize people who do this?
(Don’t know if you could tell, but I’m sort of upset with the way the system works. The asker should be need a consensus from the community before being able to delete a question.)