Suicide Threads

I've seen a lot of good threads go suicidal due to one post to the thread that was negged out of existence. I can understand the point of suicide threads for questions on like: How do I hack hotmail...etc. But what about good threads where there was a topic with a point and one person gave very unworthy input and was negged horribly and that closed the thread. Could maybe there be a way to just close that post or something similar so the whole thread doesn't have to die for one person who made a stupid post?

*LOL* I know what I'm trying to say here, and I hope I'm conveying it...

Example.

I make a post on TCP/IP and someone replies to it completely off the wall and gets negatives to the point where MY thread is closed due to someone else's stupidity. I'm suggesting that maybe the whole thread shouldn't be closed, maybe just that post. That way, if someone makes a mistake in posting something stupid, they don't get banned for posting to just one thread.

And most eloquently put .... guess that what I was trying to say in mine - but sometimes its a man thing to get the words a little messed up and come out looking like a complete idiot - should have paid more attention to that English teacher :)

this might need to be in a post by itself - but it correspondes with your example. considering there is now the possibility for a thread to kill itself - would it be beneficial to have a thread have the ability to revive itself, too. ie. you could still assign ap's to a thread after it's death; maybe they aren't refelected to the user tally, but to just the aggregation of the thread.

if and when a thread's aggregate total get's out of the red, it regains its open status. this might not even be feasible based on the current point assignment model - i don't know.

Actually, I think this "Anti-point" system should've never been here. I post a thread on the Unhackable Hotmail like yesterday, today, it've gone was shutted down because of this. My thread was there in the first place trying to tell script kiddies to give up hacking hotmail, stop doing something's that's wrong, invading someone's pravicy. Then for some reason, it went bad, then to positive, then a few hr. later, it was shutted off.

Would anyone mind to explain why the Negative Anti-points?

I am not sure if that idea might work. I was thinking that maybe the threads could be reactivated instead, perhaps by JP or a mod. And that when the thread was reactivated the post with all the negs could be either hidden or deleted all together.

I thought that maybe you could just neg a post off a thread or something, make just the singular post to that thread disappear or close off from getting antipoints, sort of automatically contract, I don't know how you would go about doing it or whatever, but those are my thoughts. I wanted to comment to Negative's bomb thread, but it was already closed due to one post in the thread. I think a thread should only be killed if maybe 2 or more posts in the thread go suicidal, something like that. That's how the "I Am American" post started, because the previous thread on the Pledge of Allegiance being changed became suicidal because of one person.

Or maybe the thread can only close by suicide if the person who started the thread gets negged to death, that would actually prove the thread to be pointless because the first post pretty much determines the content of the rest of the thread. That way if someone makes a stupid post to the thread and gets negged to death, the thread won't close, but if someone asks how to hack hotmail by starting a new thread, that one can be closed by the suicide option.

EDIT: I can see a downside to reopening threads. I think negs can be thrown around carelessly. I like the idea of the limitation that the one bad post can receive as far as negatives, that way a person cannot be banned due to one comment that someone didn't like. Everyone has a chance to redeem themselves, if it continues, then it should be straightened out with the antipoint system, which it usually is. I'm also afraid that if a post reopens, since it's been closed due to that specific post that got negged to death, that it will just turn into a complete flame thread, and I KNOW that all forums have flaming, as AO does, but keeping it to a minimum keeps it more community friendly and a better place to learn without getting bashed for one bad post.

Apparently mods cant reopen suicide threads. If they could it would increase their workload. GG's idea sounds the best. IMO

JP did say that he's got "a TON" of things to check that the thread doesn't do suicide for nothing but I've also seen rather good threads go suicide because of one stupid post... I wonder if JP's algos count the number of negged posts in a thread, that would solve something.
Also if AP's could given to an entire thread, not single posts, users could balance threads they think are too negative. Those AP's would then actually fall into a black hole affecting NOTHING but the thread.

Or what about if the thread starter carried the weight of the AP assignments, so therefore i the first post was negged into oblivion the thread would be closed because, chances are, it's something like 'how can i hack into my girlfriend's email account?' if it's been blasted that much. But if the other posts are negged, that just affects the person who posted it, instead of compromising everyone else? I've noticed as well posts can be negged because of bad phrasing or the suggestion of a lack of consideration; perhaps it would also make people less critical if they know negging a post for minor reasons could kill a potentially useful thread [i.e. sometimes questions are asked badly or stupidly but the threads come up with some great answers and useful information]. So to summarize:
1) Thread started getting negged gets the post closed, since that's most likely to contain the concept and content of the thread
2) Other posters just get their own status into the red
Just a thought...

XXX

I think what ZeroOne meant was that those points would only go towards the thread, not the people in it. Sort of a way to judge a perfectly good thread or not, and in addition to personal antipoints the the individual posters will receive, will create more fairness in keeping valid threads open.

I agree with you GG, but I have also seen quite a few threads where there are 5 or 6 posts that are getting a lot of negs. If you only removed certain posts, then a good portion of the replys would be removed, and the thread would basically be sucidal anyway.

One of the things that he has for a check is that it is based on the entire thread level, not just 1 post. So if there is a good thread, with 1 really bad post, make sure that one of the really good posts gets postive points. That will help "balance" the actual thread. I have seen threds where someone makes an excelent reply to a question, yet no one gives that person positive points, even though thats what the points were originally designed for.

Ohhh I see, sorry dunno how I misinterpreted that; that would make the system more complex but at the same time a lot fairer, and yes, that would be more effective...I think! But on what criteria would you rate a whole thread? Surely it would achieve the same end but indiscriminately, and if you'd posted to it you wouldn't know who was being criticised were the thread closed; I'd be really sad if I had a thread and it got closed without personal messages on negative antipoints explaining why! But I think that's a better way round it, just needs developing as an idea - or explaining to me more thoroughly, sorry am I being really slow here?! :P

XXX

I agree with you GreekGoddess. Numerous useful threads often turn suicidal, due to one highly negative post.

There really should be "more" checks & balances which ensure that a perfectly useful thread doesn't go suicidal. GreekGoddess is on the right track. :)

Any random person with a few positive APs in their account can neg a thread, causing the total point for that thread to go down. If a bunch of people do this, it takes a while before the thread's closed (I think). Problem lies in when you get heavy-hitters with over 2000 APs negging a thread. You get two or three of those and the total point just plummets. Now, I disclaimer this by saying I don't know if that's correct in my assumption but anywhere a person can assign points, either positively or negatively, those with more points can do more collective 'damage' (or good assign as well).

I'm pretty sure that the antipoint effect you have on a post has to do with how many antipoints you have yourself, but again...I'm not sure about that. A thread started in Addicts on a similar topic. It was suggested recently that you could balance out someone's post that may have received negatives for no reason at all by assigning it back to even. The same vice versa. It appears this may have gone into effect. souleman had mentioned it in the thread I was talking about above, and I experience a similar antipoint correction notice when I assigned some greenies to an overall negative post.

This should help if you feel a post has been unreasonably negged or given positives, even if your points don't count as much as someone elses this seems like a fair way to balance things out.

I see what you're saying also souleman. What about contracting the post that has the negatives that would usually make the thread suicidal, where you can no longer give negatives to that user, but the thread can continue, but that person can no longer post to that thread, because he's basically be kicked for it. That way, the deterrence has been taken care of, cannot get banned by over-negging, and the discussion can be continued. And the same idea as I threw out before that a post can go suicidal as it is now if the first post (the one who started the post) asked "How to Hack Hotmail", obviously that post is going to get negs and be a thread full of flames, so there's no point in it's survival, keeping it open, whatever. Did that make sense?

It's a good idea GG ;)
Gaaagh!....it's happening to this thread..... :p

- Noia

hmmm..ask me! while i newely arrived at the site and earned one solitary greenie! one of posts erased me and gave me a two brownies!! and that was not even a forbiddin topic...loz..not thatv am complaining..neways...:)

Just ideas to toss out in case they aren't already in action:

1. Have a countdown timer.
   When the thread goes to 'suicidal', then have it wait a day or 12 hours, and THEN close. (With a little indicator at the top, maybe call these threads: 'probationary' or 'condemned'...) That way people really interested in the discussion are able to add positives and take action to prevent any percieved abuse. As it stands now, there isn't much of a chance for people who LIKE the thread to prevent forced-suicide, because after the deed is done you can't assign antipoints.
   
2. Assign Towards Even
   
   I'd like to re-advance my old suggestion of an antipoint function that would allow you to basically say: "I think this post doesn't deserve positives or negatives, and I want to use my antipoints to keep it that way." Essentially it would let you use the right fraction of an AP assignment (up to a full assignment) in order to bring a post back towards an even value...
   
3. Question... How is sucidal rate calculated?
   
   For a post to be a 'suicidal' post, is it the ABSOLUTE antipoint value, or the AVERAGE value of the post given all of the antipoints? Say a post gets... oh... 5 greens, 3 greens, and 15 reds. The absolute value might be -7, enough to make it suicidal. But the AVERAGE would be -2.33, which is a significant difference. I would suggest that any suicide calculations take into account any positive assignments by using the average rather than the absolute. (This would also reinforce the usefuless of the assign-towards-even feature.)
   

I like the idea of the timer but I don't think it would solve the problem of someone posting something that will be flamed for. What happens if, per se, a topic came up in Cosmos dealing with some specific mathematical theory, greats great responses, everyone is sharing their ideas and such, but someone has to ruin the whole thread (saying Terr originally started it or added some ideas to the original topic) by saying: "Damn that Terr is a freaking moron. He should leave AO, his posts are worthless. What does MATH have to do with SECURITY? Blah, blah, blah." That post ALONE would receive the negatives needed to close that whole thread down, and I don't think that even putting a timer on there would resolve the negatives issued to that post because the person certainly deserved them for making an ignorant comment like that, so why would he receive any balance points?

I like the suicide thread option, it's a great way of keeping the newest members here that have a misconception about what AO is about in line, if not away from here, but it's imposing on the people making valid threads and having an ignorant person post to it and having it close.

I haven't been through all the forums yet today since I last posted, but souleman made a comment earlier in Addicts about something that sounded similar to the assign towards even suggestion you had made a while back. I received a similar notice when I assigned some greenies to a post with overall negative status. I don't remember the quote exactly, but it was something about correcting the antipoint status of the thread. So maybe JP has implemented it, and just hasn't announced it yet? We're probably overwhelming him with all the ideas lately that he hasn't had the time to sort through all of them yet, let alone post features he's finished up on.

EDIT: lawrence171 is a perfect example of what I'm trying to suggest changing. This thread is negative because of an antipoint query he posted. If he gets enough, this perfectly valid thread is going to go suicidal on us.

My hotmail thread is not to ask how to hack Hotmail... You ppl's heart are so limited and you seem to sterotype alot here. You have been brain washed, all that you know is that Microsoft = Bad. You people don't even think for yourselves anymore... So, assign whatever point you like. You brainless people will never become leaders if all you think about Microsoft is that they suck, you should actually review and consider factors that had lead you to think that (although most of you just heard other people say so and believed it).

Okay, listen here bucky...DO NOT try and suicide this thread with your post about your Hotmail thread. I will NOT tolerate it. *stomps her foot* This has nothing at all to do with your Hotmail thread, I apologize for the animosity it has caused we are trying to add suggestions to change the suicide thread guidelines. If you have something valid to contribute to this thread, then do so, if not...then HUSH before the flamers get here and neg this post to death.

*gets out her squirt gun and defends the thread*

hmm posts 12, 13, 14, skips GG, 16, 17, 18, skips GG, are all neg and at the same point.. Prolly got GG earlier and can't give em to her again... another abuser I guess.. Seems like this is becomeing more and more of a problem. Perhaps there should be some features built in that if a person negs more than one or two people in the same thread it will stop counting them. Just a thought.
x

No, I'm getting negs, they just aren't counting, they're showing up as grey, and clicking on my assign button to my own post they're showing as red. Someone is obviously trying to kill this thread. I don't know why though, I would think if something was done about this it would be a good thing? Or am I not seeing the bad of changing it?

JP wrote in a reply some time back (I can't seem to find it right now) that it is up to us as a community to fix problems that we see occuring. He wants the community as a whole to correct itself. So here's my solution until I hear otherwise from JP that this was not his intent. Whenever I see negs being throw around without cause (as happened earlier in this thread) I will do my best to move the post back towards even. If enough of us work to correct the problems we see, then we won't need to bother JP to fix a problem - we can fix it ourselves.

hmmm - contact user about this assignment
suicidal thread lol - contact user about this assignment
: ) - contact user about this assignment
No one ever explains......... - contact user about this assignment

These are the negatives I've gotten......guess someone thought it would be funny to post AP's without a reason, someone is obviously finding humor in this, as I obviously am not.

I believe to an extent that it's up to the community to fix the problems, but if it's something that's just going to abused for no reason whatsoever, I can't see why the creator of it wouldn't get involved and do something about it. AO users shouldn't have to go around balancing out points because some jackass felt malicious and dumped his negs into several posts on a thread (and that goes for Senior Members, Addicts, Members, Jr. Members, and Newbies that actually have greens to contribute). To my knowledge, from comments older AO members have made regarding APs, this was NOT why the system was implemented.

I think it's great that you will in the future keep a lookout for threads that are receiving unneccessary negatives, but this thread wasn't meant to be a plea for antipoints. I was hoping that it would actually CHANGE something. And I'm sorry if it seems ungrateful, since I HAVE received greenies, but it wasn't a rally for green APs and I want to make that clear, so there is NO doubt of why I created this thread.

I think also that if the community could fix things, a simple AP ethic FAQ would resolve a lot of issues that AO users are experiencing regarding AP. Where APs should be assigned, why they should be assigned...etc.. But I don't think even a FAQ would matter.

Hmm... or try always contacting the user about any weird assignments to either get back or get information. (Pick one.)

Personally I find the thread closing aspect more irksome than the "Ow my Antipoint Total is going down" factor. If I had an AP total that was always at zero, I probably wouldn't notice that much difference in my board experience :)

<shameless plug of own idea>I wonder how the gold dot thing would change this... </shameless plug of own idea>

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mm posts 12, 13, 14, skips GG, 16, 17, 18, skips GG, are all neg and at the same point.. Prolly got GG earlier and can't give em to her again... another abuser I guess.. Seems like this is becomeing more and more of a problem. Perhaps there should be some features built in that if a person negs more than one or two people in the same thread it will stop counting them. Just a thought.

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that is a damn good idea

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So here's my solution until I hear otherwise from JP that this was not his intent. Whenever I see negs being throw around without cause (as happened earlier in this thread) I will do my best to move the post back towards even. If enough of us work to correct the problems we see, then we won't need to bother JP to fix a problem - we can fix it ourselves.

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Also another good idea but not totally failsafe, if someone is determined to kill a thread, they can neg each person in the thread until the thread goes suicidal. I do agree that as a community we need to work towards stopping this abuse, but some system safeguards would compliment our efforts.

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Originally posted here by lawrence171
My hotmail thread is not to ask how to hack Hotmail... You ppl's heart are so limited and you seem to sterotype alot here. You have been brain washed, all that you know is that Microsoft = Bad. You people don't even think for yourselves anymore... So, assign whatever point you like. You brainless people will never become leaders if all you think about Microsoft is that they suck, you should actually review and consider factors that had lead you to think that (although most of you just heard other people say so and believed it).

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I have no idea where your response came from, but here goes:

1: do you know how many threads have been started/closed in concern with hacking hotmail? Enough to make my eyes melt. And considering I'm not one of those people who said anything or ap'd you on your said thread, I don't appreciate being lumped into the same group as those (see your 'You ppl's heart are so limited and you seem to stereotype a lot here' comment).

2: No, I have not been brainwashed into all that I know is that MS = Bad. I'll tell you why MS sucks...because they don't create anything, they steal/reverse-engineer/buy out/bury other people's competitive product. Because they don't create anything with security or stability in mind. Because a majority of their products are completely ass-backwards when it comes to functionality with everything else out there that might be third-party. Because everyone's come to know the BSOD and they accept it because "that's the way it's always been" instead of saying "Damnit, this sucks, fix the damned product!". Because rebooting is for adding new hardware. Because Windows limits everything you can/can't do. If MS could make Windows 9x/etc to be half as stable as Office 2000/etc are, this wouldn't be THAT big of an issue. If MS didn't try to force IE into everyone's browser-of-choice and actually LET people choose, it'd be less of an issue (hence why they're in court again and again and again). If they made IE to actually WORK right instead of inherently cascade-crashing the system just because of some random bug you'll never know about occured to which it happens in an 'unknown' area. That alone tells me the programmers said 'I don't know where/what happened' and left it at that. That is SORRY ASS programming there. We get the picture I think....this is all my opinion by the way, and as far as I'm concerned, I'll never just accept MS for anything on an OS level until they prove they can actually compete instead of just buying out or using usual dirty tactics to get their product on the frontlines.

3: I do think for myself. That's why I decided to go into unix administration. That's why I'm posting here in defense for myself because of your lump-sum comments.

4: this post brought to you by Opera on Red Hat 7.3. Have a nice day.

I totally agree with everything GG said.
It also is (for instance) stupid to get negative antipoints for a rollcall thread. If it's going on like that this site's getting some anarchy like thing. I probably get a lot of neg's for this post. I want to assign some postive antipoints to this thread (GG) but i don't have enough myself to make it count really...

edit: allright this post wasnt really complete on all subjects and that wasnt my intention because i do not have to much time now. Why are U giving negative antipoints because of that?

It's been said countless times, nobody has to put anything in their antipoint assignment and GG, for your grey assignments you've gotten, that just means the person isn't high enough for their points to count against your total. On this same thread, I got a red point from some whore stating '**** off' but that's ok because it's their "entitlement" to have an opinion on my statements, even if they're completely misguided in their thoughts and a complete immature loser to boot.

And is it just me or am I the only one seeing that a lot of people are sucking up to the "girls" of AO? I've been reading so many "I agree completely with <insert name of female char here>"....what makes their posts any more different than others that contribute? It's not like they're the only ones saying useful things.

*watches the negative points roll in on this one, rofl*

I've come up with a plan layout from all of the suggestions...so listen up, this might help solve the problem with threads going on lately.

First of all, the problem of threads going suicidal does not always lie in the hands of one person, who posted a stupid question and got negged quite a bit for it. It can happen if two people (especially those with higher greenie/negative effects) goes through and negs each individual person in the thread, turning the overall thread status to extemely negative, if not suicidal.

Proposal 1. Back to the one person that can suicide your thread with a question that's completely off topic and people give that person negatives until your thread closes, even if your thread was relevant to begin with.

The thread may only be closed due to this person if he/she is the original author of the first post of the thread. That keeps threads that spawn: How do I Hack Hotmail? out of there.

Instead of usually suiciding the thread, the person who would have suicided it in the first places post looks similar to the Banned post, where you can no longer assign points, and it's automatically minimized, therefore reducing comments on it while keeping the topic of the thread open. They can no longer post to the thread, nor can they give any antipoints to the thread. They've pretty much lost their priviledges to the thread all together.

Their post may look something like this:

This person has been banned from "Thread Name", and as a result, all of their posts to this thread have been marked as Hidden. The user was banned from this topic for a reason, so this post may: promote illegal activities, contain flames, off topic content, and less-than-family-friendly language, among other things.

To view this post click [here]

Okay....so that takes care of the one person who can suicide your thread...now, what about the people who go through and neg everyone in the thread for no apparent reason.

Proposal 2. Antipoint limitations in threads. There are enough members of AO that you don't need to take it upon yourself to assign points to everyone in a thread, no matter how much you don't care for the topic, or you just don't like the people in it, feeling mean or whatever.
You have a limit to the amount of negatives AND positives you can give out in one thread. This limits those hit and run neggers to only getting to a couple of posts, but most likely won't throw the thread into suicidal, because there's plenty of people on AO that will eventually get to your post and give you some greenies if they feel that you've been unbalanced for no reason...That's where the community aspect comes in, with a little implementation behind it.

If people have a thread that's going suicidal, then you know it's just not a couple of people that want your thread gone. It's apparent that there are quite a few people, and that seems more fair, IMO.

What do you guys think?

Sidenote: Vorlin, I know people don't have to put in reasons and I know that greys don't count, I just posted those points to show xmaddness that someone was going through all the posts and hitting them with negs to try and close the thread, because it seemed like I was being skipped, when in fact, they just didn't effect me much...

And about the guys sucking up...I've noticed it quite a bit...I get a lot of greenies for being a girl...I get negatives from the skeptics that say I'm really a guy...hahahaha
I don't want to be treated differently because I'm female. I think that once the surprise wears off that more and more females are coming to AO, they'll get used to the idea.
: )

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And about the guys sucking up...I've noticed it quite a bit...I get a lot of greenies for being a girl...I get negatives from the skeptics that say I'm really a guy...hahahaha
I don't want to be treated differently because I'm female. I think that once the surprise wears off that more and more females are coming to AO, they'll get used to the idea.

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So it shall be added to the AntiPoint algos that if positive points were assigned to females they count only half of the normal! ;)
Or we could also have a button "No thanks, I don't think I deserved these greenies." which would return the AP's to the sender (or something).

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You have a limit to the amount of negatives AND positives you can give out in one thread.

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Yeah, I'm for this idea.

I still say that the algos should count the number of negative posts in a thread and not kill it if there was only one negative post, no matter how extremely negative it was (except if it was the post that started the thread). Banning the author from that thread might be a good idea.

You must spread your AntiPoints around before giving it to this thread again.

How does that look like? Should appear if ap's were given to two (or mayber depending on the number of posts in the thread) posts. Additionally it could just start to decrease the value of the antipoints given until they're "spread around".