Voting rigged by non reviewers? 6 Months On No Action
Posted: Tue Nov 20, 2007 11:26 pm
Back in May 2007 I asked a valid point.
I even offered assistance which was never taken up (funny that) (Before Amy attacks me again!)
6 months on and still the faceless anonymous voters are rigging votes.
The same example can be quoted as before - Joomla Tags. (I only use this as its an extension I watch daily - it could be happening to any other component)
It has 12 reviews ranging from 1 star to 5 stars. = thats an average star rating of 4.16666666
Therefore it has 13 faceless rotes that are bringing its rating down to only a 3 star rating.
Now those 13 faceless voters have not had to explain why they are giving their votes. they could not even have downloaded and tried the component!!! They could be competitors, they could even be my dog - who knows (I dont have a dog so I know!)
The point is that voting, can be rigged by the faceless.
Now the point of this thread is that on May 18, 2007 ot2sen is quoted as saying:
[quote="http://forum.joomla.org/index.php/topic,171406.msg821391.html#msg821391"]On top of our (our = Editorial Team) Wishlist is combined Vote/Review.[/quote]
6 months on, after several offers of assistance from outside (outside core team) PHP Developers this still has not happened. Even after it was agreed:
[quote="http://forum.joomla.org/index.php/topic,171406.msg821391.html#msg821391"]Indeed there are some lower votes provided by faceless voters. Agree[/quote]
Too often we (The community with PHP Skills) are accused of complaining and not doing enough to support and offer our skills to the Joomla Project - too often people like myself offer - and are ignored (I have documented evidence of this) - you can only give back if someone is there willing to take back!
Having reviewed the Mosets Tree Components Code I can tell readers with absolute certainty that the changing of the voting system to display the main count of star based on ONLY the stars awarded when reviewing a component and NOT by the anonymous choosing of star rating by a single click is only a matter of approx 20 lines of code and approx 30mins work to implement, test and push live!
I think this bog standard joomla forum member hits it on the head 6 months ago:
[quote="http://forum.joomla.org/index.php/topic,171406.0.html"]I think the voting system is flawed.
First of all if the voter and comments can remain anonymous the system can be open to abuse by a disgruntled user of in the event of a commercial component a competitor.
Secondly when viewing the comments if you are only able to see the positive reviews this gives an very unbalanced view. The review system can be very useful but if you can only see half the information you don't get a balanced picture.
Thirdly a review will reflect a version of an extension being used at the time, as extensions are continually updated the reviews can become dated very quickly, this being the case would render the review system inaccurate.
I think all reviews should be shown, keep users anonymous if you like although I think if someone feels strongly enough to right a bad review they should be prepared to have their name against the review.
Version numbers should go against a review so the viewer can determine the relevance of the review against the component they're assessing.
Reviews should be displayed in date order which would indicate if the component is improving or deteriorating.[/quote]
I even offered assistance which was never taken up (funny that) (Before Amy attacks me again!)
6 months on and still the faceless anonymous voters are rigging votes.
The same example can be quoted as before - Joomla Tags. (I only use this as its an extension I watch daily - it could be happening to any other component)
It has 12 reviews ranging from 1 star to 5 stars. = thats an average star rating of 4.16666666
Therefore it has 13 faceless rotes that are bringing its rating down to only a 3 star rating.
Now those 13 faceless voters have not had to explain why they are giving their votes. they could not even have downloaded and tried the component!!! They could be competitors, they could even be my dog - who knows (I dont have a dog so I know!)
The point is that voting, can be rigged by the faceless.
Now the point of this thread is that on May 18, 2007 ot2sen is quoted as saying:
[quote="http://forum.joomla.org/index.php/topic,171406.msg821391.html#msg821391"]On top of our (our = Editorial Team) Wishlist is combined Vote/Review.[/quote]
6 months on, after several offers of assistance from outside (outside core team) PHP Developers this still has not happened. Even after it was agreed:
[quote="http://forum.joomla.org/index.php/topic,171406.msg821391.html#msg821391"]Indeed there are some lower votes provided by faceless voters. Agree[/quote]
Too often we (The community with PHP Skills) are accused of complaining and not doing enough to support and offer our skills to the Joomla Project - too often people like myself offer - and are ignored (I have documented evidence of this) - you can only give back if someone is there willing to take back!
Having reviewed the Mosets Tree Components Code I can tell readers with absolute certainty that the changing of the voting system to display the main count of star based on ONLY the stars awarded when reviewing a component and NOT by the anonymous choosing of star rating by a single click is only a matter of approx 20 lines of code and approx 30mins work to implement, test and push live!
I think this bog standard joomla forum member hits it on the head 6 months ago:
[quote="http://forum.joomla.org/index.php/topic,171406.0.html"]I think the voting system is flawed.
First of all if the voter and comments can remain anonymous the system can be open to abuse by a disgruntled user of in the event of a commercial component a competitor.
Secondly when viewing the comments if you are only able to see the positive reviews this gives an very unbalanced view. The review system can be very useful but if you can only see half the information you don't get a balanced picture.
Thirdly a review will reflect a version of an extension being used at the time, as extensions are continually updated the reviews can become dated very quickly, this being the case would render the review system inaccurate.
I think all reviews should be shown, keep users anonymous if you like although I think if someone feels strongly enough to right a bad review they should be prepared to have their name against the review.
Version numbers should go against a review so the viewer can determine the relevance of the review against the component they're assessing.
Reviews should be displayed in date order which would indicate if the component is improving or deteriorating.[/quote]