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The complete guide to Why We Are Here and Why We should reveal Our RatingsJul 17 '00 Write an essay on this topic.Have you ever wondered why someone rates anonymously or worse, not at all? I see it everyday and I believe it is ignorance by some new members when they set show/ hide options on their profile. Because of this, I wanted to help the anonymous members with an editorial and hopefully clear up some things about what happens when they do rate. ----------------------Section 1----------------------------- If you read it, RATE IT! The Web Of Trust Every member has someone who trusts them. Don't you want to return the favor? You might ask how you can do that, maybe by trusting them back? You could do that but it is not the answer. The best way to return the favor would be to rate! I know it sounds strange, but it's true. If you rate an opinion as Highly Recommended, It will likely end up at the top of the list for that subject. It might not sound like much, but your rating will make that opinion 10 times more likely to be read by people who trust you. If you have many people who trust you, your rating can influence hundreds of people and how they see a certain subject. This is why rating fairly is so important! If you accidentally rate an NR quality opinion HR and didn't catch your mistake, think of the influence that one rating will have on the web of trust; the people who trust you will see it, the people who trust them will see it, and the people who trust the members who trust the author that trusts you will see it. If only fifty people trust you, you will affect thousands! Please take rating seriously if only for this single reason. Influence on New Members New members are extremely vulnerable to getting the wrong idea of epinions. If "newbies" see trash opinions, they will think of it as normal! They will write the same trash and wonder why they are not making any money. These make up a large quantity of abusers; and these abusers cause trouble for us all. This is why epinions has gone through all this trouble to make HR fanatics anonymous, keep widely distrusted authors hidden, and keep the unrated material as well as NR and SR opinions out of the "just in" box. Your rating can affect what the "newbies" see! If only a single NR opinion is rated HR, think about how many "newbies" will see that opinion and get the wrong impression, especially if they trust you! Usefulness to the occasional Browser I know it may sound dorky, but we the members are NOT the end user of epinions.com. The end user is the person browsing epinions for advice about what they should buy. Isn't this why we rate anyway, to help those who want to make a buying decision? If someone looking for advice finds a review about the backstreet boys saying "they are so hot!", will that someone use epinions.com in the future? I think not! Do you know the importance of rating yet? -------------Here is an example------------ 1. Ethel wants to buy a new computer. 2. Since she knows nothing about computers, she visits her son's house and uses his computer to access the internet. 3. Her son suggests Micron Computers. 4. She tries a search engine and epinions comes up. She decides to visit the site. 5. Naturally, she wants to find all the information possible before spending thousands of dollars on a computer so she looks at all the top reviews and then, hopefully, reads more reviews down the list. 6. Ethel now knows significant knowledge about Micron computers but she is still not convinced so she reads up on some other brands before she makes a decision. 7. After all this research, Ethel has acquired free, organized, and highly relevant knowledge. This is thanks to all of you who rated opinions and thus sorted out the informative from the uninformative. -----------End Example------------ What I mean by all of this My point was to remind you that we are not the end user of epinions. We are paid to assist the end user to made a decision and not to write junk and likewise steal money from epinions! We keep epinions valuable by bringing the useful opinions into the open where people like Ethel can find them while hiding the trash at the same time. A reviewers weight Weight? That's mean! ... I don't mean that kind of weight, I mean the weight you have when rating or the level of influence you have on opinions. Web Of Trust When you rate opinions, you have a level of influence on what everyone else will see. However, this level is different for every member. It's not exactly the influence on the opinion itself but rather how others see it. If someone trusts you, your ratings are going to have more weight on that person. The same is true, but on a smaller scale, of the people who trust them and so on. You can also influence a persons influence on you and your opinions. If you distrust someone, their ratings will have no influence on you and what you see. Distrusting also counter-acts all of their ratings of your opinions. If you are having trouble with revenge raters, then distrust them! If you see members using revenge rating on others, then they may do the same to you someday. Use your distrust for people who abuse the system in anyway that might affect you. Think of it as lifting their "weight" off your shoulders. Expertise Advisors (formerly Experts) have a significant weight on opinions within their own category of expertise. Advisors can change a rating from a solid Recommended to a solid Highly Recommended with just one rating even when five or six normal members rate as Recommended. Advisors may have significant weight but not as much as someone on your Web of Trust. Trustees You might ask about the normal member who doesn't trust anyone. What affects their weight? Almost every member has someone who trusts them. Trust is directly involved with a persons weight. It's as simple as this, the more trust you have, the more weight you will have on opinions. This gives each member a different weight that is never constant and pretty much unique only to them. Page Views This is highly theoretical on my part but I have found that a person has more weight when they have more page views. It might still be directly involved with the amount of trustees but this system would only make sense; it would give each member their own weight that would always be unique to them with no exceptions. Again, this is only theoretical. How can I improve my epinions weight? 1. write reviews that the Advisors can trust you for. 2. Rate a little more to get people coming to your profile. 3. Once they see your reviews they will probably trust you, a big plus in my book. 4. I would also write a lot in a particular category and then apply for advisor status. Follow all these steps (number 4 is optional) to improve your epinions weight. Points???? Since each reviewer has a different weight in ratings, it would only make sense to have a points system to rank opinions in the archives. Don't believe me if you want to but you must agree that it only makes sense. How else would epinions rank opinions then with points? Every user rates an opinion and adds their points to it. If a review earns more HR points then R points, it will be listed under HR according to how many HR points it earned. The points are secret so you can never find out how many your opinion has earned. If you want your opinion to beat that rival just above it, try placing a link on your profile to get more users to it. The more HR points it has, the more it climbs the scale. Also, I believe that points from other categories affect the point value somehow. I can never know for sure. This system ensures that not only members, but also people just stopping by get "the cream of the crop". Hopefully, they are impressed by what they see. -----------------Section 2------------------- ************************************ ** Why You should Reveal Your Ratings ** ************************************ More Opinion Hits People are curious. It is a fact. If the author of an opinion sees your name on their review, then they will more than likely visit your profile and your latest opinion. It has happened time and time again and can happen to you if you will only show your name. Even if the opinion was NR, show your name! The author can't possibly be mad if 5 others also rated the opinion NR. Be BOLD and leave your name! Respect If you leave an NR and do not hide your name, I will respect that. You will be instantly be added to my notify list because you have integrity! I am sure many others look at this integrity and smile also. Earn my respect, Leave your name! Comment There is a special way to avoid many revenge raters and that is a comment! Think about it, will you hold a grudge if you know your mistakes? I wouldn't; I'm open to criticism and it improves my opinions! It really works! The consequences of being anonymous I have been e-mailed constantly asking for advice or how someone like me, with so few opinions, got all those page views. It's because I leave my name everywhere! The people who ask for this type of advice are the kind who either don't rate or rate anonymously. They only get page views from the "just in" box and then are quickly forgotten. Please leave your name! If you have been picked up by the filter, leave a comment. Just get your name everywhere you can. Conclusion Hopefully I have informed you about ratings weight and how it works as well as the consequences of being anonymous. And please, Show your name! If you have any questions at all, even ones I have already answered here, please don't hesitate to ask via e-mail.  |
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