28
votes
Vote box should be on the left-hand side
Why? My mouse, as well as my vision, are focused on the left. The vote box feels like its light years away on a 16:9 screen. It's on the opposite side of the screen from everything else I might click in the GUI. Its a waste of time/movement.
HTH!
Which is precisely why the vote button is on the far right. The first thing you do should not be voting, it should be reading the title and ideally the submitted content as well. Seeing the vote total before reading the title and submitted content also has the potential to influence your judgement regarding the content before you have actually read it. This is also why the vote button/count on comments comes after (underneath) the comment and not before like on reddit.
It seems a lot of suggestions aim to make this more like reddit. I for one am here because I /don't/ like reddit's system. I want less meme-y posts, and circlejerks, and more discussions that make me think, or make me challenge my existing views. The number is purely telling us how popular a post is (because lets face it, that's what causes people vote), not it's quality. And I get this by reading the comment, not by knowing it's popularity. Hell, I wonder if having the number displayed is even necessary for my what I (and others by the looks of it) want from this site.
I think it's worthwhile to know how many people voted on something. There's a democratic element there I'd be sad to lose.
That said, that vote number does not necessarily have to be the only, or even the primary, factor in that content's ranking. We can have all kinds of sorting/ranking methods, too. In the end that big fat number could just be window dressing.
What would you miss? Several months ago, I configured my browsers to hide all scores and karma on reddit and I haven't found myself caring too much. I'm still not convinced that votes / karma are a meaningful or useful improvement over Usenet.
I'd miss what other sites don't really give us - accurate vote numbers. How many users voted, the real, honest number. I don't miss the karma totals and the scoreboard-chasing one bit.
I guess what I'm trying to say is that I'm not seeing value in karma or voting. I'd rather make my own decisions about whether something is valuable. It's hard for me to understand why I should value something because others do. I've always been an iconoclast that way.
I think of it more like counting other people's endorsements. That doesn't make me value something more or less (though for others it might). I mod a music forum where the best stuff rarely breaks 20 upvotes. I just like having a sense of the genuine reach of something, knowing how many real people it touched enough to get them to vote it up.
Fair enough. Reach is a very different way of looking at it than "karma" or "votes", and that's helped me think of it in a new light. Have a vote because it touched me enough to make me change my mind. :)
An iconoclast, or someone independently-thinking? It seems like you're trying to act like the former, while mostly reflecting the latter in values.
You don't have to use the values provided to you. You don't have to vote, or label, or use anything beyond simple posting of topics and replies. It's there if you want to. If you don't, and you have the means – which you do – you may freely relinquish yourself of another eye sore.
You may also try to persuade people that your view of these matters deserves attention. That would be iconoclastic. Oddly, you may find that the topic would get more votes the more popular the idea is with people, which I find... interesting.
The idea of sorting by votes is not inherently foul. You may consider it the forum equivalent of herd immunity, except in reverse: it lets the interesting topics through, while keeping the uninteresting down the list. Maybe it's "popular" rather than "interesting" – which, I feel, rests with your idea of what is interesting.
I'm a progressive person, but I wouldn't advocate the removal of such a basic feature without adequate consideration. You, however, may go right ahead and make your game the way you want to play it.
I've spent so much time on sites like reddit that independently-thinking is associated with being an iconoclast in my mind. So that may be why I present as someone who wants to be an iconoclast.
I don't really see the features as an eyesore, particularly given the insight from Amarok elsethread that it can be about "reach" rather than "karma" or something like that.
I'm not sure it's equivalent to herd immunity. The herd is not drastically harmed if someone doesn't participate in voting the way they are when part of the herd doesn't have immunity to a specific illness. Am I taking your point too literally or being too reductive here?
I'm fine with--and eager to be!--wrong, and think I may be here, thanks to you and Amarok. Thank you. :)
This was one of the points I wanted to make: that voting needn't be solely about the accumulation of wealth (and let's face it: karmawhoring is hoarding, since wealth only has the value we assign to it). When I said "herd immunity but in reverse", I meant that it acts as a filter for the good stuff: entries of no significance remain at the bottom, and the rest rises according to its value within the community.
I think Hubski chose well when its makers named their "voting" mechanic "sharing". This framing defines the way we interact with any particular score: we don't necessarily approve of the message, but we may choose to share it with others for the sake of discussion and gaining insight from others. "Voting", on the other hand, retains the positive connotation "sharing" doesn't necessarily have: you vote for something you value and agree with.
I wonder... what if it was 'vouch' instead of vote? That's kinda how I look at it myself but that's just me. Vouch sounds like you're giving it your seal of approval rather than participating in some kind of democratic process.
I feel like I don't need to tell you that naming something defines the something.
My thinking is...
I can't vouch for a question, unless the question is interesting. So, there might be many duller questions that would have a lot of comments – replies – that might be interesting. "What happened to you this week?" isn't something to vouch for, though many answers might be.
I can vouch for a suggestion, or a proposal, or an official change. "Yep, I agree with that". "That's a valuable contribution".
I don't know if I can vouch for an article posted by someone else. I can recommend it, I may choose to share it, I may want to indicate in some other way that it's a worthy read.
Perhaps others may disagree with this assessment.
The thing about "share" on Hubski was also that people could follow each other, and you'd get shown a post one of the people you follow had shared. There were mechanical reasons to justify the name, not just semantic.
"Vote" is vague, non-defining, and non-binding. I can vote on a question to share it, or to appreciate it, or to indicate that I find it interesting.
The question is: is that what Tildes needs? If so, it should be left as is: if it works, it works. If not – things need to be considered.
Yeah. IIRC Deimos has actually mentioned perhaps adding a “left-handed mode” for mobile for exactly that reason.
I agree w/ this guy.
Thank you for this, I had not come across the existing discussion.
I'm perfectly comfortable with userscripts, but I think it would be nice to have as a native option. Thanks again for the link!
If moving your mouse to the right side of the screen is too much effort than you probably have not put in enough effort to read the post/link and evaluate its quality.
Its totally fine if most people never use the upvote button as long as the ones who do take care in its use.
As dismissive as the reply is, there's a kernel of truth in it.
That said, as a UX designer, I have to disagree purely from such a perspective. You might want to make things that deserve attention adequately difficult. It may be beneficial. However, when things seem too difficult for users for not enough gain, the tiresome interaction creates a negative loop over time that feeds into the overall impression of the item.
In other words, I would say it's okay to put the vote button far away, but it's not okay for its usage to create friction.
Having read through more replies, I think I understand more about the aversion to it. And I agree to an extent. But I would still prefer it on the left while the post is actually opened - So I can easily upvote it once I have read it for quality. The reply upvote link is on the left. Why shouldn't I be able to just as easily upvote the post itself?
I otherwise have no opinion about it being on the far-right in the main page list-view. That's typically not where I upvote posts unless I am already aware of the post contents.
This got me thinking... Take a look. What do you think?
@Deimos, you might wanna take a look, as well.
Definitely wouldn't do anything like that. The vote counter is at the bottom and unobtrusive on purpose, that's very much the opposite (and would be especially bad on mobile where it would use up a huge amount of the horizontal space for the comment's text).
Wait, you moved the reply upvote to the right? :-D You're killing me!
Granted I'm newish to being able to interact with the site, but for the most part of my experience so far, my mouse is hanging out on the left-hand side when I am going through posts and replies. It's where I am clicking to select, expand, shrink, reply, vote on replies.
The vast majority of my clicking is on the far-left.
Upvoting on the far-right side of the screen is tantamount to user abuse - especially if its to make a select group of people feel like this means that their posts or replies have been 'thoroughly read'. This is striking me as a very high-horse way of looking at a UI issue.
That's interesting. Are you left-handed?
Wasn't my intention. I was merely experimenting with the UI, seeing if a change would make the design better. I know something has to be done with the current model (with four different datasets each in a different space of the comment), just not sure what yet.
Besides: isn't putting the vote/label to the bottom of the comment's container, way past the text, the same "thoroughly read" enforcement? or am I misunderstanding your idea here?
No, I'm right-handed. But most of the clickable links are on the far-left. The only thing thats on the far-right is the sidebar and the post upvote link. Everything that involves post interaction is on the left except for the post upvote.
Where does you mouse loiter when you are going through posts on Tildes? I don't see what being left-handed would have to do having everything but the post upvote being on the left regardless of ones dominate hand. The majority of the site interaction/use takes place on the left.
I guess that's the issue that I am only just starting to realize - that people here on Tildes are choosing to forgo ease of use for enforcing a perceived notion of wether something is "thoroughly read". That's the source of my high-horse comment.
It was previously insinuated by someone that I'm not reading thoroughly if I want the post upvote located on the left; and now I am learning that this is apparently an intentional design to enforce this. Is there data to support this theory? I am extremely skeptical that this will work as intended and isn't just making the UI unnecessarily cumbersome to use.
I like some of the concepts and notions behind Tildes. They brought me here to read, and later encouraged me to seek an invite to try it interactively. I'm fully aware that this is a work in progress, but I am not terribly thrilled with the idea/attitude of attempting to train members behaviors through physical obtacles.
You're describing the entire field of design. Not even just digital/interface design, but everything. Almost every product, every piece of media, every physical location that you interact with has gone through some level of conscious design to encourage certain types of behavior and discourage other ones. TV shows design their music to influence how you feel while watching them. Artists design their colors to influence your emotions. Stores design their layouts to influence which products their customers find most easily.
You're acting like the votes being on the left is the objectively correct location (or at least the "default" one), but there's nothing that makes that true. Choosing to put it on the left is exactly the same type of design choice as putting it on the right, you're just accustomed to having it on the left because that's the choice that some other sites made. Since Tildes's default sorting is Activity, the voting on topics is not very important right now, and it would be bad design to put it in the most prominent position (the left) despite that.
I don't agree. When I click into a post, my mouse is still on the left-side of the screen. It has nothing to do with my reading comprehension. I kind of don't like the implication that my lack of or desire for less mouse movement means that I'm putting in an effort to read.
lt's nice on mobile but on ultrawide resolutions it gives me neck pains.
Have you considered using an extension like Stylus? You could easily add in a simple rule to limit the width of the content and center it. For example:
Unless @asoftbird removed it with CSS, the site does already have a max-width set, of 1400px for the main area + 300px for the sidebar. So it will go reasonably wide, but it wouldn't go all the way across an ultra-wide monitor (or even a full-screen browser on a 1080p screen).
Ah, that's right. Not sure why ultra-wide would be problematic, then, unless (as you said) they have styling in place to override the default width limit.
I think this is a great idea, but it would be nice if this was an option in the settings. Having it on the right side is great when I browse on my phone, so being able to choose if it was on the left side or right side would be amazing.
I think this is the best solution. Having it on the far-right side as a default is fine, but if people want an option to have it on the left that should be fine too.