VBForums FAQ

Here you can find answers to questions about how the board works. Use the links or search box below to find your way around.

Reputations

This section contains lots of information about user reputations including what they are and how they work.

How can I see what reputations ratings I've received?

The most recent ratings will be displayed on your User Control Panel page. This was set to the lasttwenty-five (25) reputation, but may be more or less if the settings have changed.

What are reputations and how do they work?

The VBForums site allows for a number of different ratings. You can rate a thread by selecting a number of stars, or you can rate a single post by selecting the scale icon () above the post .

Reputations are the total of the points gained or lost on individual posts within the discussion forums for each single member. Because these are tied to individual posts, they reflect back on the person who made the post, thus giving them a reputation.

Your reputation can have positive and negative changes. As a member of VBForums, you maybe able to add to others' reputations. If someone gives you a great answer, you can give them a postive rating — and thus positive reputation point(s)— as a thanks. If someone blasts a thread with an off-topic post or with negative comments, you can give them a negative reputation. With time, these reputations will help the "star posters" rise and the people who only provide noise to become visible as well.

Is it possible to cheat the system? Yes, but the forum moderators and admins are aware of many of the ways to cheat the system and will take appropriate actions. Additionally, a few safeguards have been put into the system to help make it more difficult to cheat.

Reputations are indicated by a small graphic. The more positive your reputation, the more visible the graphic will become. This will be displayed by all your posts and in your profile. To add to someone's reputation, you will click a small scale graphic on the upper, right area of the post. It looks like a scale or balance. This will result in a pop-up window as shown in Figure 1.

Figure 1: The Reputations window.

In this window, you can either give a positive point (approve) or negative (disapprove). You should also add a comment on why you approve or disapprove. If this is your post, instead of rating the post, you'll be able to see the reputation points you have received.

Note that if you leave a negative rating, you should leave a comment as well stating why you disapprove. If you do not leave a comment and the member being rated questions the negative rating, it may be removed because it is not substantiated. Even with postive ratings it is nice to leave a comment.

Reputations come with rules. You can only give a certain number of reputation ratings in a single day.

Additionally, there is reputation POWER. Power is the number of points you give each time you rate a post. This starts at 1 point, but increases based on a number of criteria such as posts, tenure, and your own reputation. Additionally, when you give negative points, they are at half of your power level.

Here are some other rules and settings for reputations(which are subject to change):

  • You must give reputations to 10 different people before you can come back to the same person again. No giving just one person all your points!
  • For every 4000 counted posts — so not including chitchat — you get an extra point of reputation POWER.
  • For every year you have been with VBForums, you get an extra point of reputation POWER.
  • For every 1000 points of reputation you receive, you get an extra point of reputation POWER.

In addition to the above rules, you must also meet certain criteria before you will be able to start giving points. Until these criteria are met (or any time they are not met), then you will have an effective power of 0:

  • You must have at least 20 counted posts.
  • You must have 5 points of reputation yourself (everyone started with 5, so you have to lose points in order for this to impact you.

Please be aware that leaving reputation points may not be anonymous.

Search FAQ

Select this option if you would like your search to look in the text of FAQ items as well as their titles.

Select an option here to specify how you would like your search query to be treated. 'Any words' will return the most numerous but possibly least relevant results, while 'Complete phrase' will return only results that contain exactly what you are searching for.




Click Here to Expand Forum to Full Width