Do you think the "highlight" feature is useful? - Discussion and poll!

[We Are The Witches]

You already know about the highlight feature on Kiwifarms, which I believe works based on reactions given and time/how quick those reactions were assigned.

There are a couple of threads about it, but slightly different; here, you can comment on how useful you think it is, and how would you improve it (or completely change it).

One of its purposes is to save the reader's time, and not make it daunting to scroll through a thousand pages to get to something with substance, so with that basic initial idea, how would you make that a feature? (i.e: even if it's another entirely different feature that accomplishes the same goal, as an administrator, what/how would you do it?)

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The problem I find with it, is that it may very well skip greatly informative posts (which are of my interest), and just pull me to one that states that someone is fat, and that the poster would not have sex with them.

I've seen some suggestion about making a "browse highlight" box, for displaying all of them so that you can click on the one that interests you. Another one could be that the community itself would vote on a comment, if it's worthy enough of being a highlight, and once a threshold is reached (to avoid trolling), the mods of the board are notified & get to choose on whether to make it as such or not.

These are just ideas for a healthy discussion, even if I/you don't find it imperative for it to be changed.

 

[herefortheactualthreads]

i think it is good as it is if someone doesnt want to read through 5000 pages.

 

[Sexy Senior Citizen]

Yes, it helps summarize the thread and lets you see the best (and worst) posts in it.

 

[Ultrapenguin]

I doubt the mods would appreciate a whole heap of extra stuff to deal with on their little janny queue re: manual approval.

Although something I think might actually help now that I think about it, maybe if features were of two possible (non-mutually exclusive) categories.

Specifically if a post got an inordinate amount of "informative" reactions from the userbase or was manually highlighted by moderation, it would be recognized as an informational highlight and get a different outline which could be browsed separately.

If something got an overwhelming amount of general reactions, it would be categorized as a general highlight.

Of course that probably wouldn't work because a lot of people are scrubs and wouldn't understand they need to rate things informative if they're informative, but still.

 

[$5.3 Million Dollars]

Yes, it helps summarize the thread and lets you see the best (and worst) posts in it.

Its always funny when you see a post highlighted that's majority trashcan stickers. Is it the most informative thing in existence? No. Is it funny? Usually. And in the end aren't we all here for funny?

 

[Taxidermied Rat]

I think it's fine as is. However it would be nice if more informative post were highlighted. I think the easiest solution would be to give more weight to posts rated "informative" or include those posts among the already highlighted ones.

 

[Stephanie Bustcakes]

Have the nuts and bolts of the highlight system ever ben explained anywhere? I'd like to see exactly how it determines what should be highlighted. Even some pseudocode would be informative.

 

[Weebburner]

i think it is good as it is if someone doesnt want to read through 5000 pages.

pretty much this. Especially when a thread is moving at stupid pace like the rekieta stuff recently. its a good way to get caught up. I wish though that there was a distinction between most sticker and most informative post. Informative post are generally upvoted enough to appear on highlights but id like it if i could just see the most informative post instead of what people found the most retarded or the funniest.

 

[Paper Machete]

It's fine as is. Aren't the OPs intended to be updated with any new major info? If you're reading an older thread it's all there in the OP and if you're keeping up with a newer thread you don't need to bother for obvious reasons.

 

[Super Shiro]

It's a really useful feature, but gets annoying when threads are derailed by arguments that end up being highlighted across multiple pages. It'd be nice if there was a way to mark these posts as pointless to get rid of the highlight, but that'd probably be too easy to abuse.

 

[Rembrandt]

A summary list of highlights would maybe be useful. It'd be like the bookmarks page but for a thread, saving up internet bandwith by only showing the important bits. It'd be useful for the war threads specifically, where most highlights are for either interesting talking points or key events from the situation.

 

[winterfag]

It's great, I love being informed every time some literally who troons out

 

[Summer of George]

I think it is mostly fine as-is, as long as you understand the context that it is participation-driven. It relies on your fellow Farmers to help the best posts bubble up to the top. That is how I think it should be, even if some good bits fall through the cracks. I wouldn't want some algorithm deciding whether any given post contains "quality information" or not. If I want that, there's the entire rest of the fucking Internet.

By the way, posts can lose their Highlight status as the thread develops. I am not sure what the scope is (I think it is per page?), but if other "nearby" posts surpass a highlighted post in popularity, those posts can "usurp" the original. So if you think an undeserving post is getting highlighted, you have the power to exert influence by removing your sticker from that post, and/or by giving a sticker to a different post.

 

[Harm]

Could always be better, but it's generally good for catching up with a thread.

It has weird preferences like the first posts on new pages can sometimes end up "highlighted" even if it only has 1 reaction and posts with plenty reactions can inexplicably lost highlighted status even if they're still receiving inordinately high amounts of reactions.

Without knowing the real nitty-gritty of its innerworkings though, it's hard to give real pointed feedback. It'd be nice to have a "latest highlight" button to easily jump into the highlights instead of having to dig through the latest pages of a thread, too.

 

[herefortheactualthreads]

Have the nuts and bolts of the highlight system ever ben explained anywhere? I'd like to see exactly how it determines what should be highlighted. Even some pseudocode would be informative.

i guess it just automatically highlights posts if the ratings are higher than the average posts.

 

[Brenda Holiday]

I've been appreciating the feature since the latest Balldo happenings. Sometimes it doesn't work well on lesser known/smaller threads or old threads that also don't have a very good OP.

 

[Swine Schwein]

It's useful in long threads, and good for finding moments where a happening happened.

If we could customize it for personal use, that would be even better. We could set the terms ourselves as to what constitutes a highlight and such. But the system is fine and useful as it is, it's easier to quickly get to the point when it's objectively the same for everyone.

 

[Fatniggo1488]

I said a bad thing about feminist chink island monkeys and pissed off most of the site, so yes it is useful.

 

[Water 2.0]

If it aint highlighted then I aint readin it

 

[I've Seen Some More Shit]

It's useful for quick context. If a post is important enough, either it'll be a highlight or it'll be within a few posts of a highlight - either directly or via quote.