Post ratings
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This article is a Wok In Progress |
Post ratings are a forum feature unique to Facepunch. Users may pick from a selection of ratings to give a post, such as Funny, Dumb, or Informative. The number of each rating which a post has received is displayed under the post, and a collapsible list displays the users which have given each rating.
Ratings are a divisive feature; some believe they set Facepunch apart from other forums, while others believe they are pointless and incite people to become ratings whores.
Ratings are unavailable to users who have less than 30 posts, due to a recent, unpopular decision to disable ratings in Sensationalist Headlines causing many new accounts to be made for ratings spam.
History
Ratings were introduced very early on in Facepunch's history, at some point in 2005. As with today, a wide array of positive and negative ratings were originally available. User pages also detailed how many of each rating a user had given and received, and their most-received rating was shown next to each of their posts. In January 2008, garry cut down on the number of standard ratings available, removing all negative ratings and leaving only Thanks, Informative, Agree, Funny and Friendly. He explained on his blog that he hoped to make the forums "more encouraging and friendly, rather than trying to score points off each other."[1]
Ratings were removed altogether in Facepunch 2009, but were reintroduced six months later and with a wider variety available, including negative ratings.[2] Some ratings, such as Zing, and special ratings were still missing however, and were not restored until the launch of Facepunch vB4.
Following the Great Facepunch Migration of 2018, a complete new set of ratings was introduced, derived from Microsoft's Emojis - while Agree, Disagree, Funny, Late and Artistic were preserved, the rest were removed - Love (a renamed Friendly), Sympathy, Cookie (substituting Winner), Child Molester, Baby, Coin, Good Idea, Snowflake, Diamond, Asshole, Cute, Lucky and Big Woop were introduced, while Bad Spelling and Bad Reading were brought back. A month later, a minor reshuffle occurred, with Love being renamed back to Friendly, Sympathy's icon being changed to a more appropriate one, Cookie and Child Molester becoming Winner and Dumb, and Informative being brought back.
Standard ratings
As of April 2016, there are 21 standard ratings, available in all forums.
Agree
Agree indicates agreement with what a user has said. It lives next door to Lucky and is good friends with Informative.
Disagree
Disagree is Agree's arch-nemesis. After centuries of oppression, Disagree gained the right to vote in 1962 and married Dumb in 1997. They have since had two children: Baby and Winner.
Funny
Funny originally used the 
icon, but this was replaced by a generic smiley face in Facepunch 2009, much to the criticism of Facepunch users. On March 2, 2011 a redrawn version of the original icon was introduced, to widespread acclaim.[3]
Late
Late, often called clock, is given to posts about old news. The song "Clocks" by Coldplay is the official theme tune of this rating.
Friendly
Friendly, apart from its obvious use, is also awarded as an extremely thoughtful token of condolence to people to who post about friends or family members dying, and for cute posts. It briefly called itself Love before coming to its senses.
Sympathy
File:201803rating Sympathy.png
File:201804rating Sympathy.png
Sympathy, despite its initial look not showing it, was given to posts as a means of showing sympathy towards an event or person. The rating itself decided to look its part a month later.
Artistic
Artistic is often used for its intended purpose, but some users also use it as an Autistic rating.
Winner
Winner is awarded to people who make exceptionally awesome posts, successfully win in an argument or post this image. Winners are regularly seen as achievements and getting winners is a symptom of being an agreeable and exceptional poster. Was briefly substituted with Cookie for a month.
Dumb
Dumb, often called box, is given to stupid posts. It has given rise to the concept of imaginary 'box forts', which may be built if a user collects enough Dumb ratings. Was briefly substituted with Child Molester for a month.
Baby
Coin
Good Idea
Snowflake
Diamond
Asshole
Bad Spelling
This rating was given to those who demonstrated an inability to properly spell words (and occasionally granted to grammar mistakes as well). Retired at the same time as Bad Reading, currently no rating has been able to adequately replace it (though some users have opted to use Dumb instead).
Bad Reading
This rating was given to those who demonstrated considerable ability in being bad at reading, whether they misread a post, or (as is more likely) they are speaking about something that was already addressed one or more pages ago. "Late" now serves the same purpose.
Cute
Lucky
Big Woop
Informative
Informative is awarded to people who post pictures of dogs in hot air balloons.
Special ratings
Special ratings were only available in certain forum sections. These were removed in Facepunch 2009, later reintroduced in Facepunch vB4, but then removed once more with the New Sites Forum.
Gold Star
Moustache
Available only in The Gold Members Forum, the purpose of this rating was open to interpretation and it was often awarded at random. Some users believed it was to be awarded for elitism. Created by user CarlBooth.[5][6]
Smarked
Available only in the now deleted Durgs Discussion, this rating was awarded at random by those under the influence, however was most often awarded if a user appeared to be intoxicated, especially under the influence of marijuana. After the section's deletion, mods would occasionally move threads to the ill-fated section as to make use of this rating.
Lua King
Available only in LUA Scripting, this rating was intended for those who show good Lua code in the forum.
Lua Helper
Available only in LUA Scripting, this rating was intended for those who help others with technical problems in the forum.
Mapping King
Available only in Mapping, this rating was intended for those who show considerable skill at creating maps.
Programming King
Available only in Programming, this rating was intended for those who show good code in the forum. It was also given out sarcastically to bad or basic programming.
OIFY Pinknipple
This was the only rating available in the OIFY, and was awarded largely at random.
Retired ratings
Retired ratings are ratings that used to be in the system.
Zing
Zing was awarded for clever puns or put downs. The name "Zing" is a derivative of the Greek god Zeus, who would yell awful one-liners before smiting his enemies with His Holy Lightning Bolt.
Useful
Useful, apart from its obvious use, was also awarded to posters who were tools, because of its icon.
Optimistic
Optimistic, popularly known as Gaybow, was barely used for its intended purpose at all. It was instead primarily awarded to posts about homosexuality.
Cookie
32px Cookie, in the brief month it existed for, was awarded in the same way Winner was, before that rating was brought back.
Child Molester
32px Child Molester, alongside Baby, Snowflake, Asshole and to a lesser extent, Big Woop, served as the alternatives to the then-ill-fated Dumb rating, and aside from using this particular rating like Dumb, it was also used on posts discussing potential child molesters. Some saw it as tasteless, and Dumb was brought back in its place a month later.
Ratings whores
Ratings whores are users who write their posts a certain way with the specific intention of maximising the number of a chosen rating that they will receive. News puns are an example of ratings whoring. Some people, including garry, believe that ratings whoring is a negative effect of ratings, and use it to argue for the feature's removal. Others enjoy the often funny posts and threads which result from ratings whoring.
References
- ↑ Garry's Blofg - Coding... I Need Better Blog Titles [external link; broken]: http://www.garry.tv/2008/01/27/coding-i-need-better-blog-titles/
- ↑ General Discussion - Ratings are back!: https://facepunch.com/threads/778263
- ↑ General Discussion - The old funny rating icon is back!: https://facepunch.com/threads/1065392
- ↑ Sensationalist Headlines/Polidicks - "Clocks is 'greatest hit' of the past ten years" (post #11): https://facepunch.com/threads/1244572?p=39455784#post39455784
- ↑ General Discussion - "Wikipunch: The (Un)official Facepunch Forums Wiki" (post #407): https://facepunch.com/threads/1269761?p=40700417#post40700417
- ↑ General Discussion - "Wikipunch: The (Un)official Facepunch Forums Wiki" (post #410): https://facepunch.com/threads/1269761?p=40700506#post40700506
