Mysterious star ratings
Heater.
Posts: 21,230
Am I going mad? Mysterious star ratings on threads.
It has happened twice now that I go to put a star rating on a thread and it tells me I have already rated the thread.
The first time I just let it go as a "senior moment" as they like to say nowadays.
But now there is a thread in the Propeller Chip forum with a five star rating earned from one vote and apparently it was me. Well, unless I'm really senior or schizoid, I'm pretty sure I did not vote for it.
http://forums.parallax.com/showthread.php?t=120707
I'm not in the habit of scattering votes around that I might forget about. I only vote if the thread is extremely good (or mine:)).
Edit: Seems I also voted for this one:http://forums.parallax.com/showthread.php?t=125614&page=3
And this one: http://forums.parallax.com/showthread.php?t=125674
I sure I did not.
It has happened twice now that I go to put a star rating on a thread and it tells me I have already rated the thread.
The first time I just let it go as a "senior moment" as they like to say nowadays.
But now there is a thread in the Propeller Chip forum with a five star rating earned from one vote and apparently it was me. Well, unless I'm really senior or schizoid, I'm pretty sure I did not vote for it.
http://forums.parallax.com/showthread.php?t=120707
I'm not in the habit of scattering votes around that I might forget about. I only vote if the thread is extremely good (or mine:)).
Edit: Seems I also voted for this one:http://forums.parallax.com/showthread.php?t=125614&page=3
And this one: http://forums.parallax.com/showthread.php?t=125674
I sure I did not.
Comments
I'm afraid you have a condition known in the medical literature as somnastradonism, the propensity to award stars in one's sleep. If you keep a laptop or other texting devices near your bed at night, it may help to remove them to a safe distance, unless you also suffer from somnambulance (sleep walking). Some have reported success from wearing mittens to bed; but I have my doubts as to their effectiveness, unless they're secured by another person so you can't get them off by yourself. Hypnosis, apparently, is successful in only 12% of the cases reported. Sleep aids are very effective at night, but result in an even more severe rebound during the day, known as hyperastradonism -- probably not what you want.
Left untreated, the condition is relatively harmless, and most sufferers report diminishing symptoms over the course of several years. Due to it's rarity, research into the condition has been scattered at best, and there is no agreement as to what the root cause might be.
-Phil
I don't trust you diagnosis of somnastradonism:
There are now three threads in the first two pages of the Prop forum with one star which I understand means at least someone thinks they are terrible. If I try to rate them I'm told that the someone was me.
Now, I am not in the habit of putting anything down and am sure I have only rated a couple or three things at five stars.
Could be somnastradonism as you suggest BUT the latest one has only been up for a few hours and I have NOT been asleep all that time! Namely this thread: http://forums.parallax.com/showthread.php?t=125696
This might seem trivial but this one star is on a thread by Humanoido and he's my mate and now he is going to think I put him down.
Do I also have narcolepsy, schizophrenia or early onset dementia?
P.S. There is no laptop or computer near my bed. But wait that new Android phone could be do it.
Okay [thinking more calmly now], since somnastradonism is so exceedingly rare, it's statistically unlikely that both of us are afflicted. On that basis, I suspect there's something weird going on with the vBulletin software. Maybe Dr. Jim can shed some light on the situation. (Ah. He's already on it.)
-Phil
There is a thread about C# on the Prop http://forums.parallax.com/showthread.php?t=120707&page=2 rated with 5 stars by one person who seems to be my alter ego again.
Now this is odd because for sure I would never put five stars on anything related to Microsoft, as a matter of principle.
I'm seriously starting to doubt my sanity here, help!
I propose we start a self help group. Society will not understand us. Perhaps there are few more afflicted souls out there who have not dared to speak up yet for the shame of it.
-Phil
Pick an un-rated thread and rate it. Tell me which one it is here and I'll see if I have rated it as well.
-Phil
However, from here this thread only has three stars and apparently it was me who put them there!
What hover balloon are you talking about, I can't find one anywhere?
There are 8 or so threads with rating on this forum, again it looks like have rated them all.
-Phil
So who the hell is the mystery voter?
1. I gave one of my posts in the Test forum three stars.
2. Go to the Test forum and see how many stars it has.
3. Then click on the post and, before doing anything else, see how many stars it has.
-Phil
2. Star power has three stars.
3. Click => Rating: ***
Now I click to rate it and, low it says "You have already rate this thread".
The thing is, if this happened to everyone, no thread could have more than one rating. But we already know that's not the case.
-Phil
Anyway I'm off to bed. Hope I don't do any somnastradoning tonight.
-Phil
Addendum: Heater must be waking up by now, so I don't expect any further stars to accumulate for another 16 hours or so...
Phil, see I was asleep for 8 hours and no mysterious stars appeared.
Ah, just noticed your addendum, you are wrong, I immediately put 5 stars on Beau's Prop II layout blog thread:)
Like the picture, looks like the Parallax forum is to boldly go where no other forum has boldly gone boldly before:)
Humanoido
Edit: Ba, how do I delete this spurious post?
Hey no, there are 12 posts on the Prop forum with 5 starts just now. Only one of them is a thread belonging to me. And yes, I put five starts on it myself. So? I blow my own trumpet occasionally. Given the amount of interest in that thread I think I'm justified in that case.
How your thread(s) got one star (= terrible) is a mystery to me. It was not me, even if the forum tells me it was. I would never dream to put any thread down that way unless it was seriously off topic, technically wrong or misleading, spam, abusive or similar.
Don't worry I won't steal your starts, I have enough stars in my head already:)
More seriously, I hope someone is going to reset all the star ratings when this forum bug is fixed. What we have now is gibberish.
By the way, the is something weird about the idea that stars can be used to mean anything bad or terrible. Normally if you get even one star for anything it is something to be proud of. Think the restaurant star guides.
Take for example the taxi driver in China. Hold onto your seat for the roller coaster ride of your life, dangerous as hell, been in several taxi accidents so far, carsick, hit my head on the roof, face smashed to the door handle, knee'd in my eye, and my heart ends up in my nose like free fall in a cable cut elevator.
Now, the government of China put a star rating system into place. If the taxi driver had no accident in one year, he gets one star. Two years two stars, and so on. The first time I rode with a one star taxi man, the ride was so fantastic and so safe and so smooth, I tipped him, which pretty much never happens considering how the average taxi driver drives like Armageddon.
Every time I see a star on the outside of the taxi, that's the one I want. One time, a taxi man had 4 stars. The ride was unbelievable like a cushion of air, and an experience of a lifetime. I was so excited and happy and honored to be transported so safely. But watch out now. As luck would have it, there are now fake taxi drivers with fake stars...fresh out of hell... OMG!
Humanoido
Frankly, it wouldn't bother me if there were no rating system at all. I'm not the least bit swayed by what others think about a thread, and no one else should be either. The posts speak for themselves.
-Phil