Describe a solution for posing polls in comments

frediy commented 9 years ago

From Matthew.Fallshaw on July 03, 2012 09:21:07

* NOTE: This is a design only ticket and a placeholder - do not code anything! This exists to invite ideas and allow me to organise my thoughts. *

Implement a solution for posting polls in LW comments (that only registered users with 50+ karma can vote in).

I need a little more help with this one. Some of our best and brightest users currently use the existing karma system for polling (example here: http://lesswrong.com/lw/452/suggest_and_vote_posts_we_want_to_read_on_less/ ). What are the disadvantages of this system?
That the poll host gains karma? That upvotes and downvotes are allowed?
If polls just changed child comments so that they:

looked different

had only upvote controls

didn't pass karma to commenters

… we would address these issues.

The current implementation often breaks out into discussion nested into the poll, and one can't automatically distinguish between comments and new poll item suggestions. Perhaps also:

allow others to add "poll items" only from the poll root node (and thus only one level deep); OR

[this is getting complicated] make comments made on poll items selectable as either nested poll items or comments

[this is still complicated] voting on a nested poll item passes the vote up to its parent - use case: should we fight (with swords or staves?) or run? (voting for staves is voting for a fight)

Disadvantages of the current system:

Sometimes karma gets "unbalanced" because people forget to downvote the "karma sink" comment. Also, this causes users to have heavily downvoted comments that aren't actually downvoted because they are disliked.
Users can see the current results of the poll before casting their own vote, which may bias the results.
Less active users may want to post a poll but not be familiar with the standard workaround.

The "slight modifications to child comments" solution doesn't fit problem #2, and I can also think of some other concerns about it. So I'd prefer to go with an "integrated" solution more like a typical poll that allow you to insert a poll within a comment, or create a "special" comment that is just a poll (e.g. poll title/question, single-select or multi-select, and the options to choose from). There could then be a "Show results" link below the poll that would clip from the poll form to the results view, and "Hide results" would flip back to showing the poll. Votes on polls would always be tied to each user account, so users could go back later and change their vote if they desired. Moreover, you'd need to have 20 karma in order to vote on polls. No karma goes to the creator of the poll from votes. That's what comes to mind when I think about it, anyway.

Original issue: http://code.google.com/p/lesswrong/issues/detail?id=320

frediy commented 9 years ago

From Matthew.Fallshaw on July 02, 2012 16:22:39

Issue 201 has been merged into this issue.

frediy commented 9 years ago

From Matthew.Fallshaw on July 02, 2012 16:24:08

See https://github.com/jimrandomh/lesswrong/commits/master/ for jimrandomh's 2 year old (very unfortunately ignored) contribution.

Cc: jimrandomh@gmail.com

frediy commented 9 years ago

From Matthew.Fallshaw on July 03, 2012 14:53:53

Jim, thanks for your contributions at https://github.com/jimrandomh/lesswrong/commits/master/ . We've finally reviewed them, and they're a good start. There's work to be done both is styling them and in making them more robust. We'll estimate that work and likely get to it soon.

Owner: lukep...@gmail.com

frediy commented 9 years ago

From Matthew.Fallshaw on July 09, 2012 18:51:09

Status: Duplicate
Mergedinto: 321

bellroy / lesswrong

Describe a solution for posing polls in comments #418

looked different

had only upvote controls

didn't pass karma to commenters

allow others to add "poll items" only from the poll root node (and thus only one level deep); OR

[this is getting complicated] make comments made on poll items selectable as either nested poll items or comments

[this is still complicated] voting on a nested poll item passes the vote up to its parent - use case: should we fight (with swords or staves?) or run? (voting for staves is voting for a fight)