Current voting: Something…is…not…right. (Part 2)

why dont you explain to everyone why you make stories dissappear mario, i have seen it several times , stories doing well and then magically dissappear.
you want to come out with this bs and call me a sock puppet or whatever, well i got one name for you and your bs news station, traitors.
doesnt matter anyway ive been pretty much done with this site , you can just cancel all my accounts. lol
people notice when they do a story and it all of a sudden dissappears, maybe thats why you can only get 1000 views per story after being in business for 3 years. all you people will cover are the same exact stories done on the main stream media.
PEOPLE WHO BELIEVE THIS BS BY MARIO ARE THE SAME PEOPLE WHO BELIEVE VOTERS PICK THE NEWS ON THIS SITE. PEACE IM OUT OF THIS HORSECRAP WEBSITE.

good post. good explanation Mario. thanks for that. I can say this for myself that I know much of my frustration is more global than with Current. Current is indeed just a thin slice of a larger mass opinion of people.

Let's talk about pie. You have a large apple pie in front of you and you want a slice. YUM! as you start taking slices you notice the mold. Down to the last slice it is moldy. Damn! Current is a slice of humanity and the way we are with each other. Many of us keep turning to the next thing in hopes that it will not be moldy. Some turn to Current in hopes it could be the perfect place of "Non-moldy Pie" and everything will be perfect. Problems is there are way to many version of perfect out there. We need to learn to live with the mold.

Now I am thinking of cheese. ....mmmmm....mold. yum!

Thank you Mario. Apparently there are some that still won't get it. I appreciate the work that went into sorting them out. Next time before you expose them can I call them trolls first?

I think much of the frustration is from seeing something sit in the top ten and get lots of action and suddenly "poof" gone.

just an idea. maybe Current should have a few stock e-mails that can be on the ready for each post that you knock out for whatever reason. If Current "manages" a post out of it's position you could fire a quick e-mail off to that posting person letting them in on the general reason this happened. In the long run this could help people become better story hunters if ,say, they are constantly getting e-mails from Current saying their story is from 1982 and something more up to date would live longer in the list. Ya know what I mean? something like that.

Thanks Mario. I know this is a tough thing to have to address just as I know there are some genuinely frustrated people out there. I hope this helps them and helps you guys make this a better medium (such an odd word). I'm pretty happy with my moldy piece, but I can see where the people who aren't are coming from.

Thanks again.

This isn't really related, but my profile got deleted without me doing a thing.

I could understand if there was offensive content or something (there wasn't but whatever) but I wasn't even notified. It was just gone when I opened it up.

Did someone on current do this? Or is it just some glitch? If it's the former I would kind of like to know.

Works for me Mario, thanks. There are always going to be two sides to every issue - and nowhere is it more apparent than on Current. After all it's about communication. I'm sure you'll take suggestions into consideration but unfortunately there's no way to please everyone on every issue. It's nice to have something voted up and selected for TV, but if that's not the ultimate goal we all still get our message out and feedback from those interested - to me that's rewarding enough in itself. Maybe not perfect for everyone but Current is the closest to it I've found.

Hmmm...well, I haven't really been that concerned with or aware of these issues to be honest.

In the grand scheme of things, current has a pretty cool format where the freedom of speech allows fools and geniuses alike to say whatever they feel in regard to current events, so I'm not going to get bent out of shape about it one way or another.

I say consider the source and take everything with a grain of salt.

I'm going to give you guys kudos and some style points for just putting this issue out there directly and listing the names of the suspected puppets openly.

I find this quite amusing and educational.

Imagine if someone finds themselves on the sockpuppet list just because they are very unoriginal. Judging by the above sockpuppets response though, your theory could be correct.

Imagine meeting some of these people face to face instead of them hiding behind the computer screen and making snarky comments.

How about a t-shirt that says "Your mama's a sockpuppet." with a little current logo on the back or something like that?

Good explanation.
Thanks.

Though nothing will ever be perfect, and sadly, to be better than a half-assed site, you have to sell ads... still either way, I have always loved current.

Well handled Mario. Now I just have to figure out how I'm going to uninvite PoohKits to my kid's birthday party. I really thought we had a connection there!

I guess I should have figured it out when he said "Will entertain children for hours with my sock puppet".

copy/pasta from part 1 comments due to lock-down:

Whenever you give the populous the ability to decide what is news worthy there will be biased parties who form coalitions with like minded people to successfully push their agendas and/or suppress others'. Its a sad state of affairs, but its true. People, under the guise of anonymity, lower their ethical boundaries, and raise their personal ambition. This is possibly because it is easier to be recognized as an individual citizen of the internet while remaining anonymous when you act like a total tool. On the internet you catch more honey with flies, not the other way around.
I personally can't stand the voting system here on Current, and have my Current bookmark set to /newest so I can decide for myself. The ability to vote whether a story is newsworthy just from reading the headline is flawed in itself, and it encourages people to 'judge a book by it's cover' as opposed to investigating the contribution and then passing judgment. Not only that, but it also encourages readers dive into the popularized list just so far and then turn back when they get to unpopular waters. They then miss potentially interesting news items that have been glossed over by the majority.
I think the popular stories should be based on a combination of unique visits and comments, and how many people took the time to follow the source material instead of just reading a summarized blurb.

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new:
Take one look at Myspace and you'll vomit from all the Sock-puppet accounts. It makes finding the real John Stamos impossible. That's a bad thing.
Also, If the present voting system is to remain I would urge putting a predominant link to the source article on all stories' thumbnails. Moving the voting button to a story's comment page would also deter puppets from mass voting as they would have to load individual pages with each monkey wrench they decide to throw.

Might I suggest a place to turn in suspected socks, and trolls? Flagging doesn't quite cut it. A person in charge of this problem. A specialist. That way the staff isn't overwhelmed by our paranoia and one person getting it all would have a better chance of spotting them sooner?

hey nothing i pergect but the reason i come to current.com is b/c 1. i have no life and 2.. b/c its the only thing where people actually get to make the decision.. and i get that there are some controversial "Swithcharoos" but in the end ... its still a whole lot better that the other crap out there....
so thank you current.com..

(sheesh now i feel like a suck up_

Mario
Thanks for addressing this. I now have a question based on this comment:

'However, a good chunk of these Monsanto stories fell victim to sockpuppet gaming.'

Will the ratings on entries where these supposed "sockpuppets" ganged up on me be adjusted so that they can be in the ratings where they deserve to be? You mentioned the reason but not a remedy.

And please, if you could, mail me to let me know which entries I posted

http://current.com/topics/85538011_monsanto

that were out of date or had unconfirmed sources (whatever that means) since this is the first I'm learning of it.

I will certainly then be making sure to now monitor posts I make here to see if the voting statistics change any on certain topics, specifically that one. An entry I posted yesterday about Monsanto which was very timely and relevant wound up with the same ratings as before however, so I still wonder if "sockpuppets" are all there is to this. But nevertheless, thank you again for addressing this.

Clarification was needed. More clarification may be in order as new "glitches" arise. Mario_a and Co. did the best jod handling it as any team could, as far as I can tell. Thanks to Current's awareness, I'll continue to type out what I think and feel, no longer concerned with the negative crap that may follow.
For me, this website is about gaining knowledge and sharing opinions, not building popularity.

Thanks Mario. This is one of the select few sites I frequent. I'm glad to see that these issues are being addressed.

In Part 1 you mentioned the integrity of the site and that is why I'm posting my support. Colonial_Zombie sent me an email not too long ago sharing my sentiments.

I was slowly seeing this become a dumping ground for hip-hop promo videos, old YouTube clips, conspiracy theorists, and pro marijuana legislation.

If there isn't fact checking or confirmation of stories, then this might as well be the NY Times.

Thanks, and keep up the good work.

Well done Mario! I love Current Community! Well, I guess we will have to come up with something outrageous regarding the dying seeds and Monsanto monopolies that affect the health and well being of every living thing on this planet... I personally am working on it, and hope to get Current community support in this regard. It may take a little time and effort... but I'll see you when we get there!

It's not about popularity to me either. I do think though that if a member is targeted for whatever reason that the algorhythms on their posts should be adjusted accordingly. It's hard for others to share information if it winds up in the back every single time due to people ganging up on others deliberately.

I would like to thank the users who speak up against wrongdoings and bullcrap going on here at Current. Especially JanforGore and Jubal. I would also like to thank the staff at Current for listening to these legitamate concerns and taking action. Mario, I have full faith and confidence in you. All Best to everyone here who is being real.

Mario - I was thinking last night that a lot of the misunderstanding came from making assumptions as to who was voting their site down. I guess some automatically assume it has to be someone who disagreed with them or they think holds a grudge. If "down" votes were as visible as "up" votes on each person's site would that help? It would make voting down as transparent as voting up. It sure would stop some unwarrented paranoia.

Many stories I've posted on sustainable energy solutions, indigenous issues, peace, politics and censorship have made it to the US and UK homepages and then been quickly voted down.

On lots of these stories, the usual suspects appear quickly and hijack the conversation with name-calling, unsubstantiated accusations and generally negative comments. These haters pop up so quickly and their comments are often boiler-plate propoganda found everywhere on the internet from the right wing, fossil fuel industries, and multinational corporations.
The rapidity and homogeneity of their posts indicate that they are paid shills hired by corporate interests and political campaigns to discredit anything posted that counters and/or exposes their interests. One poster even admitted he wasn't "paid much" by the political campaign he endorsed.

I've observed similar behavior on the stories that other activists like JanforGore post.

I'd be interested in knowing how many TouchArt stories were voted down by sockpuppets.

Reprinted>And thanks Mario for this post, truly informative. You definitely have your hands full! As far as the rights to certain film/video...lets say for instance my STAND UP FOR PEACE article I recently posted. Now, that person that did it on YouTube, would he need to get into the act as far as giving CURRENT:NEWS permission to air it? If so, maybe we can do a pre-emptive release with this and similar stories/video. In other worlds, before I post it, I contact the person responsible for filming it and ask for a limited release and link it in the storyline.

Anyway, thanks for doing your job to facilitate our concerns about the world today. It is truly a turn this world needs and that is the way to get our one and shared conscious out to the world. Another thing it does is pressure the few people int he world that think they have the power and not the people. We ARE the people!
NEW>
Just got the homepage hero email..checked the story position (9) and went and emailed my current list...went back (2 minutes later) and the story (Another Republican Busted Oil Related) is literally gone! I checked till number 100...another idea is to get some communication about why or where our stories are bumped so hard that they disappear! anyway, thanks again for the info..peace!