Sunday 11 July 2010

A proposal to encourage Artwiculate voting

An idea to encourage Artwiculate voting


First, the success of the game is in the enthusiasm of individual players, lovingly crafting tweets using the WOTD. It is not dependent on results! However, many players are proud and happy when they feature in the rankings, and anything that would encourage more people to vote and make the rankings more accurate, would be welcomed by many players.


The number of people who actually vote on the Artwiculate site has always been comparatively low, but recently seems to have nose-dived. From conversations with Artwiculati, it seems that the main problem is the number of tweets to read through (it's a daily commitment, not a one-off exercise). On an average day there may be 15+ pages, numbering in excess of a 300 tweets.


These tweets - which Artwiculate automatically indexes from Twitter - include a number of 'non entries':

  • tweets that were never intended to be part of the game
  • retweets that went wrong ("RT" missing, or comments added)
  • tweets that reference other tweets - e.g. "<== this is awesome!"
  • tweets from Artwiculati, thanking other players for RTs, etc
  • duplicates, where players haven't used the Artwiculate 'remove' button
  • spam (on a bad day!)


My idea is about 'filtering' the indexed tweets to a level that other players have agreed would be more manageable : 100 tweets, the equivalent of 5 pages. It would look something like this :

  1. with (e.g.) 2 hours to go, Artwiculate would issue a list of the 100 leading tweets, in a form that could be voted on
  2. 'leading' is defined as the 100 tweets which, at that point, have gained the most points by Artwiculate's scoring system, but see next..
  3. in order to maximise the number of players who would be able to feature in this list, only a player's best (e.g.) 3 tweets would appear (as more players joined, this could be reduced to 2, and perhaps even to 1 in the future!)
  4. No player would be able to vote for any tweet in the list which they had already voted on, on the main site (just as no-one could vote previously from a profile AND on site)

None of this would stop people from voting through all the tweets as now, if they wish, but it would be a boon for busy or tired players who at present find voting too much of a regular commitment, and are therefore - as can be seen from the figures - choosing not to vote at all. Looking through 100 tweets would still be a solid task, but it would be manageable. 


My estimation is that much of what is required is already in place, in effect : 

  • A list of top tweets for the day (there is already a Top 50 produced daily)
  • Limiting number of 'tweets per player' that can rank (already done for the Top 50)
  • Limiting voting to once per tweet (already done)
  • Announcing the list with 'x hours to go' (already done with "the lead has changed...")

A side-effect of this would its scaleability in the future : as more players joined the game, and the number of pages grew, the task of voting would remain the same. And the BEST result would be on 'spam' days, where even 60+ pages of tweets would still only require 100 to be voted on!



4 comments:

  1. I will make any sensible changes and then post the idea at GetSatisfaction. So your constructive feedback is welcome. :-)

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  2. Dear Tid, I suggest you go ahead and post your (so well elaborated) suggestion to GetSatisfaction.

    The main reason I came here was your message: "@Wifsie No-one has left feedback on my blog about voting changes :-( http://bit.ly/9jCYvx Would you start it off Maryse? (I feel depressed)"

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  3. Dear Tidd:

    thanks for laboring through these suggestions.
    i am all for improvement of Voting system to encourage more voters.


    i am posting my input/comments but I hope not considered as "KVETCHING".[have you read other recent GS posts referring to our twitting/posting complaints/improvements as such?]

    well, as our objective is "improvement" & we are "customers" / players in this game so here goes [BTW i am sure @Artwiculate welcomes both positive ESPECIALLY negative/complaints to improve -that's their reason for putting up the "Get Satisfaction " posts right?]

    On the voting suggestion:

    1.with (e.g.) 2 hours to go, Artwiculate would issue a list of the 100 leading tweets, in a form that could be voted on

    DJ: good one but my apprehension is that if the basis for top 100 is RTs it may "disenfranchise" tweets with less RTs but good ones - maybe not RTd coz late in submission may be one reason?


    2.leading' is defined as the 100 tweets which, at that point, have gained the most points by Artwiculate's scoring system, but see next..

    DJ: same as no one comment

    3. in order to maximise the number of players who would be able to feature in this list, only a player's best (e.g.) 3 tweets would appear (as more players joined, this could be reduced to 2, and perhaps even to 1 in the future!)

    DJ: if there are 250 active players x3 that would mean 750 tweets so its beyond the 100, must be "BEST TWEET" only per player same as the top 50 on the board, it will be "Top 100" with one best tweet only per player in contention for votes/crown

    4. No player would be able to vote for any tweet in the list which they had already voted on, on the main site (just as no-one could vote previously from a profile AND on site)

    DJ: rightly so, to avoid duplication

    Cheers Tidd & hugs *smiles*

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  4. Wonderful idea, but I have a question. What if most of us decide to wait till that list comes out before we vote? That would mean the top 100 have very little points at the time the list is posted. This could lead to skewed results, don't you think? And with low points, the chances of entries tied on points are more. What do we do then? Include all the entries equal on points? If that's the case we could have many more than the 100 each day.

    But I should say it's a great idea. It can reduce spam (though not entries like @mashable's win for doppelganger). If Artwiculti will vote as they do even before the list comes out, then this is the way to go. If not, I have my reservations. But it's worth testing. :)

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