| Pages in topic: < [1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10] > | Should the KudoZ points system be abolished? Thread poster: XXXphxxx (X)
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Samuel Murray 
Netherlands
Local time: 06:08
Member (2006)
English to Afrikaans
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| But that is the current situation anyway | Feb 10, 2013 |
Sheila Wilson wrote: Valery Kaminski wrote:
But the one Samuel suggested (holding back answers for 30 minutes) looks pretty good! But in practice, that would lead to tens of people doing exactly the same research, and coming up with exactly the same answers.
The current situation does not prevent that from happening either.
My own experience is that even at times when I had clicked the KudoZ link the very moment it appeared in my mailbox, and wrote a short but checked response, by the time I hit Send and refreshed the page, there are 5 other replies from colleagues already, some of whom having consulted the same resources that I did.
Do you currently keep the question open in a separate window and autorefresh it while you write your answer, and then delete your partially written answer as soon as you see someone else having written something similar to what you were about to say? I suspect not.
| | | | | Ah, whiners... | Feb 10, 2013 |
Yasutomo Kanazawa wrote:
If you read the KudoZ related forums, you'll see a lot of people whining about KudoZ users, especially those who asked a thousand questions and have only answered five so far, or users posting twenty questions in one day, obviously from the same text, etc. If this was happening only in one (my) language pair, why would there be many KudoZ related forums talking about abusers?
Like you wrote, yes, you can ignore those abusers, and they are just demonstrating their incompetence. However, not everybody understands this (including the incompetents), and this situation creates and gives a bad impression to people who access this site, unless those abusers are banned or restricted.
The things you write about are nothing new. They appeared the day after kudoz system was first introduced. People have never stopped whining about kudoz since then. So I wonder what makes you call the situation 'rampant' and vote for abolishing kudoz now.
And I fail to see what exactly can give 'a bad impression to people who access this site'.
| | | | Samuel Murray
Netherlands
Local time: 06:08
Member (2006)
English to Afrikaans
+ ...
| Some problems have no solutions, but their consequences do | Feb 10, 2013 |
Lisa Simpson, MCIL wrote:
1) In my view, points encourage people to answer in fields/languages in which they are not competent to do so, in the hope of scoring points.
Yes, that is true, but I can think of no way to prevent that. It is unfortunate that the first couple of responses you get from any KudoZ question will likely include answerers who did not read your question properly, or who came to a conclusion based on the first google hit they found, or who would write something that sounds reasonable but then provide references that are only vaguely related to the answer (as if finding references is a separate task that is done after the answer is already written).
But as I said, I can think of no formalised way to prevent that from happening. If you take away the points system but find some other way to keep people excited about participating in KudoZ, the same thing will continue to happen.
Instead of trying to prevent that from happening, rather see what can be done about the consequences of it. For example, if it leads to less useful glossaries, then change the way glossaries harvest KudoZ answers. Or, if it leads to unfair points allocation, then change how points are awarded.
The system also encourages lazy askers to post questions without having conducted due research, in the knowledge that from the multitude of instant answers they are virtually guaranteed, one may fit the bill and be shoehorned into their translation.
Yes, one problem with it is that it leads to an oversupply of easy questions that can be grabbed by non-busy answerers who can use it to artificially boost their KudoZ scores.
What do you think of this idea, which would prevent an oversupply of easy for-points questions while allowing askers to ask as many questions as they wish:
Let askers have set number of points per day that they can allocate to questions, and make the value of the question known to answerers in the notification e-mail. In other words, the asker can ask 10 or 20 or 50 questions per day but can only award a maximum of e.g. 20 points per day. Perhaps the asker will make the first five questions count 4 points, and let the rest of that day's answers count 0 points, or perhaps he will be thrifty with the points and allot 4 points only to really difficult questions. Either way, this will prevent lazy askers from being a cheap source of easy KudoZ points for non-busy answerers.
Contribution to the site is not, to my knowledge, stated as being the primary criterion for ranking and this should be transparent to whomsoever conducts a directory search...
Yes... and no -- a user who does a directory search will see the KudoZ column and will see the scores, and will be able to see what KudoZ is by clicking the tooltip link in the column heading.
| | | | | Rather presumptuous, don't you think? | Feb 10, 2013 |
Samuel Murray wrote:
one problem with it is that it leads to an oversupply of easy questions that can be grabbed by non-busy answerers who can use it to artificially boost their KudoZ scores.
So if someone has time to answer KudoZ questions they are automatically branded "non-busy"? And what does "non-busy" mean anyway? Second-rate?
"Artificially boosting their KudoZ scores." Last time I checked, you got points by answering questions. Answer a lot of questions, you get a lot of points. When did dedicating time to helping colleagues suddenly become the crime of "artificially boosting my KudoZ score"? To me these presumptuous attitudes regarding KudoZ and the reason for a particular individual's participation in the system is one of the most irritating aspects of all.
And what is "easy" for one person may not be for another. If I have thirty years experience in cardiology, I will be able to answer fairly difficult questions with ease that others will struggle with. Oh but that means I am answering "easy questions to artificially boost my score." Hmm. Best keep that knowledge to myself then, lest others misinterpret my intentions.
[Edited at 2013-02-10 14:53 GMT]
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Samuel Murray
Netherlands
Local time: 06:08
Member (2006)
English to Afrikaans
+ ...
| On presumption | Feb 10, 2013 |
Fiona Peterson wrote:
So if someone has time to answer KudoZ questions they are automatically branded "non-busy"? And what does "non-busy" mean anyway? Second-rate?
I never said nor implied "second-rate".
Speaking for myself, each KudoZ question is an interruption. So if I'm busy at the time when a KudoZ question comes in, I can't answer unless it is an easy question that requires no research or fancy explanations. When I'm not busy (i.e. when I'm a non-busy translator), I can answer any number of KudoZ questions without suffering from the interruption.
Answer a lot of questions, you get a lot of points. When did dedicating time to helping colleagues suddenly become the crime of "artificially boosting my KudoZ score"?
Did I say that? Really?
And what is "easy" for one person may not be for another.
Absolutely, and this is why I don't judge translators who ask lots of questions. Some questions are difficult for some but easy for others. But you have to admit that there is a class of questions that is easy for everyone with a dictionary and one page of google. When I said "easy questions", I meant those (and so did the person I replied to).
| | | | Oliver Walter
United Kingdom
Local time: 05:08
German to English
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| Splitting points, resetting to zero | Feb 10, 2013 |
Ty Kendall wrote:
If it is to stay then major changes should at least be made, for starters you should be able to split points, sometimes it's a synthesis of responses that provides the final answer, yet your only option is to give all the points to one person, or nobody at all.
This has already been suggested at least 2 years ago (e.g.
http://www.proz.com/forum/kudoz/181681-abolishing_kudoz_points-page3.html#1594739 )
and not implemented.
And, considering David Hayes' idea "It would also be good to set a time limit for holding points (say, 5 years), after which you would go back to zero points and thus need to start again.", I suggest instead to "forget" points older than (for example) 5 years, but not set them all to zero. This would mean KudoZ remembering the dates on which the points were awarded, and then deleting (from a member's rating) those points awarded more than X years ago.
Oliver
[Edited at 2013-02-10 17:04 GMT]
| | | | Samuel Murray
Netherlands
Local time: 06:08
Member (2006)
English to Afrikaans
+ ...
| @Lianne, regarding the 30-minute delay proposal | Feb 10, 2013 |
Lianne van de Ven wrote:
We will all have 30 mins to prepare our informed answers, and then try to snipe the first place.
I think you misunderstand the proposed 30-minute delay.
The suggestion is not that answers can't be submitted for the first 30 minutes (i.e. that answerers must wait 30 minutes before they can submit their answers), but that all answers that are submitted during the first 30 minutes are "held back" by the system, and then all of them are revealed (perhaps in random order) as soon as the first 30 minutes have passed. All answers submitted after the first 30 minutes then appear underneath the answers that were submitted during the first 30 minutes.
This means that you are free to submit your answer within 1 minute after the question was posted, but your answer won't appear until 30 minutes have passed... at which time it will suddenly appear, along with the answers of everyone else who submitted their answers during the first 30 minutes.
To recap: the advantages of this is that (a) there is less pressure to submit an answer before you have done proper research, and less pressure to submit a short answer where a slightly longer one might have been more useful, (b) askers can evaluate the first couple of answers equally, and (c) it reduces/removes the possibility of answer piracy (using someone else's answer and writing a more useful entry for it, thereby getting the points for it).
| | | | Phil Hand
China
Local time: 12:08
Chinese to English
| Old war-horses vs young whippersnappers | Feb 11, 2013 |
I certainly understand the frustration that new users have when some people have been building up points for 10 years, and it feels like there's no way you can ever surpass their scores and climb higher up the director rankings.
But I kinda like that. In our non-hierarchical industry there aren't many rewards for longevity. You don't get promotions as a freelancer. But experience does count for something. And if many years of answering Kudoz questions gets you a good position in the... See more I certainly understand the frustration that new users have when some people have been building up points for 10 years, and it feels like there's no way you can ever surpass their scores and climb higher up the director rankings.
But I kinda like that. In our non-hierarchical industry there aren't many rewards for longevity. You don't get promotions as a freelancer. But experience does count for something. And if many years of answering Kudoz questions gets you a good position in the directory, that seems like a little bit of compensation that us younger translators could just allow. ▲ Collapse
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564354352 (X)
Denmark
Local time: 06:08
Danish to English
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| 30-minute delay in answers not helpful | Feb 11, 2013 |
Personally, I have only ever asked questions at KudoZ after I have exhausted all my available sources and practically completed a translation. I.e. KudoZ is the absolute last resort that I would only turn to in absolute desperation. Each time I have done this, I have been fortunate to receive helpful answers within a relatively short span of time, and I have really appreciated the fact that people took the time to answer so relatively quickly. But even so, I would never for a moment rely on thes... See more Personally, I have only ever asked questions at KudoZ after I have exhausted all my available sources and practically completed a translation. I.e. KudoZ is the absolute last resort that I would only turn to in absolute desperation. Each time I have done this, I have been fortunate to receive helpful answers within a relatively short span of time, and I have really appreciated the fact that people took the time to answer so relatively quickly. But even so, I would never for a moment rely on these answers, I would still go on to do further research of my own to be sure the kind answerers got it right. The end translation is entirely MY responsibility not the KudoZ answerers'.
I see no value whatsoever in delaying the answers by any length of time. Why change the system to prevent bad practice if the way it is now favours good practice, i.e. potential help in 'cases of emergency'?
Besides, points cannot be awarded until 24 hours have passed, so the asker would still have to come back to assess all received answers, so what use is the 30-minute delay, or any delay?
One final point: as for the directory ranking and the 'no chance for newbies to move up the rankings ever' view, this is not true in my language combination, so I wonder whether it only applies to the 'big' language pairs, e.g. English/Spanish, English/French or whatever.
Maybe the problems with KudoZ are actually limited to just a few language combinations? Has anyone got any overview of that? ▲ Collapse
| | | | XXXphxxx (X)
United Kingdom
Local time: 05:08
Portuguese to English
+ ...
TOPIC STARTER | The experience argument | Feb 11, 2013 |
Phil Hand wrote:
But experience does count for something. And if many years of answering Kudoz questions gets you a good position in the directory, that seems like a little bit of compensation that us younger translators could just allow.
This assumes that people joined the site or started participating in KudoZ at the very start of their career, which is often not the case. For a start the site has only been around for 14 years. I still think newbies, who may very likely be more competent, should be given more a chance.
| | | | XXXphxxx (X)
United Kingdom
Local time: 05:08
Portuguese to English
+ ...
TOPIC STARTER | Quite possibly | Feb 11, 2013 |
Gitte Hovedskov Hansen wrote:
Maybe the problems with KudoZ are actually limited to just a few language combinations? Has anyone got any overview of that?
I can vouch for the fact that there are certainly problems in all my combinations and, from what I gather, also in English/Italian, English/Chinese. English (as always) being the common denominator
| | | | Samuel Murray
Netherlands
Local time: 06:08
Member (2006)
English to Afrikaans
+ ...
Gitte Hovedskov Hansen wrote:
Why change the system to prevent bad practice if the way it is now favours good practice, i.e. potential help in 'cases of emergency'?
As I said, there should be the option for askers to require instant answers if they want it.
Besides, points cannot be awarded until 24 hours have passed, so the asker would still have to come back to assess all received answers, so what use is the 30-minute delay, or any delay?
Well, the thing is that not all askers award points themselves. As far as I know, if an asker fails to award points, after a certain period of time the KudoZ system awards points itself, based (primarily) on which answer was first. Also, my experience is that the first answer is more likely to get points anyway, if that answer is similar enough to other answers, even if someone else later gave a more useful answer.
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Cetacea
Switzerland
Local time: 06:08
English to German
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| Less and less indeed | Feb 11, 2013 |
Stefan Blommaert wrote:
Conclusion: I couldn´t care less about whether Kudoz survives or not, and, if it does, in what form. I use it less and less and if I should make some kind of extrapolation, based on the last couple of years, the expected shelf life of Kudoz, for me, is approaching its expiry date. There are much more valuable sources of information out there.
Even though I share these feelings, I doubt that KudoZ will actually disappear or even be improved in any way because it looks to me as if the ProZ powers that be actually encourage abuse. Currently, there is a truly flagrant example of this to be found in the FR-EN and DE-EN language pairs, where a certain answerer (a native speaker of neither English, French or German...) keeps posting completely useless suggestions with a CL of 5 and (of course...) no references to back him up. But if somebody like me finally breaks down and tells him his answer makes no sense whatsoever, the comment is promptly removed by a moderator (always the same one). The last example for this was his translation of "blocage de lots" with "of full suspending"--and you don't even need to speak French to know that this doesn't make any sense. Naturally, my comment to that effect was removed. When this happened for the first time, I e-mailed the moderator in question, asking her to please enforce KudoZ rules not only regarding me, but also this particular answerer (I mean, aren't we supposed to provide more than "imho" as an explanantion, not to mention references other than Google translate?). Her reply was a long e-mail message containing every single ProZ rule, so I haven't bothered to contact her again. But if even obviously incompetent trolls like this one do not even receive the slightest e-rap across the knuckles, I doubt that anything will ever be done. Not as long as there are enough people out there to pay for ProZ membership, that is.
| | | | Christophe Lefrancois (X)
Local time: 06:08
French
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There are many forums or translation websites where people help each other, they often come up with excellent references and answers and the only reward they get is a simple "thank you". And this "thank you" contributes a lot to their happiness as in a way they feel rewarded for their help. They do not fight for points like animals do for a piece of meat.
As for the Kudoz system, sometimes i find it a bit unfair as i don't always have the time to answer questions. Moreover, in my l... See more There are many forums or translation websites where people help each other, they often come up with excellent references and answers and the only reward they get is a simple "thank you". And this "thank you" contributes a lot to their happiness as in a way they feel rewarded for their help. They do not fight for points like animals do for a piece of meat.
As for the Kudoz system, sometimes i find it a bit unfair as i don't always have the time to answer questions. Moreover, in my language pair (en-fr), it's always the same people who answer the questions and their scores are almost unreacheable for newbies who may be discouraged to participate because of that. ▲ Collapse
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Cetacea wrote:
I e-mailed the moderator in question, asking her to please enforce KudoZ rules not only regarding me, but also this particular answerer (I mean, aren't we supposed to provide more than "imho" as an explanantion, not to mention references other than Google translate?). Her reply was a long e-mail message containing every single ProZ rule, so I haven't bothered to contact her again. But if even obviously incompetent trolls like this one do not even receive the slightest e-rap across the knuckles, I doubt that anything will ever be done. Not as long as there are enough people out there to pay for ProZ membership, that is.
This has been my experience too. In reply to a certain asker who consistently posts questions without the merest trace of context, I dared to post a reference to the KudoZ rule stating that context should be provided. It was promptly removed. I would never use KudoZ for anything other than a last resort; while certain askers seem to post every single doubt that comes into their mind when it's clear they have not even bothered to open a search engine home page. These people continue to bombard KudoZ with their ridiculous questions and nothing - apparently - is ever done.
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