topic ratings

is it possible for someone to give themselves a maximum star rating for a topic they started? i ask this because
i've noticed threads that (as well as being boring) have had absolutley no responses but they have maximum
star rating. how is this? i would have thought that a maximum star rating would be for a thread that's had loads
of hits not for one that's had none. more responses = more interest = higher rating.?

is it possible for someone to give themselves a maximum star rating for a topic they started

Not unless someone has Dual Id's.

If you move the mouse cursor over the stars old-timer it will show how many people have actually voted to create that rating.
So one person voting (& giving 5 or 6 stars) is probably not as a good a guide as 10 people giving a rating of 4.
If you think a post is boring or worthless then you are quite entitled to vote & give it 1 star, which would bring the overall rating down - unless a great many members had given it a high rating that is.
It is quite a new feature and (as far as I can see) not many people are actually bothering to vote at the moment. Maybe that will change in the future, as it certainly would be valuable for new members who were looking for information in old posts...

right now i see this thread has suddenly got maximum rating from 2 evaluations at 6.00 on average, now i'm going to give this boring thread a one star - i don't think the op should be allowed to rate his own
topics, am i right in saying he (the op) could give himself the maximum evaluation and if nobody else bothers to vote it looks like the threads a real winner in terms of interest instead of boring crap.
thanks for the info.

old-timer wrote:right now i see this thread has suddenly got maximum rating from 2 evaluations at 6.00 on average, now i'm going to give this boring thread a one star - i don't think the op should be allowed to rate his own
topics, am i right in saying he (the op) could give himself the maximum evaluation and if nobody else bothers to vote it looks like the threads a real winner in terms of interest instead of boring crap.
thanks for the info.

as i said old-timer you can't rate your own...unless you got 2 id's...

I'm not sure about that BM -either way....maybe Lee will tell us, or old-timer can try & rate this (his) thread & tell us.

you can vote twice also... in fact you can keep changing our own vote...just been doing it with this rating..

bm's right, you can't vote for yourself unless you have 2 id's, which i am pretty sure some people
have, and if you have a look around you will see 6 star ratings for topics with no replies by people
that everyone knows has 2 identities, now i'm off to down rate the topics that put me to sleep.

You can vote only once per topic unless you sign in with another username.

All I can say is, now that I know how it works I may start using it.

So how does it work ??

On averages I believe Aa.
So 1 person votes 6, you have a star rating of 6. Another votes giving a rating of 1 & you end up with a rating of 3.5 stars (7/2) and so on.
You vote on a topic by opening the thread then clicking on the star you think it is worth at the top of the topic page.
1 (first left hand star) being poor, 6 (last right hand star) being excellent.
If you run the mouse cursor over the star rating of a topic (either when you have the thread open, or when seeing topics in something like "view new topics") then it will say how many people have posted a rating on it. If you have already rated that topic it will also say what your personal rating was as well.

you can vote more than once, but it will not add, just adjust your original vote, so you can not jack up a rating by multiple votes, just adjust your own.

I 'll be darned if I can see the sense of the rating system anyway!maybe somebody can enlighten me to why it is needed,wanted or even desired??

Certainly Stan.
If it is properly used then it would be of benefit in the future for anyone looking for information in historical posts.
If, for example, someone was looking for some information on visas then (in theory) high star rated items that came up in the search would be the ones to read first.
It might also (some of us are always optimistic ) discourage a poster from making a series of "like" new threads if the previous ones had always received poor ratings...