What is the WATS Index?

I searched it on here but it just led me to a vague explanation.


My WATS index is a 6. What does that mean?

reply to post by FreedomXisntXFree


I hope the below link to a past ATS thread will help you....the moderator explains some of it.

www.abovetopsecret.com...

It's the score you get that determines what prizes you qualify for when you head to the counter.

It was funnier when we had it as the TWATS of the month award...(The Way Above Top Secret...award)

Originally posted by Gazrok
It was funnier when we had it as the TWATS of the month award...(The Way Above Top Secret...award)

LMAO

Hilarious.

I followed the link which had another link to what S.O. SAYS it is, but what he says does not compute. He said it was five times stars times flags divided by a million, but that isn't it at all and gives you a completely different number.

But the idea is that the more stars you get feeds into flags and posts (and maybe points) in such a way that if you contribute consistently, over time the W index will go up. It's a measure of your level of contribution, which includes what other posters think about your posts. I have heard that there may be a ratio between posts and stars such that if yiou have 1,000 posts and two stars that does not weigh as heavily as someone with 1,000 posts and 2,000 stars. It would indicate that you are making a lot of superficial posts that your fellow posters do not think contribute much. I think that's kind of the idea ATS is trying to get across They're trying to get a measure of quality, which is difficult to quantify with a formula.

It doesn't buy you anything these days and it isn't something to obsess over. Lots of people here think it does not matter, and that's a valid position to take. Personally, I use all those scores, join dates, etc. to see whether someone has been around awhile and generally what their contribution level is, and I probably pay a little more attention to someone who has been around awhile than to someone brand new, but that's just a generalization. It could mean someone doesn't have a life and hangs out here too much.

I look at it like a new person who moves into your apartment building. They're new to the building, so you don't know them very well, but you never know, they could become your new best friend. On the other hand, the guy who's been in Apt 49 for ten years could be a really pretentious prig, which you are quite sure of because he's proven it time and time again.

Over time ATS has changed the rating systems many times, with a trend to making it less complex. My guess is the current system will not be the last system. We're likely to see more changes in the future.

It largely measures quantity of contribution.

It's roughly number of posts ÷ 600, number of flags ÷ 80 and number of stars ÷ 170.

Whereas the ''karma'' score is more slanted to represent quality. It's stars x 15, flags and applause x 10, divided by the number of posts which you've made.

Originally posted by Sherlock Holmes
It largely measures quantity of contribution.

It's roughly number of posts ÷ 600, number of flags ÷ 80 and number of stars ÷ 170.

Not really. In this formula (with + replacing your commas), the dominant factor is flags, the second dominant is stars, and the least dominant, by far, is number of posts. The resulting score is heavily influenced by the number fo flags, which can only be earned by starting threads. If you say that

Flags earn a full point, then relative to them,
Stars earn .47 of a point, about half
Posts earn .13 of a point, about an eighth

The idea here is to reward thread starters where better threads earn more points by getting more flags.

Whereas the ''karma'' score is more slanted to represent quality. It's stars x 15, flags and applause x 10, divided by the number of posts which you've made.

Here it is stars that are dominant. Interestingly, applause is scored as number of applauses, not number of points, and therefore counts very little. Flags are still there, but not as dominant. The whole thing is divided by number of posts, so this means that if you make a great number of posts without garnering stars, and to a lesser extent, flags and applause, the score goes down. So if you tend to post off-the-cuff uninteresting posts, that is reflected in the score. This entire score would tend to favor those who do not start threads as a rule, but do posts that are well-rewarded. A few pithy posts which earn lots of stars are "worth" more than a lot of mediocre posts that earn none.

In this scenario, points by themselves don't count at all, though they are related. You get a point for a post and two points if someone replies to your thread. Staff can reward points in chunks of 250 or 500 as applause for a good post. Points are what they dock you for an off-topic or T&C violation, but points by themselves don't contribute to any scores.

reply to post by schuyler


No, the WATS index is most certainly quantity over quality.

If matey boy fires off 10,000 quick-fire posts, only scoring, on average, 1 star per post, and puts up 1,000 threads, only gaining 1 flag per thread, then he's going to be around 85-90 on the WATS score.

Whereas, someone else, who makes 1,000 posts, averaging 10 stars per post, and only post 20 threads, which average 50 flags per thread, only scores around 70-75.

Like I say: the WATS score rewards quantity over quality.

reply to post by Sherlock Holmes


OK. Let me put it another way so we can isolate the relative effects of either metric. The way you've added in stars and flags favors your interpretation, but is an impure example.

10,000 / 600 = 16.6 so 10,000 posts gets you a WATS score of 16.6

10,000 / 80 = 125 so 10,000 flags gets you a WATS score of 125

10,000 / 170 = 58 so 10,000 stars gets you a WATS score of 58

The bang for the buck here is in flags. The LEAST bang for the buck is in posts. It is NOT about quantity, but about starting threads. Mere posts in this equation do not earn you much at all relative to the other two metrics. If you earn no stars or flags, your WATS score is relatively low in the scheme of things. Quantity is a factor, but it is the least relevant factor of them all.

This, by the way, is precisely what Skeptic Overlord has said about the matter in previous posts. He didn't give us the formula that I recall, but he did say that WATS was a way of rewarding thread starters in his "User provided content" theme of ATS.