A Guide to the ATS Rewards System: Points, Flags, Stars, Karma and Wats

My question is are they still adding borders to members? Has it been cleared up on the system? I feel like the criteria was simpler and easier before. Like 2500/500/1000 for bronze or something like that.

reply to post by schuyler


Nearly everyone here will say the same thing, even Beezer and Phage, who top the list. No one wants to be caught being on the wrong side of this.


Not me...I love blue stars.

I'd like to see most of it all go away.
Keep the number of posts .. the points if you must .. and the flags I understand.
But Karma and stars are just conditioning people for 'group think' ... IMHO.

Originally posted by FlyersFan
I'd like to see most of it all go away.
Keep the number of posts .. the points if you must .. and the flags I understand.
But Karma and stars are just conditioning people for 'group think' ... IMHO.

Says the person with 36,000 stars...

But seriously lol, I think stars do an excellent job of pointing out those who make strong points over time whether you disagree or not with them. I think you'll notice that those with a high post count and low star count trends to be someone who doesn't contribute substance or is more likely to be a troll. Not always but more often.

So, know about these boarders?

reply to post by bknapple32

My question is are they still adding borders to members?

We have 2 levels. The gold, for the top 50 members who also appear on the WATS list, and then the silver borders are for the next 50 members I believe.

Nothing has recently changed.

Originally posted by bknapple32
Says the person with 36,000 stars...

... and considering that I think that the stars should be gotten rid of, that tells you something, right? That I don't care about stars or karma. I stand by what I said .. I think stars and karma add to group think and the creation of an echo chamber.

I think stars do an excellent job of pointing out those who make strong points

I think stars are something people click on when someone says something they argree with .. well thought out or not. I see lots of silly and insulting and mindless posts that have stars on them simply because somebody agrees with it even though it's devoid of anything of substance.

borders

I have no opinon on the borders ...

reply to post by FlyersFan


I agree but over time those with a plethora of stars built up over time usually are accurate in rating the level of contribution to ats.

OK so I was wrong on thinking borders were determined by a 5000/1000/5000 system or something to that effect ?

reply to post by bknapple32


Not sure what that's supposed to mean but as I've said above, we're running on a 2 border system now. Gold and Silver.

Here's a post from SO, site owner, highlighting what I said before:

Your posts now have a subtle but noticeable indicator for those who have achieve a high-level of member-recognition on ATS.

Those 50 members who have achieved the "Way Above Top Secret" status are now indicated as "GOLD CONTRIBUTORS" in their posts (which will soon also show for non-logged-in guests).

Members in the top-100 rankings, just below the "Way Above Top Secret" group, have a "SILVER CONTRIBUTOR" indication.

www.abovetopsecret.com...

This indicator is the border around our posts. Those with silver are in the top 100 but not in the top 50. Those with Gold around the border of their posts are in the top 50.

Here's an explanation into how your WATS score, which is how you gain your borders, can be achieved:

WATS is influenced most by a flag-to-post ratio, with a minor influence from stars and post-count.

Long term members with a high number of well-flagged threads will achieve a high WATS number -- or -- mid-term members with highly-flagged threads will also receive a high WATS number. It reflects a ranking of those who start quality threads (mostly).

www.abovetopsecret.com...

Hope this helps a bit.

Yes it does. I don't remember where I thought I read that borders went off that number system I referred to. lol. I have a long way to go before I get a border. Hehe.

Originally posted by Rising Against
reply to post by bknapple32

 

WATS is influenced most by a flag-to-post ratio, with a minor influence from stars and post-count.

Long term members with a high number of well-flagged threads will achieve a high WATS number -- or -- mid-term members with highly-flagged threads will also receive a high WATS number. It reflects a ranking of those who start quality threads (mostly).

www.abovetopsecret.com...

actually, no. That's a misleading statement. The formula was given to you all at the beginning of this thread:

It's (number of posts ÷ 600) + (number of flags ÷ 80) + (number of stars ÷ 170).

SO would like us to believe it's all about flags, but it is not. Flags have the most influence here; they are factored by 80 where stars are worth just less than half a flag at 170, but someone who starts very few threads but contributes mostly via posts can have a very high WATS score. In other words, 2.125 stars = 1 flag. Flags DO count more, it is true. It's just that their influence on the score has been highly exaggerated.

Also notice that unlike the K score, there is no "correction" factor for superfulous posts. The Karma formula is divided by number of posts, so if you make a lot of no-count posts, ones that earn no stars, no flags, and no applause, the K score goes DOWN. With the WATS score, it always goes up, no matter what. It's just a matter of time. All things being equal, your W score will notch up a digit about every hundred stars or so. Your W score will NEVER go down and will ALWAYS go up. It's kind of a measure of longevity more than anything.

The Karma score, however, is a measure of quality. Once you establish a pattern, it's VERY difficult to raise your Karma score. My K score of 33 is probably where I will sit, since my pattern is established. Is this a great score? well, it's passably OK, but not great. The formula is: ((stars * 15) + (flags + applause) * 10)) / posts. Here stars are worth half again as much as flags or applause, BUT the whole thing is divided by number of posts. This means that if you make a lot of posts WITHOUT earning any stars, your score goes down. So if you see someone with a high Karma: 50 or above, you can know pretty easily that his posts are valued by other members.

** Note ** Mods have their own forums and often have low karma scores because their posts earn no stars in those forums. You also get no stars here, in introductions, or in Freshman's forum. There may be others.

Now, y'all can call this GroupThink if you want. It's a very popular attitude to have, but this really is a criticism of your fellow members and yourself. You are saying members cannot be trusted with being discerning with their awards of stars and flags, that they have some gut-like reaction to award a star. You may as well say, "My fellow ATS members are too stupid to understand what a great post or thread looks like. They are all idiots."

** Further Note ** I have never claimed these formulas are the EXACT formulas used. I claim they are "predictive," which is a quite different claim. There could be other factors, and the formulas could be changed without notice.

reply to post by schuyler


I found myself interested in the silver and gold content contributor buttons. Or I was wondering how many buttons like yours, the Document Achivist button, are there?

Great post! Awesome resource for members.

Originally posted by Cosmic911
reply to post by schuyler

 

I found myself interested in the silver and gold content contributor buttons. Or I was wondering how many buttons like yours, the Document Achivist button, are there?

I believe you are seeing part of the old system where some members have copied the graphics. It used to be a lot more complicated than it is now, and far easier to reach the various levels. Some people did not appreciate being downgraded, so they kept the old images to display themselves.

I don't know the exact criteria today, but a silver border means you are in the top 100 in terms of stars. A gold border means you are in the top fifty in terms of your Wats (W) score. What exactly makes these borders kick in I don't know. It could be a combination of factors, but what I have listed is pretty close.

The buttons I remember seeing are Document Archivist, which was awarded for working on Blue Book reports trying to get them all organized, and Subject Matter Expert. I do not know what criteria are used for the latter, There are also the "Writer/Fighter/Scholar" tags used for writing stories, participating in formal debates, and participating in research projects, respectively.

The whole system has changed a number of times. Overall there has been a trend toward simplicity.

I just want a free tshirt.

reply to post by schuyler


OMGoodness, thank you for explaining this, for taking what must have been an incredible amount of time to think this through and put it in plain language we can understand.

I appreciate your contributions to the forum and this kind of treasure is just what we call icing on the cake.

Very cool of you.

Edit to say that I had never noticed the silver band around my posts... hummmmm.

reply to post by schuyler


I have a question regarding Wats score. Since you seem to have a good handle on all this stuff, I thought it would be best to ask here.

On my mini profile my W score is 50.


But, when I look at the Members List , my score is 22.


I'm confused. Can you shed any light on this?

reply to post by watchitburn


Yes, I noticed that, too. My conclusion is simply that the members list is completely inaccurate. I don't know why that is. It may be they simply didn't bother to update it from a previous version. The page is, I think, rarely visited and kind of out of the way. If there's anything more to it that that I don't know what it is.

FlyersFan
... and considering that I think that the stars should be gotten rid of, that tells you something, right? That I don't care about stars or karma.

Please accept one million extra stars for saying that.

Arbitrageur
Please accept one million extra stars for saying that.

FUNNY! The system is broken so I already got one million extra stars.
It's been broken for a while now. Nothing under the persons avatar is accurate
except their post count. I don't know if it'll be fixed or just be taken away.

There's definitely a problem with the star system. This last "upgrade" seriously messed with it, including awarding millions of stars to some (but not all) people, which in turn messes up the karma and Wats scores to make a comparison virtually useless. "Points" is also not showing up, though presumably "Applause" still earns you some. I'm guessing they are still in the background because for most of us, the K and W scores continue to work in the same way as stated in the opening posts.

Borders have grown even more mysterious. A few people with high somethings have earned a gold border. Most of us have green, including all the former silver-border people.

Though I know it is PC for people to disavow any interest in such rankings, since everyone puts their pants on the same way, has the same high IQ, and other things exactly the same length, the system as it now stands is completely useless even for people who put stock in such things. Management seems either unwilling or incapable of explaining what is going on here, so that begs the question: Why is there anything there at all? What's the point?