Haha Jet, I've been trying to say that ...

Good quality and popularity are not related. How many run-of-the-mill tracks get to BotW, while there are some hugely amazing tracks that go completely unnoticed? That's a clear instance of quality not necessitating popularity and vice versa.

Bucky says:
How many run-of-the-mill tracks get to BotW, while there are some hugely amazing tracks that go completely unnoticed?

There it is again! "Amazing" is just a more extreme version of "good." Maybe (hypothetically) you have a strange taste in tracks, and what you think is amazing is a pile of sh*t to everyone else - and maybe those 'run-of-the-mill' tracks are loved by everyone except you. As i see it, it's up to each individual user to define a 'good track.' And since everyone has different opinions, this discussion about the 'flaws in the awards system' keeps coming up.

Does anyone else understand what I'm saying?

Yeah, now I get it

With that in mind, let's rework my example a bit. Instead of 'hugely amazing' let's have something that would top the BotW list, if it had gotten attention. Now do you see my point? Even within your standards of subjectivity, my point remains.

Bucky: I understand awards measures "popularity" and not qualiy. But in some way, this two concepts are working together: How can I find a good (quality) track here? Best way is looking for a popular track. Best way because is the only way. So I'm obligated to use popularity to find quality. And this works quite well: I get nice tracks looking for popular tracks. So my "confusion" with those two words has a bit of sense...
I'm not the only one who believes that awards is a sort of rating. Maybe we are rating popularity and not quality, but in the end we are rating in the more simplistic way.
And why we can't rate popularity and quality at the same time? Always something works, it can be changed to work better.
I don't think implement a basic rate system based on a score from 0 to 10 is a dificult thing... (I really don't know: I don't understand a word about computers)
You can see the rating (quality), and you can see the number of votes (popularity). With those two numbers you can have a more acurated idea about the track.
For example we have two tracks with this score: (extrem example)
Track 1: 9 points (average) / 20 votes (or awards)
Track 2: 7 points / 500 votes
Wich one will you try? Yes! You can choose what are you looking for At the moment you can't choose, you just have popularity. Sometimes you will choose a 8/3 before a 7/30, when you want to discover a overlooked track... Often happens when you're trying to look for an overlooked, you find a crap. You, of course, don't award it... And someone else will find the same crap when looking for under-rated tracks... Another lack of the system: A crap and a new track (but nice) or overlooked seems the same when listing.
I'm not saying this award system is a sh**. I'm just saying it can be easily improved.(not removed or totaly changed) And I accept what we got, I'm not complaining, I'm trying to be constructive.

And of course, I don't read all coments in all tracks I download... I would like to do it, but I often don't have the time...(And I know they are talking good about the tracks in the awards) I just play a few hours per week. And like me, a lot of users use this site in the "fast way": More awards=better track. I'm not confused about what awards mean. I just use awards like rating because there's no rating...
And sometimes I'm lazy or don't have enough time to write a few words on my awards and just put: Nice! ... Also it's dificult to me to tell (in english) what I mean... (I think all of you have noticed this...)

Jet777 says:

Bucky says:
How many run-of-the-mill tracks get to BotW, while there are some hugely amazing tracks that go completely unnoticed?

There it is again! "Amazing" is just a more extreme version of "good." Maybe (hypothetically) you have a strange taste in tracks, and what you think is amazing is a pile of sh*t to everyone else - and maybe those 'run-of-the-mill' tracks are loved by everyone except you. As i see it, it's up to each individual user to define a 'good track.' And since everyone has different opinions, this discussion about the 'flaws in the awards system' keeps coming up.

Exactly this!
Everybody likes different things. All we have different oppinions about what makes a good or amazing track, so it's absolutly senseless to talk about quality of tracks.
Just because someone worked 5 hours a day for 2 weeks on a track doesn't make it a quality track. As player you may notice he put a lot of heart and effort into it, still you might find it terrible.
Another track built within 1 hour can be extremly fun to drive.
Now which of the 2 deserves more awards?
The answer is simple: None of them. No track 'deserves' awards. They just get them, based on the number of downloads and number of people who enjoyed them.
When people start to understand this then it doesn't matter which system we use to appreciate the track and that the award system is actually very good to show how many people enjoyed the track.

IMHO when a track has been enjoyed by 100 people then it absolutly deserves to be on top of the weekly popularity list.
No matter if it was built within an hour or within a month. And a track that you might consider brilliant and you can feel in every section that the author put his heart into it but only 20 people enjoyed racing it has no claim to be on top of the list.

And the same will happen within a rating system.
The track you consider brilliant will eventually get lower ratings in the end if more people had more fun on the simpler track.
And if it gets on top of the list because a few people found it brilliant while the mass of players didn't even bother rating it, and the simple track gets 100 ratings but in the end has a lower rating than the oh so brilliant track that only a few really enjoyed, then I say that's wrong.

I support the idea of a rating additional to awards. But awards should still be the base of the ranking.
So a track with 20 awards and a rating of 3 should stand above a track with 15 awards and a rating of 4.

When there is an additional rating for tracks there could be a search function to list tracks by rating.
So everybody could get tracks with highest ratings on top of their search list.
And I'm pretty sure everybody will have the same 'problem' like now.
We will download tracks with top ratings and find them terrible.
And then come the next discussions..

SkunkY says:
I support the idea of a rating additional to awards. But awards should still be the base of the ranking.
So a track with 20 awards and a rating of 3 should stand above a track with 15 awards and a rating of 4.

I disagree. Awards aren't meant to be a way of rating a track, they're just there to show appreciation of the track. If we're making a rating system of 1-5, we should use that as an indicator of "best of week".

I suggest that we implement all of these systems, then people could decide which they wanted to choose.
A point-based system, and you can +1 any track.
A rating-based system, and you can give a track a rating from 1-5, and the average would be calculated.
A feedback system, separate from rating and commenting, meant for positive and constructive feedback.

It's dumb to keep them too close together, as of right now, we have a point-based system and a feedback system integrated within each other, and it's a bad way of making people give feedback.

Jet777 say:
Trying to have awards and a system of rating would just make things more complicated for a new user.
And the awards system has been the heart of a successful group of T/MX sites for six or seven years now! It's not flawless,
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Change is good, otherwise we should still live in the 80s.
don´t be afraid of change. and we can all open a milk right. ? just becouse the opening change we don´t stop drinking milk. we learn it. ^^

DeMeNs says:
Sometimes you will choose a 8/3 before a 7/30.
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Yes, it got higher rate and less award so its probably underrated.

Another idea is to remove two, 5 and 1 from rating. if it got above x rating.
example.

before.
5 5 5 4 4 3 3 2 2 2 1 1 1 = 2,9230769230769230769230769230769 (2.9) (Calc. 38/13)

after the remove.
5 4 4 3 3 2 2 2 1 = 2,8888888888888888888888888888889 (2.9) (calc. 26/9)

But as you see, it does not do so much, unless you divide with the 4 removed ratings, and it be 2.0 (calc. 26/13)
old system. = 5 only.
new system = 1 - 5 i hope
dont like if its only. 4 and 5 in rating. =
i hope award and rating is 2 diffrent system but in one ofc.

no idea what this mean in feedback.
1, 2, 3 you must write something, but now when i write this, i guess it must be as i wrote above
1. award track.
2. choice rating. 1 - 5

confused.

eie, I don't really understand why you are so focused on seperating the awards and comments.
It's up to anybody whether he wants to give detailed feedback or just add a smiley in the award comment.
Chances that you give feedback are higher when you have to write something (as it is now) than if you have the chance to just click the award button.

Someone who wants to give an award and feedback can do this in the award box. Someone who wants to give feedback but no award can do it in the comment box. Nobody will give more or detailed feedback just because you seperate awards from feedback.
What's the problem about awards with just a smiley? What's worse about it than just seeing the number of awards raising? This only makes any differene if you want to have anonymous awards. And that would be totally useless.

As I said before and some others as well agreed, quality is in the eye of the beholder, thus a rating system as indicator for botw is not useful on mx. It makes sense on a server, not on mx.

You're right, awards are not rating the track, they show how many appreciate the track, thus the track that got appreciated by most players deserves to be on top.


The interest of a rating system is also it's downside at the same time.
When an unknown author gets into the botw with just one or a few top votes, it's fine for the author. He gets the chance to get recognition. Thats fine.

There are several problems though.
At least as much as some authors use their friends to award their tracks they will use their friends to give top ratings.
What's the result?

1.
The botw will be full of 5 star tracks. There will be no difference. The first 20, maybe 40, maybe 50 tracks will have a rating of 5. In fact, I foresee only new tracks in the botw with 1-5 ratings.
The more votes a track gets the more it will become 'average', something between 2 and 4. So while a track gets more votes it will go down in the top list.

2.
Because of friendly votes the botw will be full of shit tracks that just got friendly votes.
Of course it will be put into perspective with more votes but they got into the botw in the first place and what the player gets is a top-list full of shit.
So the botw will be of no reliance.

Now if you regulate this by letting the votes count only after a certain number of votes then you have changed nothing - you have the same problem that you want to get rid of - the unknown authors will not get enough votes to get into the botw.

That's why a botw based on the rating makes no sense.

Separating awards and text makes it easier for people just to give an award, and an empty award, and an award which contains nothing but a smiley, or "nice track" is about the same, so I believe it's just going to make it more convenient for people who doesn't want the text-part, while people who still want to give feedback can do that.

I never said I was for the rating system you suggested. but I'm still going to comment on this. You're saying it wouldn't change anything, that can't be correct. What if the minimum for track was at least 5 different ratings before it could show in the best of week. At the moment, you would need at least 10 different awards before appearing in that list. So you'd cut the amount in half. I also believe rating would be more accurate than awards, because many agree that awards isn't a good system to show if a track is bad or good.

Moreover, rating allow for tracks with a smaller fanbase to appear in best of the week, because you would need fewer votes. A track could have 60 votes or 13 votes, and both could still have the same rating, and that's really important for less known track styles, like stunt or trial.

I like awards!
Couldn't say anything that hasn't been said, I guess.