Last modified: 2013-04-22 16:14:13 UTC
Our latest data analysis suggests that about 90% of readers who click on CTA 5 (View feedback page) end up marking their post as helpful (60%), unhelpful or flagged. As a result, we need to do something to reduce this significant amount of gaming. The easiest way to reduce that number quickly would be to start by preventing users from moderating their *last* post. I suspect that it should not be too hard to hide (or gray out) the helpful, unhelpful and flag links when we display your last post at the top of the page, with the blue highlight. (If we gray them out, we could display a message like "You cannot moderate your own posts" when they click on the links.) I believe that it would be much harder to keep track of all the posts that an anon has made -- for the same reasons why it was not possible to let anons hide their posts. (Though we may be tracking their last 20 posts in a cookie as part of the throttling feature implemented by Mike Jackson at OmniTI, so that's worth looking into.) If this turns out to be easier than we thought, that full solution would be our best bet. Matthias, look forward to your thoughts on these options and what is most practical to do at this time.
Come to think of it, it would seem worthwhile to do this for all users, not just anonymous users. Just because most of the feedback is anonymous (98%) doesn't mean that the temptation is not as great for registered users as well. It's just human nature ...
It is not possible to lock it reliably lock it down completely: we'll have to trust the cookie data to know the posts an anonymous user made, and that cookie can easily be forged, deleted, or not be present when opening another browser of using incognito mode. That said, I believe that in 99% of the cases, the cookie will likely be there and we can use it to remove the controls of the feedback post, so it should definitely be a big help in deterring self-feedback!
Pushed to Gerrit (https://gerrit.wikimedia.org/r/#/c/22179/) & prototype For logged-out feedback, it will only work for the last 10 posts (I didn't want to let the cookie grow out of control - if you want that number to got up, it can easily be done), and of course only if cookies are enabled. I removed: - Mark as helpful - Mark as unhelpful - Flag as abuse - Feature - Resolve Negative actions (hide, request oversight) as well as activity log are still accessible for own posts, as I don't see these being "abused". I can also change that, if desired. I have currently just removed the buttons for it was the least amount of work; if you prefer them being grayed out and yield an error message when someone attempts to self-moderate anyway, that could be arranged as well, albeit with some additional work.
Created attachment 11069 [details] Screenshot showing 'Hide my post' link in middle of page, with misaligned tool tip pointer Matthias: thanks for the lightning-fast response! I confirmed that it works on prototype, both in reader and editor mode: http://prototype.wikimedia.org/release-en/Golden-crowned_Sparrow If it's easy, we may want to increase this to the last 20 posts, just to be safe. One other thing I recommend is sliding the 'Hide my post' link for readers all the way to the left, rather than in the middle of the bottom line, as shown in the attached screenshot. Also, the tip of the flyout is misaligned on Safari, as shown on the screenshot. The only remaining issue is that if you are using multiple accounts on the same computer, you will be unable to moderate other user's posts, but I'm not sure that can be fixed (I believe that we are using the same cookie, no matter which account you log in under). I don't view that as a major concern, provided that other user-specific activity is not attributed to the wrong user (e.g.: marking posts as helpful).
One last thing we might consider would be to add a small gray text notice explaining why the moderation tools are not available for your own posts, on the bottom line of each post: "You cannot moderate your own posts." But we would want to be sure that the wrong user will not see this message on feedback they did not post, so the multiple-account issue mentioned above would have to be fixed before we add this notice.
(In reply to comment #3) > Pushed to Gerrit (https://gerrit.wikimedia.org/r/#/c/22179/) & prototype Status Merged, bug maybe resolved
Not completely; the initial request has been fixed, the comments after the patch have not yet been completed
Why you can't or shouldn't resolve own feedback? Maybe the feedback doesn't apply any more. Please patch (Question raised at http://de.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Wikipedia:Artikel-Feedback/Notizen&oldid=111362152#Bug:_Markierung_eigener_R.C3.BCckmeldung_als_erledigt_nicht_m.C3.B6glich)
se4598: This has been changed in https://gerrit.wikimedia.org/r/#/c/43203/ For their own post: * Logged-out users will not see any tools (not editor toolbox and not the reader tools "mark as helpful/unhelpful, mark as abuse"). * Logged-in, non-confirmed users (who don't have access to the toolbox actions) will see a "discard my post" below their own comment, but not the other reader-tools ("mark as helpful/unhelpful, mark as abuse"). * Logged-in editors will not see any of the reader tools ("mark as helpful/unhelpful, mark as abuse") but will see the regular editor toolset, minus the "useful" action.
