Better implementation of "populist" badge

Question

The populist badge is given when you have an answer that outscores an accepted answer with a score of 10 by more than 2x.

This creates a few perverse situations. If there is an accepted answer with a score of 9 and someone else has an answer with a score of 99, they don't get the badge. But if someone votes up the accepted answer then they do.

I suggest that populist should be like this

When your answer outscores an accepted answer by more than 2x and your score is at least 20.

It keeps to the original spirit of the badge, while avoiding the situation given above.

Answer 1

Hmmm... It sounds reasonable on the surface. But it does change the context of the badge to some extent.

The original wording guarantees that the accepted answer was highly rated (i.e. a good answer with at least a score of 10). That may have been part of the intention of the badge. You are removing that "I beat a great accepted answer" criteria.

With the new wording, the populist badge can be awarded where the answer is not-so-great. It can have a score of zero or even negative… not quite the same achievement.

We'll have to look at the original intention of the badge so see if the new methodology would be preferred, or if it loses something important. I raised the issue with the developers for consideration.

Answer 2

Badges are weird on the various smaller SE sites. It's common for answers to get less than 10 votes, even when they're great answers. So, good luck getting some of those badges on the other sites.

I have no idea if there's a way of 'tweaking' the numbers to make getting gold and silver badges as hard as it is on SO / SU, but not easier.