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The accumulation of votes is never linear, when we instantly remove a question from the active list for reaching a -4 score we create a system whereby only a couple users can collaborate to push a user's question off the home page. This abuse requires moderator intervention however users lack the tools to really "prove" they are being ganged up on. In other words, no one will ever truly know if this behavior is happening. As such, the "no cop, no stop" rule says we are actively encouraging this gang mentality.

I am aware of the experiment to not display negative votes. But that doesn't prevent the opportunity for users to abuse the -4 score home-page deactivation scheme.

My Proposal is simply allow new questions to simmer a bit, get some eyes on them, and after a grace period pull them off the active list.

I assume there is no jarring and injurious consequence to allowing a -5 score to sit on the board for a day or so. If the post is really inappropriate we have a flag system. Voting is a low-urgency privilege that gives best results under many eyes.

Consider the corollary: positive votes may have to wait up to 3 hours before the Twitter Bot announces them, yet the instantaneous treatment of negative scores invites abuse. I realize this discrepancy is a logistics issue, but it exists nonetheless.

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  • Related: Hiding downvoted questions silences important discussions on Meta
    – Sonic the Anonymous Hedgehog
    Oct 15, 2019 at 21:50
  • -4 needs serious improvement, right? If improvement happens, people do reverse and counter other votes.
    – anki
    Oct 15, 2019 at 21:52
  • 1
    @ankii - Who will counter a vote on a question they don't see? Voting is not linear. This is a hole users can hide in and steer questions undeterred. -4 does not automaticaly need serious improvement. Flagged needs serious improvement: -4 puts the question up for review.
    – Vogon Poet
    Oct 15, 2019 at 21:55
  • After improvements, OP is supposed to ping people who helped them improve the post.
    – anki
    Oct 15, 2019 at 21:56
  • 4
    Where are these awesome posts that need to simmer a bit but instead got ganged up by those collaborating users?
    – rene
    Oct 15, 2019 at 21:56
  • 2
    @ankii - My personal experience: No one votes and tells. Who exactly do they ping? (well, I do tell when I downvote)
    – Vogon Poet
    Oct 15, 2019 at 21:57
  • 1
    @rene - You seriously want to do this piecewise as if human users are incapable of abuse?
    – Vogon Poet
    Oct 15, 2019 at 21:59
  • 2
    If a question really gathers -4 in such a short time for this to be relevant, I'm fraid it...might not be a...good question.
    – Christian Rau
    Oct 15, 2019 at 22:04
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    @ChristianRau - it might. It just as well could be the topic of this question. Can you show that it is not gang mentality? The same people who would abuse this are the people who make serial voting scripts necessary. Do you agree the serial voting scripts are needed? This is neede for that same reason.
    – Vogon Poet
    Oct 15, 2019 at 22:10
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    the last comment *Can you show that it is not gang mentality? * puts the burden of proof on you... might want to try to gather some stats?
    – anki
    Oct 15, 2019 at 22:17
  • @ankii - Consider please reading a post carefully before comments? Line 4 & 5 address your concerns, let me know if they don't.
    – Vogon Poet
    Oct 15, 2019 at 23:49
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    Yes, I seriously want to do this piecewise because I don't like to be accused of gang mentality. Specially if I think there is no evidence except a gut feeling. I don't trust my guts so a bit more substance to serious claims helps the case a lot.
    – rene
    Oct 16, 2019 at 6:16

1 Answer 1

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-4 needs serious improvement, right? If improvement happens, people do reverse and counter other votes.

At sites with a lot of questions, this pushes worthy questions off board. It also creates bad user experience and site presentation in front of people who are there to lurk. Compare it with the reason of not showing even -1 post at logged out home page.

Also, such downvotes come with other remedies such as help centre, edit suggestions and commenting. OP, after doing all necessary may ping people informing them there's a question upvote worthy.(not directly saying upvote it, but telling them to see the updated question etc etc)

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  • 1
    I will agree that each site is impacted slightly differently, based on response rate and how objective the content is. But this is where all feature requests go. I don't think building to the least common denominator wins everywhere. I agree with the removal policy. I disagree with the urgency. This answer seems to miss that
    – Vogon Poet
    Oct 15, 2019 at 22:04
  • 1
    Meta.SE has -8 as its limit. I answered for normal sites
    – anki
    Oct 15, 2019 at 22:05

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