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Stack Exchange should be more proactive when a user continuously downvotes another user.

Example: I saw on https://travel.stackexchange.com/users/1810?tab=reputation:

enter image description here

This was triggered by the "Arthur's Pass" (Wayback) user (Network Profile) leaving the website.

60 reps mean 30 downvotes on questions (this user mostly downvoted on questions). That represents ~10% of the questions posted by https://travel.stackexchange.com/users/1810. Furthermore "Arthur's Pass" user has only cast around 150 votes, which means that 20% of their downvotes were targeting https://travel.stackexchange.com/users/1810. It is ok to disagree but I believe there is a clear downvoting pattern here.

Why wasn't some serial/targeted downvote detection mechanism triggered?

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  • 3
    How long did this remain unactioned? clearly, some action has been taken. Are you arguing it took too long?
    – Kevin B
    Commented Oct 13, 2020 at 21:17
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    @user400654 I don't know whether this was ever actioned: I don't know whether the user's removal was voluntary or forced, and whether they got some warnings.
    – Franck Dernoncourt
    Commented Oct 13, 2020 at 21:20
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    Why wasn’t this submitted to Travel Meta?
    – Ramhound
    Commented Oct 13, 2020 at 21:23
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    @Ramhound serial downvote detection mechanism is SE-wide.
    – Franck Dernoncourt
    Commented Oct 13, 2020 at 21:26
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    It is, however, mods on travel meta will know more about this specific situation than meta SE mods will. (though... they still may not be able to disclose the details of any actions taken against the given account)
    – Kevin B
    Commented Oct 13, 2020 at 21:27
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    There is a serial downvoting detection system and no, it isn’t foolproof and never can be. The details of the system are not public because you wouldn’t want determined parties to figure out how to evade that system. Most importantly: you can’t necessarily see if there were more voting issues that the system did deal with!
    – Martijn Pieters
    Commented Oct 13, 2020 at 21:33
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    Next, do you know how frequently that user downvoted? Where there upvotes too? Over how long a period? How frequently did they vote for others?
    – Martijn Pieters
    Commented Oct 13, 2020 at 21:35
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    That’s still not something that is necessarily problematic and / or detectable. It depends heavily on a lot more factors that we simply can’t see.
    – Martijn Pieters
    Commented Oct 13, 2020 at 21:53
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    @Ramhound "It is something a community moderator could have helped out" -> yes but easier if a voting pattern detection system notify them. Serial just means repeating the same action. Targeted is indeed more specific, I'll add it to the question, thanks.
    – Franck Dernoncourt
    Commented Oct 13, 2020 at 22:05
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    @MartijnPieters If 20% of one's downvotes are just on 1 user, I'd suggest to start asking questions. Yes it is more difficult to discuss about the serial downvote detection mechanism since the algorithm isn't publicly available, but that doesn't mean we can't give some feedback on it.
    – Franck Dernoncourt
    Commented Oct 13, 2020 at 22:06
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    Serial downvoting doesn’t mean “repeating”; It has a specific context; both are against the rules; one is automatically reversed by the system, the other is not, because of the nature of the behavior (prolonged continuous pattern of downvoting a single individual). They probably downvoted below the automatic detection threshold. Who would be notified of this voting behavior exactly? Your feature suggestion does not make that clear
    – Ramhound
    Commented Oct 13, 2020 at 22:08
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    On MSE's chat a moderator asked for reports about targeted downvoting on old posts on this site - whether this question falls under that umbrella or would be better on Travel's meta is one thing, the reception that this report has received is another.
    – Rob
    Commented Oct 13, 2020 at 22:45
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    @Nij if we only say "targeted", it misses the fact it is a repeated action. I'm fine if some of you use a synonym of serial though. By the way serial voting is defined as "Serial voting is the act of casting many upvotes or downvotes on the posts of a specific user without proper reason." in its tag description.
    – Franck Dernoncourt
    Commented Oct 15, 2020 at 4:12
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    The number of downvotes on this completely valid question indicates that those engaging in the serial downvoting don't like attention being drawn to their toxic behavior. (For what it's worth, I'm upvoting...)
    – Mentalist
    Commented Mar 14 at 1:44
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    @Mentalist Since even some mods are serial downvoting, the practice seems rather commonplace in SE.
    – Franck Dernoncourt
    Commented Mar 14 at 1:49

1 Answer 1

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I'll summarize the answers the question received in the comments: 1) we don't know how the serial downvoting detection system works 2) it can't be made perfect. 3) if 20% of a user's downvotes are just on 1 user, it's not necessarily problematic and / or detectable.

Relevant comments:

  • There is a serial downvoting detection system and no, it isn’t foolproof and never can be. The details of the system are not public because you wouldn’t want determined parties to figure out how to evade that system. Most importantly: you can’t necessarily see if there were more voting issues that the system did deal with! – Martijn Pieters Oct 13 at 21:33
  • That’s still not something that is necessarily problematic and / or detectable. It depends heavily on a lot more factors that we simply can’t see. – Martijn Pieters Oct 13 at 21:53

I disagree, but the large ratio of downvotes:upvotes (17:7 currently) seems to indicate I'm in the minority.

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    While I agree with (1) and (2) I think (3) is subtle. Like, I can imagine scenarios where that would be valid (one user submits a lot of low value content focused on a specific topic, and a second user is highly focused on in that same topic) and there is no foul play. However it seems such circumstances would be rare and it would warrant at least some sort of flag to have someone manually review it to see whether or not there were a problem. I don't know if SE already does this. I personally have never felt any of my content was unfairly downvoted, but I also haven't posted as much as some.
    – cazort
    Commented Oct 7, 2021 at 19:46

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