One star ratings...

...They are really frustrating i find...because i really does not got one record in my collection that deserves one star...not even the worst as POS, KC, Derek sherihan and the likes deserves one star so i begin to wonder if people are really serious when they give one star ratings? I mean if westlife was included in the archvies i would still not be able to give it one star as i have some certain criterias for that:

Originality

Melodies

Abilities

These are the main criterias and Westlife does got melodic melodies and they can sing...HOWEVER they are so fantastically unoriginal that they frankly deserve two stars...but if i would judge on how much i hated the band i would give them one star....and thats how i think most people think when they rate an ablum one star because there are really very little well known and popular music that lacks both originality, melody and technical abilities (singing, playing their instruments and so on.)

i think it is a matter of how much you hate that artist and not what you actually think about the music...

One star reviews rule.

They're grrrrrrreat.

 

I agree with you, 1 star ratings are hard to justify, and seem to be based on entirely subjective criteria. The 1 star reviews I have read tend to be just a stream of unhelpful bile about how cr*p an album is without any proper argument or explanation. It's usually just someone venting their feelings, & sometimes just because an album they don't like has just received a glowing review.

I also think in part having a rating system that limits you to between 1 and 5 stars does encourage the over-use of both the 1 and 5 star ratings. If there was a 10 star rating this might not be such an issue, especially at the "top end". Sometimes you read a review where the reviewer says e.g. "4.5 stars" - in other words 9/10 - but has to give it 4 or 5. I think it is natural, when people think something is either wonderful - or cr*p - to use the extreme ratings to make their point.  However in practice whether a 10 star rating is practical or desirable I'm not sure - after all the ratings are only meant to be an indication. And I digress - your point was about 1 star ratings and your "Westlife" example of voting 2 stars with head -i.e.  by following the ratings - but only 1 star by heart is a good one.

Maybe, the system would be better if the review had to be done for several criteria separately: rating originality, musicianship.... four or five separate items. This would force people to be more objective. Then the system would rate based on the average or I don't know how...

But I assume this would be rather difficult to prepare... wouldn't it?

We have been here before guys- everybody seems happy enough with the idea that given a good ratio of ratings on a particular work, everything will even out

1 star rating isn't less relevant than 5 stars'. What does it mean "essential to any prog collection"? what collection size? What if you really don't like a genre?  Will it be essential that you own a record you will never play?

 

I've never rated albums with 1 star!

Only a pair of cds in my collection deserve 2 stars! the others are all in a higher rating's position!!

We need to stress the actual meaning of the rating system. That may help.

Bob Greece wrote: maidenrulez wrote: Bob Greece wrote: One star reviews rule. They're grrrrrrreat.   Why? They save you money by stopping you buying bad CDs. Some CDs really are for "collectors' only" even if they are prog. I have a problem with the 5-star reviews. There are just too many and they're not balanced out by 1-star reviews.

I agree that the number of 5 star reviews outweighs 1 star reviews, however most 1 star reviews don't seem to make a coherent argument for WHY it's only worth 1 star. Instead you tend to get:" I think its cr*p". Which does not help. Although I'd accept some of the 5 star reviews are equally pointless....however I do agree with cobb that overall given enough ratings they tend to lead you to a reasonable conclusion on a particular album.

I don't agree that only forum members should be able to submit reviews. Although they may generally (but not always) be well written, it smacks of "Prog Elite" and means you are restricting the number of reviews to a particular community.

Some people use the rating system in a binary form (1=no,5=yes) just to have the maximum effect on the current top 100 listing. A very childish approach but if it works, it works.

Expanding the range to 10 stars or even a percentage would be a good thing to do IMhO (you get more refined statistics for free), but that would not prevent binary usage either.

I just thought of a voting algorythm which actually prevents this sort of usage. Hmmm... Thanks for getting me to this idea, Maiden. It might be the solution for our problem, but it would require some reprogramming by the staff. Let me think about it...