Market commenting system MUST BE CHANGED

[DesignDawg]

Hey all,

I don't claim to have all the answers, and how you change a system like this without opening the door to corruption and/or accusations of it may be beyond me... Actually I did have one suggestion a while back...

But it occurs to me that the Market has all but been overrun by the worst elements of society. HOW are these people even getting these phones? If you don't know what I'm talking about, just read all comments for "four number guess" in the games section. Does that game suck? It might. It has the lowest rating possible, so I haven't given it a chance. But even if the game is unimaginably bad, WHAT does that have to do with all the hate that is in the comments section? Racist, hateful, disgusting remarks, ranging from everything from racial and homosexual slurs to invitations to burn in hell, suck organs... You name it. If it's despicable and beyond the pale for ANY cultural situation, that comments section is packed with it. --And of course, they all have 1-star ratings. So who knows what the rating SHOULD be?

And this is happening more and more across the board. You have the "first" posts that have evolved over time to people posting "first, bitches!" and much, muuuch worse, because these children think it's fun to not only annoy people with the first comments, but to rub our faces in it.

Essentially, the abuse of the ratings and comments system has rendered it suspect, and is tending toward rendering it useless. With the market growing every day, and this being our only means to "sort" and sift through to try to find quality apps, where does this leave us?

If there could be moderators for the market, I would gladly volunteer. People could report comments just like they do here, and when moderators get a notification, they could check it out. If the comment on a tip calculator simply said, "DIE F@@#TS! MOTHERF@#$ING N@#$ERs all burn IN HELL!!!" and it had a 1-star rating...well, that comment would be deleted, along with its rating and effect on the overall score. Another example: A developer put in his description "If you do not know what this app is for, please do not download", so someone downloaded it SIMPLY to rate it a 1 and leave the comment to tell him that's what he had done, to tell the developer to F@#$ himself. It should not be allowed.

So, who do we talk to? What can WE, as users do, to get some action taken? Is the iphone apps store like this at all?

[pllb]

Yeah, I've noticed some of the idiotic comments in the market also. I think feedback and comments are a good thing but obviously not when it doesn't provide anything useful. Personally I just ignore it but I suspect the only way to really handle the issue is to moderate it. I'm not sure how Apple handles it in their App Store to be honest.

[GasBot]

Do we know if the app store even allows ratings?

[justinperkins]

Seriously, what the hell is with those comments? A bunch of children have gotten their hands on some G1s I think. We should be able to rate comments, or at the very least, report them ... but that would require a dedicated staff to remove offensive comments.

btw, it's "four number guess", took me a second to find it

[pllb]

Yes, App store allows ratings and comments. My gf has an iphone so I know.

[DesignDawg]

btw, it's "four number guess", took me a second to find it

Thanks. Updated. Moderating wouldn't be a problem I think. Like I said, I would do it. LOTS of people would. It would be anonymous, without interaction. There would probably have to be a backend somewhere, like a forum for all the moderators to approve/disapprove things, AND, importantly, a RECORD of all deleted comments. That would protect google from accusations from developers that their ratings are being tampered with. I'm sure there are better ideas, and probably some tried and true methods from other projects. But something's gotta give. What a hostile environment for developers to have to endure. It seems like it could encourage the alternative markets and distro methods out there.

[DesignDawg]

Yes, App store allows ratings and comments. My gf has an iphone so I know.

Are the comments like the ones on the market? My guess (pure guess) is that the comments are moderated on the app store, and are thus held to a higher level of quality. Apple has nothing to fear for moderating like this. Their whole system is closed and overseen internally. You can't just leave everything wide open. Ever read "Lord of the Flies"? That's the market right now. And "Four Number Guess" is "Piggy" at the moment.

[Jorsher]

The comments are darn near useless.

Since the G1 is attached to your username at all times, I think Google should perma-ban people from commenting if they can't leave appropriate comments.

It wouldn't be hard at all to implement.

Or, even a rep system. People with positive rep for commenting would have higher placement. Those who can't say anything useful will be at the bottom of the list.

[fenestrator]

Unfortunately, cleaning up other people's words in the commenting system has to occur at some level. I can only imagine that it violates the T.O.S. somewhere....

What really goes to show how stupid these low-lyfes really are is that they had to have a Gmail account to get the phone operational. They can be back-tracked and can legally be sought after under anti-defamation laws. You can't openly publish the things they say even if its in the digital realm and eventually not expect to feel the repercutions of it. All you have to do is look at what some racist groups have legally faced as an example.

Eventually some group will hit these people with legal threats similar to what the RIAA did to Napster users and by then it'd be too late to mosey on back to being "nice members of society."

Remember everyone this is software!
Android will eventually be the best mobile platform in existance, it can be fixed and improved so why get so bent outta shape!

[damnitpud]

The comments are darn near useless.

Since the G1 is attached to your username at all times, I think Google should perma-ban people from commenting if they can't leave appropriate comments.

It wouldn't be hard at all to implement.

Or, even a rep system. People with positive rep for commenting would have higher placement. Those who can't say anything useful will be at the bottom of the list.

I think this would be best also. You won't need a staff, well except for the ones coding it, but Google seems to have a bunch of programmers around. I think a few could make this project pretty quickly.

I hate all of the comments i have seen on the Market, I have passed up a few apps because of the horrible feedback. But then i noticed all of the programs have horrible feedback! I sort the apps and games by date now, which i noticed i missed a few updated apps because of it. But how can you go with By Popularity, for a while there MySpace Mobile was number 1. I don't even use MySpace anymore.

Perfect Comment example: Bob on 10-30-2008 Comments on Video Player by Jeff Hamilton, Can someone tell me how to use this? Where do i put the video file so the player recognizes it? Im an idiot!!! He gave it 1 Star.

I hate people!