Ranking Systems

There are different ways of ranking whether or not you liked someone’s performance: five stars, ten points, letter grades, percentages, etc. On Good Reads, their ranking system is based on five stars for each book. On You Tube, though, their ranking system for videos is based on likes or dislikes. I personally believe (feel free to disagree with me if you want) that the like or dislike system is the only one we need. Either you liked what you saw or you hated it. Even if you think a piece of art is just “okay”, there’s still a small part of you that likes it. I thought that Fifty Shades of Grey was an okay book. I wasn’t crazy about the writing style, but it didn’t take away from the fact that I still liked it. In fact, I like it so much that I want to read the next two books in the series and have a reason to buy Kleenexes other than Pacific Northwest allergies. If we rely too much on stars, number rankings, and letter grades, we don’t get a clear picture as to whether or not it’s a liked book or TV show or whatever the case may be. I’ve seen books on Good Reads get three stars (which is supposedly a good rating) and in the actual text box, the reviewer talks as if he has a serious axe to grind. I’ve seen that with books that got four stars. The only ranking in which somebody is guaranteed to say nice things all across the board is five stars. Five star ratings are rare and are only reserved for authors who go “above and beyond the call of duty”. Above and beyond? Doesn’t anybody just like stuff anymore? If we had a like and dislike system like we do on You Tube, it would paint a clearer picture of just how popular something is. Which one are you more likely to gravitate towards: a book that has three stars or one that has 5,000 likes and only 53 dislikes? That may not be the correct math, but do you get my point? The like and dislike system is not only helpful to potential readers, but also the authors who are trying to filter out negative information. If an author sees he has a three star rating and gets suckered into reading a mediocre review, it’s going to break his heart. But if an author sees a like or dislike instead of a star rating, then he’ll know which ones to filter out and which ones to read. It’s amazing how far we have to go to preserve an author’s self-esteem. Then again, these things should go without saying. In other words, it’s just simple commonsense.

　

***COMEDIC QUOTE OF THE DAY***

“The British have Jane Austen on their money. Who should we have on our money? Stone Cold Steve Austin?”

-Bill Maher-