Please clarify how reputation should be used.

milltown

Maybe I missed the relevant meeting but I can't find any guidelines on the use of the rep/karma feature.

The reason I ask is I now have two negative reps to my name (cheers Victor and Mr.Burns!) from users who left no comment with the rep and did not reply to the post in question.

I was under the impression that Boards was a medium for discussion, within certain guidelines, where opinions could be posted and argued. As such, since the arrival of VB3 Boards, I have responded on thread to posts I disagree with and have only given one bad rep in return for bad rep received by someone who did not like being disagreed with on thread. Hell, I have even resisted dishing out bad rep for Bananayogurt and his "jokes".

Use of the rep feature in the way Victor and MB use it is not in any way constructive and seems cowardly.

Please clarify whether it is to be used as a way of having a sly, lazy swipe at somebody who's opinion you disagree with, or as I thought, rewarding posts you enjoy and punishing abusive or flaming posts.

ecksor

There aren't guidelines on boards for the use of karma, although we've banned a few people for leaving abusive comments. My own rough inclination is to reward particularly informative or helpful or thoughtful posts (or very funny posts or posts that I get some personal kick out of in many cases) and to hit people who are deliberately disruptive or occasionally (and this would be a rather controversial policy I think) people who are incredibly misinformed but somehow manage to stick dogmatically to their position in the face of being constantly corrected by people who know better.