You have a point in that there's really no point but it's there for those who want to use it and sure there's the assholes who will abuse the system but there's always people like that in everything.

I thought you could only rep a guy like, once a day?

I'd say over half of the people who use the rep system don't use it for its intended purpose.

I agree, but there is not much you can do considering that the username of the player who repped you is not shown. Therefore there is no way to really prove anyone did anything. But you shouldn't care if people are stupid. I personally don't look down on anyone with a red rep bar, unless they give me reason to.

It's just whether or not someone likes you. It's not rocket science, what more is there to understand? Obviously a lot of factors determine whether or not some one likes you, or your post.

I know what reputation is.

Answer a different question.

First thing you need to know is that rep is 100% meaningless. I have seen people that I know are good guys, and they have negative rep, and I have seen total assholes with 9001 rep.

It doesn't mean a thing.

If you get dereped for a stupid reason, then does it really matter? No, it doesn't. Odds are rep will be gone soon enough anyway. And besides, you have an actual reputation, not just some silly boxes.

So yes, people can rep and derep you without a reason, or with a stupid reason, but it doesn't matter. If you really care about it that much then get people to like you, back people up in arguments, etc.


War: DJ is cool now days, havn't you heard? D:

I'm pretty sure mods can see who repped or -repped another person (if they can't, that's a serious error by the people running the forum) so mods can see rep trading, -rep wars, stuff like that, so moderation shouldn't be too hard.

Also, I've noticed that as people get more rep, they tend to value it more.

To me it seems like it's just an ego-inflation tool, once you get it, there's nothing you can really do with it except point out that you're more popular than the other guy, as other people can't see why you were repped or de-repped. People with low rep pass it off as a joke or something, and people with high rep go "look at me!"

That particular limitation defeats the purpose of rep to begin with, to know what other people think of that user.

My 2 cents, at least.

Can someone please add the answers to the OPs question on the wiki.

Thank-you.

Ok so here is my opinion/what I know about rep.

The system is supposed to be used in order to show appreciation for somebody's input or help on a certain topic. It is supposed to encourage good forum behaviour and improve the helpfulness and relevance of user's posts, thus increasing the quality of an online community. These effects are only achieved when the rep system is used by those who are mature enough to understand what it is for, otherwise you get people who randomly +rep and who only +rep their friends for the reason that they are their friend. Gaining a high rep level is supposed to mean that you are a helpful and mature member of the community.

All that being said, there will always be idiots out there that rep each other just because they can. Rep farming could really only be monitored, IMO, if an alert system was put in place to alert SMods and higher about a user gaining high amounts of rep very quickly. Say the user gains 1000rep points in a week or less, then that would be subject to investigation.

Other vBulletin forums possess a 'Thanks' button, for which users thank people who are helpful or provide a mature and well thought out opinion, thus lessening the prevalence of rep abuse and rep use overall. Rep is then used only for those things that require an even higher standard of gratitude to be shown, thus reflecting their quality of character furthermore. This would also make rep abuse easier to catch.

The key to using my suggested method is knowing how much rep is too much to be getting in a certain interval, of course if this is discovered the rep abusers will just take their time.