The Idea of Chowk

``I have never really like muzzles`` said Nawab.
``Neither do I`` replied wondering where this conservation was going to take us.
``Easy for you to say, you are not the one wearing them``.
I squirmed, clearly this was not going to be an easy conversation.
``Well you know that the Council does have certain restrictions on noise levels``
``So?``
``So when they receive a complaint they have to act upon it``.
``What`s that got to do with muzzling dogs``.
``Well they can fine dog owners on the spot, you know``.
``You could have asked me first`` and that hurt expression on the face again.
``I had and you said something about the freedom of expression``.
``Well considering freedom of expression is enshrined in your constitution I see no reason to curb it``.
``Yes but if it disturbs other people then you can be asked to tone it down``.
``And a muzzle is what `toning it down` means?``
I did not feel like getting into another dogfight so I walked towards my computer.
``So does the internet still permit free speech?``
``Of course it does, what a sily question``.
``So why are my interacts being filtered out? And who recommends that these interacts to be filtered out``
I knew just what the problem was.
``Don`t tell me you have got been filtered out``.
``Well that is to say..grrr..``
``So have you been `filterd out as per recommendation` or just `Filtered Out Forever`?``
``Hey its their loss not mine``
Thank you Chowk Staff - you fine ``keepers of morals`` and ``upholders of free speech as long as that free speech meets your recommendations``. Keep up the good work there is an extra bone coming...er sorry wrong reward.

Dear Chowk Admin:

I would like to extend a warm hug to you for the following new feature:

[*** Interact filterd out as per recommendation *** ]

Thank you for paying attention to your readership and their suggestions.

Take Care

Chowk staff,

some sane and serious suggestion. I think u should ban anyone that uses cussing or profanity or vulgarity. Besides that there should be no censorship or rating - NONE. Before u ban, an interactor may present his/her case. After the final decision, Tell them they are not welcome, and NO TRESSPASSING or u `ll shoot them in the rear....and get some guard dogs. he he.

Having said that,

I don`t know how long it takes to delete a person....or ban his ISP....but i am assuming it takes less time than for them to re register....they will finally get tired and give up.

Most of the rejected posts in my case were because someone did not like a critique of a political figure. or another political stance....this kind of censorship is wrong.

CHOWK-STAFF:
what do you say to this?

Please look into providing a `DELETE`` feature into the inter-acts. If an inter-act is not upto guide-lines then the interactor may please be requested to delete that post and repost it.

If that interactor repeatedly refuses to comply ( say three times) then it would be appropriate to suspend that interactor for a specific or indefinite period. You would, then, be justified to exercise your prerogative after such a `civilised` warning.

This would also help `remorse` situations.

Having done that, then you can get rid of this `filtered-out` system.

I strongly believe that `rating` `filtering` smacks of colonialism. Please act as a `speaker` of the house , rather than `crowd controller`.

It is the ones who have deep-seated convictions & beliefs who always have nuggets ensconced in their rants & raves. Sometimes they themselves are not aware of their own profoundness because they have a passion in them.

As much as I disagree with Freddy-Krueger types, I am not happy to see them `filtered`out.

How come whining is mostly by a particular gender (or their limp-wristed friends)

Re: # 250

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Re: # 249 ``or link all their known nicks in the back end so that whenever they post anything under one of their multi-nicks that interaction or post will appear under all their known nicks...this will render the `ignore` feature on unplugged truly useful ``
And how do we do this? You think people give the same details when registering?

ban ban ban
If chowk is starting to remind me of a catholic school with the apple polishers running amok ``miss miss he is saying bad words to me``
It is still a pretty good forum even with the colourful speech. The holier than thou saint is equally guilty of being rude and uncouth to other interactors.

Oh yes bring back Scout...

Q. What do you call a person with multiple nicks?
A. A schizophrenick.

Re: # 246

ditto!

Chowk Admin: Keeping that in mind, I recommend that you ban the ids in post # 229 and #230 for good. HP`s suggestion to have a subscription service introduced is something to look into. If you decide to take that route then please do care to create a poll and solicit input from the readers, writers and interactors to provide their favorite charities` names.

Thanks.

#248:

i asked you on the other thread where you repeated this post and am asking you here also...what do you mean by ...use of a single handle by multiple people....?

as for your other assertion...the original twelve head has been effectively banished...if it helps;)

Re: # 246


at the same time you should ban the use of a single handle by multiple people. This is happening on chowk. Semnatics, syntax, etc are dis-similar that sometimes its frightening. The reactions from the same nic are so varied you wonder if your talking to the same person.

However, I know for a fact you cannot ban multiple nics. I know of other boards where this has been gotten round. You just cant do it - even using cookies. This is the world of Window where the same machine can be used by many people so setting up n-accounts on one machine and getting n-nics is not impossible.

ps:

let me rephrase this:

...in the interest of further levelling the playing field i would suggest you ask folks here to select and stick to one nick only...and if they are found contravening this voluntary restriction than just de-register their multiple nicks...or link all their known nicks in the back end so that whenever they post anything under one of their multi-nicks that interaction or post will appear under all their known nicks...this will render the `ignore` feature on unplugged truly useful

attention chowk editors

...one more area that needs your attention is the use of more than one nick ...

...while this is not a major issue here on main page yet, this twelve-head syndrome is causing mayhem on unplugged...and i suspect those with multiple nicks try to out-muscle and overwhelm other unsuspecting interactors...

...in the interest of further levelling the playing field i would suggest you ask folks here to select and stick to one nick only...and if they are found contravening this voluntary restriction than just de-register their multiple nicks...

...this will make life a little easier for an overwhelming number of chowkies with only one registered nick...

rgds

t

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Chowk staff,

thanks for listening to the interactors,

my concern is, some interactors are being filtered out by `chowk filter`. is this a permanent thing? and why?

Re: # 242 i agree with him/her

Wow! so now ``chowk staff`` has come back to its senses.
SR`s (#241) suggestions are worth considering.
1. If there has to be a rating than all interactors should start from a common rating of ``unrated``.
2. Writer`s ratings should be kept separate from interactor`s ratings. Several good authors have shown themselves to be poor interactor. Many don`t even interact. Interactor`s rating should be based on peer review and that too based on a minimum quorum. Feedback from twleve-heads can be filtered through some logic.
3. Chowk should list all editorial members of its ``chowk staff``.

Chowk staff, what do you mean by filtered out indefinitely and filtered out forever? In the latter case, Scout has only responded in cases of extreme provocation. Are there different rules for men and women on chowk?
About Sameer, I do not have to tell you what an intelligent contributor he has been. On what grounds has he been filtered out?
Why do this when in the past you did nothing about individuals like Honorable Syed and took such tardy action against a certain multi-nicked individual? Why these double standards that replicate our society`s double standards?

O dear, Oh Dear Me, the scores are all gone... what happened?

Just as I was beginning to bask in the glory of my above mediocre score, it was gone again and all interact responses were again uncategorized.

First, to all those who make noises about democracy, awami raj, and rights on Chowk (or any other website) forget The Golden Rule

The golden Rule, of course, says: He who has the gold, makes the Rules. PERIOD...

Second, the rating idea is a good one in its core, but hard as hell to impliment in a rational and effective manner.

I cannot pretend to have the best solution but here are some ideas that may have been useful to apply.

1) Let the rating system be based on the concept of ``Peer Review``...

2) Let only verified registered users cast a ballot... ie, give a rating score.

3) Start every one with an uncategorized rating or some initial rating based on the editors` initial assessment. So thus many, many will be uncategorized and aome will have an initial score...

4) The starting score does not start changing with the first cast ballot. No. It should have a minimum quorum requirment of, say, ten or 15 ``click`` votes before an aggregate acore appears. Only one registered user could make one click per message.

5) There should be two numbers running before each message. A ``general score`` for the interactor giving his/her overall score as computed by the system at large, and a second, for the particular message, IF that message has been scored by a required number of readers.

This scoring system will be slow to evolve but will reflect the collective prejudices of the general readership somewhat more accurately. The scale should be from ``uncalassified``, to 0 to 10...

Most will remain ``unclassified`` for a long time. That is better than being a zero or -1...

...SR

Re: # 236

``I agree that i could have been more refined in my criticisms...i will try to do in future.``

I believe that`s all Chowk Staff is asking from its interactors.

TEHREEK-I-UNPLUGGISTAAN

faisaluno:
cc. Saima Shah/Safwan Shah!


Thank you.

Some new measures have been taken by the Martial-Law authorities at Front-page but they have still not relinquished power.

The power MUST come through the Public, the awaam, the common-people, the riff-ruff--you & me!

After posting the guide-lines, there are two options left to those who run their business. Either to let the offending/offended interacts battle it out or ignore each other OR the OFFENDER ( like me) must be banned ( The business owner reserves the right NOT to do business with some one). This way at least some risk is taken.

What they cannot do is to ``tolerate`` someone like me, increase traffic at the business site [thus use me] AND at the same time beat me up like the Muttavaas in Saudi Arabia.

If the number & the volubility of certain interactors is a crowd-puller and
thus an advertisement, then it is dishonest to announce such lofty and bombastic a claim as ``unflinching idealism`` .

Baigaani shaadi meiN abdullah deevaana is not bad if it is Abdullah`s decision, but to arrange one`s wedding and insist thet the city`s deevaana Abdullahs be brought to the `show` BUT kept in line, is kind of ``westernism & ``colonialism`` which the Unpluggistaanis, the unadulterated Desis, have spurned and look down upon.

If you think it is a good idea then please copy it and bring it back on top as a refresher & reiminder. Others please do it as well.

P.S: Saima Shah* & Safwan shah are excellent people, but I am extremely stingy in my praise to anyone DEsi because such behaviour has become our national pastime. It has robbed us of our sting and instead the whole society operates on sifaarish, phony-politeness, and perverted networkings.

I do not particularly like to be `lovey-dovey` on an anonymous website which in this day and age of the ``Oppression by Freedom`` is the last refuge left where one CAN ( & allowed by default to) speak one`s mind and heard--even for a flickering second.

Sad, so sad but true.

*: hope you`ll smile a tad!

tehreek-e UnplUggistaan

Re: # 232 by ZahraJ

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re:#235 by godot
May be you confuse my hatred of some of the ideals that Pakistani rulers espouse (religious extremism, support of jehad in Kashmir etc) with hatred of Pakistanis. There is a difference. Individual attacks on some people on chowk do not constitute an attack on the whole nation. I agree that i could have been more refined in my criticisms on some occasions, which i will try to do in future.
Sridhar

Re: # 233

Sridhar

Yes, those ``ugly`` replies were selective, and contrary to what you say some of them were explicit ``personal`` attacks in a manner not befitting an intelligent being.

Those selective qoutes from your posts tell a reader that you are full of hate against Pakistan and Pakistanis (and anyone who dares to criticize India, perhaps reflecting your insecurity) and you don`t shy away from sinking low in your hatred.

re:#212 by nazarhayatkhan
Thanks for the kind words.
I was no doubt angry but now i am back. I congratulate the Chowk Staff on a good decision (getting rid of the scoring system).
Sridhar

re: Godot`s reply to my post
I am happy the scoring system is out. I am not sure how this filter system is going to work but this again is an unwarranted attempt to modify people`s behavior.
Godot,
You saw fit to post some of my ``ugly`` replies but not the one i talked about. In the other forum about ``Middle Kingdom wallahs``, i had interesting discussion on Buddhism with Kabuliwallah and DM.
Anyway, since the scoring system is out, i feel this discussion is irrelevant.
I hope people do not forget that abuse can be gross or subtle. Both can hurt. I have called some interactors names but this related to the interacts but was never personal. I am proud to say i have never ever abused anybody`s religion or race. I make no secret about the fact that i do not like military dictators. If there are some interactors out there who are offended by this, i would say: tough luck.
Paki is a short version of Pakistani. Why should one be offended by this?
Anyway, Chowk will lose fun if it becomes a newer version of Catholic day school.
Sridhar

[This is from the ``reading options`` to Chowk Admin :) ]

~ Kee Mae`rae Qatl Kae Baa`d...Us Nae... Jafaa Sae Tau`baa

Hayae...
Hayae.......

Hayae Uss Zood Pushaemaa`n Kaa.....Pushae`maaN.Hona. (Simply Beautiful)

This filtering system is utterly hopeless.

The scoring system was good because it put the interactors in his/her place without infringing upon their right to say whatever they wanted to say and in whichever manner. The intelligent interactors would have gotten the message and had made sure that their posts are written intelligently so they don’t score low. Those who are not very bright would have been stuck with a low score. It’s all in “how” one says it. Decency scores high, foul-mouthed and idiocy scores low. It’s simple as that. Neither is prevented from posting as their heart desire. Intelligent people abhor low scores. Hence, the good weeds out the bad.

The scoring system would have forced interactors to be more thoughtful when posting.
The Chowk filter makes no sense when it passes a “chutya” (#204)

Re: # 226

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#223: Who cares if someone is on your list or not ? You never know how many may have you on their list. How foolish and silly of you! I am glad that you disappeared for a while. I hope you took care of your ``perpetual perversions``.

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Let me be the first one to participate in this latest Chowk Jihad to share my list of interactors blocked by me before I leave again for unspecified period.

succubus (for provocative username),
catchy and several of his nicks (for 24/7 on the chowk, mean-spirited and promoter of religion),
ali_1 (for invectives-filled language),
atif2 (promoter of religion and until recently the patron of one, barachota and his various nicks),
lifta, mbz Isphani, zeena (boring and hard to decipher language),
nangaparbat, queen_cut&paste, ThothoEwing, ..., saleem and 10 other usernames (for 24/7 flooding the chowk, wasting bandwidth and disturbing the peaceful interactive atmosphere on chowk unplugged),
ZahraJ (for perpetual whining)
echoboom/ farangi_kush/ hamzad afaqui/ chusni (for senselessly promoting religion and hate agaisnt the west)
aasif (for wasting other`s time in reading his 10% arabic, 20% persian, 30% urdu and 40% supposedly English mix and senseless posts with occasional invectives)

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Re: # 219

``2. Use the Chowk filter – this will mark out select interacts which are abusive``

Okay, Chowk Staff, tell me why the post #204 is not filtered out by Chowk filter for using the word ``chutya`` in it (which is curse word), but post #214 was filtered although it had no curse word in it (and more troubling is scout`s deletion)? How do you decide what`s ``decent`` and what`s ``abusive``? What makes you pass post #204 but not post #214?

Re: # 219

Omigod Chowk Staff... did you say we are all unemployed aunties and uncles on UP??

We are indeed not. We just...have cyber addiction problems. There at least I admit it...

The intention behind the system of scoring each reply was to push up content for higher visibility however based on the feedback here it seems scoring was such a huge distraction that it was doomed to be ineffective. So without further ado it has been removed but it is now replaced by a filtering system which will continue to push down interacts that are abusive, off-topic, long cut-n-pastes and flamebaits. The way it works is that you have 3 choices

1) no filter - see all replies

2) use chowk filter - it does not show replies that have been marked down

3) use your own filter - it does not show interacts posted by people on your ignore list which can be set from the edit profile page.

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We want to apologize there was a software glitch yesterday afternoon which caused some replies to be set with score zero. This has now been fixed.

CHOWK STAFF,

please get rid of this scoring system or are you guys bent upon committing chowk suicide?

Feedback to Chowk`s Administration

Despite the spellbinding efforts to improve the interact features on Chowk, there is something completely missing here. It goes back to Samina`s point on making the interactors (women, in particular) feel comfortable in sharing their opinions on any subject.

In addition to that, creating an environment in which women are able to express their ideas, views and perspectives without any backlash is crucial for this ezine to survive. I am positive that none of the women frequent this place to exchange kicks and jabs . At times, it can become very annoying and you may lose your train of thought, while telling someone to ``shut up & get lost``. It`s extremely distracting when each and every subject is hijacked by the orthodox clergy on board. I have no issues with the ones who offer their views and do not try to impose them on others. I do have issues with those who try to act like party-poopers.

Apparently, there is a fear amongst some that if vocal and strong headed women started sharing their heartfelt sentiments and ideologues that may end up influencing the direction of their society. Obviously, women have a lot of power whether they realize it or not. All the more reason, some men can easily be intimidated by their natural awe.

In order for Chowk to bloom and flourish, women ought to be encouraged to contribute. By the way, there is a difference between girls and women. Just like boys and men do not fall in the same category.

Chowk should NOT represent or emulate the environment prevalent in the traditional eastern societies. That direction will do nothing but create a regressive cyber society.

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Re: # 210

Sridhar, if I may...

I checked some of your most recent posts and here are the excerpts. What value do they add to discussion at hand? What do they tell us about the interactor posting them? [Also, read back your posts and see how many times you have called Pakistan “Pak” and Pakistanis “Pakis.”]

If you were to assign a score to the interactor who posted the following remarks, what score would you assign him?


#1 The Idea of Chowk on January 27, 2005
re: the scoring system
I see that rats like Romair, Urstruly (a hindu hater) are getting good scores.
Chowk has just gotten rotten now. This place is now only infested with rats.


#2 The Middle Kingdom Wallas on January 24, 2005
re: more about this scoring system
I think this scoring system tells us a lot about the Paki mentality…Typical Paki style.
I personally say fukc the Chowk.


#3 The Idea of Chowk on January 24, 2005
re:#51 by tahmed32
Perhaps nature (or call it God) weeded out the worst elements from India in 1947 (when Pak was formed) so India can progress. I can see why this was good for India today.


#38 Let’s talk to Mallika Sherawat’s Breasts on January 10, 2005
re:#21 by bts
You are an idiot. This author has no class. That is why she seeks to shock by cheap innuendos.


#39 Let’s talk to Mallika Sherawat’s Breasts on January 10, 2005
re: this article
Cheap mindset begets cheap talk. With peanut sized brains, it is not surprising she makes such cheap statements. She has shown that she can only wallow in jealousy and self-pity.


#42 Let the People Meet on January 10, 2005
re: travel across the border
I can understand Indian muslims (some of them at least) travelling to Pak to see their relatives or just to see how things are across the border but any hindu travelling to that country ought to have his head examined by a psychiatrist.


#45 Point of View, 1971 Through Now on January 8, 2005
re:#78 by Romair
Ursltruly has made an A$$ of himself about this UN business… Urstruly, who someone in this forum said was an A-hole, goes to prove that he indeed is.


#47 Reforming Pakistan`s Universities -- II on January 6, 2005
re: another stupid article from our Paki friend


#70 Khamosh Pani Crosses the Border Noisily on December 26, 2004
re:#239 by Pakshaer
I pasted the news items from International media. What else u want?
Frikking morons like u continue to believe what your dictator tells u.

Re: # 210 Rsridher

I think you should not worry about this scoring business. I have not even tried to understand it. I am on Chowk for my own personal interest. It does not bother me who thinks what of me.

You are a very valuable member of Chowk - highly balanced and very knowledgable. And a big contributer.

So dump you anger - and take this in a much lighter vein.

nhk

Well, too many interesting features have been implemented in one go.

A few thoughts/feedback on the ``reading options``:

1. The idea of setting reading options by selecting different levels can be a useful tool to filter posts. How are the levels assigned? I think the scoring is tied to the levels. Correct me if I am wrong? That`s why I see 106 interacts with level = 2. If your numbering convention is based on the interactor vs. his or her interacts then that is an issue. The scoring should be based on the substance of the interactor`s posts vs. the interactor`s history and contributions to Chowk. I understand that will be quite cumbersome since you cannot automate it unless you are incorporating some features of artificial intelligence here. And, interestingly the scoring will vary when you go by the content of a post only. Something to look into!

2. The nested layout/threaded feature is a useful option to sift through the pertinent thread of a discussion.

3. I would recommend an update to the following:

- order = newest first and order = oldest first should be revised to ``ascending order`` and ``descending order``. The current terms seem to address the needs of those who have never used the basic features of a newsgroup, outlook email and other basics. That`s just a suggestion to make the rectangular box with a drop-down look better.

re: the scoring system
I am quite fed up with Chowk, so this may be my last post ever here. I feel sad after being here for more than 2 years and having posted more than 2000 posts.

``If an interactor is constantly at 0 or 1 (or worse, at –1), we can safely conclude that that interactor has nothing of value to say.``
I am saying that the scoring system is biased. You can go to my posts in the forum ``The middle kingdom wallahs`` and tell me if ihave nothing to say in the posts there. Even Dost Mittar agreed that the scores of 1 that i and another interactor got was unwarranted.
So, it seems scoring system has been brought in mainly to make some people bad. I see that rats like Romair, Urstruly (a hindu hater) are getting good scores.
Chowk has just gotten rotten now. I am not surprised so may good interactors have already left. This place is now only infested with rats.
So long, then.
Keep up this tamasha and let us see how long this forum lasts.
Sridhar

i miss the simple old chowk, please get rid of all the changes, including the unplugged section and return to the format and formula before, you`re going to detract new visitors because of this confusion

the best websites on the internet are the simple, user friendly ones

what the hell is this

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SameerJB ji

Nice to see you back.

SameerJB SameerJB
where have u been
you went to heaven
to look at all the asinines ?

Regards

Re: # 202
viz a viz your post-
1.
Prisoners and detainees are not held because they are `unsuitable` people. They are there because of the retributive elements of their actions. Afterall, they do get out and mingle within society while being `unsuitable`.
Saima`s point still remains that people are quarantined in real world.This happens in social unions as well, maybe less explicitly.The basis may be retribution or anything else.
This does not follow necesarily that chowk should be that way, and I will come to that later.
There are convicted sex offenders whose rights to be anonymous are being championed by civil rights organization. kaka is championing the rights of arjun and echoboom in the same way. ESPECIALLY, SINCE NOW YOU CAN USE `IGNORE` AND ` THRESHOLD` BUTTONS TO KEEP THE NEIGHBORHOODS OF YOUR COMPUTER SANCTIFIED.
This analogy cannot stand by itself because their is one additional parameter, the objective of chowk. The rights of arjuns and echobooms should not interfere with objective of chowk and how chowk sees itself. We cant assume that there is no objective of chowk.
2. Do not put too much hope in the efforts of `tax-collectors` such as the government etc to make good use of your tax-dollars and wishes. There is the Patriot Act and a sleuth of irelevant and harmful measures taken up by governments on your behalf. You need to be less trustful and demand more accountibility. Refer to post 169 to know what is at stake here.
I agree that the government`s role is debatable and besides the analogy to non cyber(i am refraining from the word real) world can only work to a certain extent.
3. You share cyberspace and indeed chowk.com with several people. Jostling with the `ignore` and `threshold` buttons will enable you to customize your view of reality as far as chowk is concerned. Empower yourself on your profile page without having to appeal to authority to ban certain interactor or remove certain posts.
4. You can create a parallel civilization for the positive sides of chowkies by going to your profile page. Nobody should leave just because arjun is insulting Mohammad and echoboom is typing angry invectives against Muslim atheists like kaka. Just type the words `arjun` and `echoboom` in the ignore space and watch their bakbak poof away.
5. You can maintain that `critical balance` by taking a chance on some interactors and letting them froth while putting others on the `ignore` cruise mood or whatever. Others shouls also have the right to keep their own `critical balances` by toggling with profile pages. The point is, there doesn`t need to be a comprehensice chowk control about it.

The threshold system depends largely on the felicity of chowk staff of rating interactors. So the god like shadow of chowk staff is always there. Chowk staff have made a very stupid beginning by rating interactors based on the articles submitted. If I had written a few articles on my pre pubescent love affair with a bespectacled girl and chowk would have published them(which is not a long shot), I would be having an interactor rating of five . Interactor rating is more of a subjective and debatable activity than screening posts containing expletives and personal attacks. The default threshold rating which lurkers see also depends on this. Currently you are rated at 1 and the lurkers would probably see all your posts.
As per the ignore button and the interactor rating as well, one can get into practical problems in a three way discussion where there is no data transfer among all the three sides of the triangle.So, this system is not as perfect as it looks.

6. Chowk does not have to be a mirror for everyone. It could be a plyground for others too.

Agreed.But chowk has to decide what it is.It cant be everything to everybody, though it may try to be.If it wants to be a playground for some, it is sure to scare off the diverse variety of people that it attracts.When it is a free for all, everyone is bound to cuss and swear from time to time.I have a feeling it will go towards having more bohemian rhapsodic people discussing some abstract issues, who are beyond any sense of id or ego and the normal people who want to discuss more mundane things like the h in shalwar would fall by the wayside.
7. The question is, do you want to work towards an ideal which limits Freedom of Expression? Do you want to work towards a Draconian ideal or an Islamic Ideal or whatever ideal? Sure the ideal probably cannot be achieved, but if you are looking for a homogenized, monolithic that everyone has to subscribe to, then kaka is going to keep writing against that ideal.
Again I support your right to write and fight and cuss(and you do not have to explain your urge,I also have that from time to time), but instead of such big ideals and big words, I think just posts using cuss words directred towards an interactor should be screened, and this is the most sensible way of attracting people from most diverse backgrounds and standings on the bohemian scale. The example is unplugged.You can easily guess what percentage of people visiting front page go to unplugged.If you call this homogenized,monolitic, maybe it is so.But it is sure to attract more different people as far as I can see. Finally, it all boils down to what chowk wants to see itelf as.Personally, I am all for insulting such figures, who are revered to such an extent that everything that they have uttered are taken to be true and immutable. Popes, prophets,saints.But I know that not many people will be able to debate anything here then.
Again, what chowk wishes to see itself as.

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Re: # 200

Saima

1 Prisons and detention centers are for the criminals not for those who hurl abusive language.

2 The real world has not been successful in preventing rapes, murders and genocide. Those are the real culprits in an uncivilized world. Abusive language does not even figure in the agenda of the institutions you cited.

3 A world where everyone is caring, well-behaved, civilized, intelligent, thoughtful, and well-read is a world beyond reality. Even in a “civilized” world not every single individual is bestowed with those characteristics.

4 Chowk, just as any self-respecting society or community, needs to set rules of conduct for its interactors, which it most certainly did in its guidelines. My take in this article is that it’s fine to screen and reject posts but not to ban interactors. I liked the idea of letting everyone have his/her say but score the interactor. If an interactor is constantly at 0 or 1 (or worse, at –1), we can safely conclude that that interactor has nothing of value to say. The real world is full of folks like that. If the Chowk interactor does not mind being in the rut with a very low score that reflects his/her inner being, then that’s fine too. It’s his/her prerogative. Others would just laugh, curl their lips in disgust, and move on. The smart ones won’t read or respond to a 0 or a 1. The point is, just like the reader who is empowered to choose which posts to read or not to read, an interactor is also empowered to say whatever he/she wants to say. No intelligent person has ever suggested banning Howard Stern, but we all know how much he is respected and paid attention to as compared to, lets say, Jim Lehrer. In the real world both exist side by side. Lehrer is happy with his dignity, Stern is happy with his stink. That’s the natural world order.

5 The problem is who decides that “critical balance”? Who’s watching the police? What’s the guarantee that the police responsible for maintaining the “critical balance” is impeccably neutral and objective? [Scoring an interactor has the same issue but is perhaps less biased than rejecting a post or banning a person.]

6 If Chowk is going to be a true mirror then it must reflect the reality of those who interact at Chowk.

Chowk will not lose authenticity by becoming civilized. The scoring system is driving towards that goal without infringing on the right of the interactor to say with complete freedom as to “how” the interactor chooses to say it. If “good” people want to leave Chowk because of the “negativity” the freedon would bring, then they should do that because they are paying too much attention to 0s and 1s. In that case, Chowk is not the only problem they have. They have major issue with the real world they inhabit.

`#200 by SaimaShah on January 26, 2005 12:52pm PT Score=4

1. The real world has a structure where unsuitable people are banned from ordinary interaction with others. Prisons and detention centers are created to keep society safe.

2. The real world is constantly being adjusted by Government, Society and Associations, to be a more fulfilling place for all of humanity. UNO, UNICEF, Charitable associations, medical doctors, newspapers, religious institutions and myraid other places contribute to this grand ideal.

3. Is the nebulous ideal of civilization as an ideal good? I believe Yes... and that I`d love to go into with you over a cup of coffee--perhaps several would be needed. In a nutshell we the people need civilization to survive.

4. Civilization with some of its contraints or actually `standards` is what Chowk needs to survive. Otherwise it will not be a safe place for people to exist as a community because it is too biased towards the negative side of humans.

5. A critical balance needs to be maintained, between throat strangling civility/suppression on the one hand and freedom.

6. Chowk is a mirror. Yes. But its reflection is powerful too.

Now the other concern that I felt you had in the sub-text..

Will Chowk lose authenticity by becoming civilized?

7. Since 1 is an ideal, it is never achieved, it is a constant process, and human nature will always fight it, I am not afraid that Chowk will become a less authentic place--there is a healthy mix of the bold and the outrageous.`


1. Prisoners and detainees are not held because they are `unsuitable` people. They are there because of the retributive elements of their actions. Afterall, they do get out and mingle within society while being `unsuitable`.

There are convicted sex offenders whose rights to be anonymous are being championed by civil rights organization. kaka is championing the rights of arjun and echoboom in the same way. ESPECIALLY, SINCE NOW YOU CAN USE `IGNORE` AND ` THRESHOLD` BUTTONS TO KEEP THE NEIGHBORHOODS OF YOUR COMPUTER SANCTIFIED.

2. Do not put too much hope in the efforts of `tax-collectors` such as the government etc to make good use of your tax-dollars and wishes. There is the Patriot Act and a sleuth of irelevant and harmful measures taken up by governments on your behalf. You need to be less trustful and demand more accountibility. Refer to post 169 to know what is at stake here.

3. You share cyberspace and indeed chowk.com with several people. Jostling with the `ignore` and `threshold` buttons will enable you to customize your view of reality as far as chowk is concerned. Empower yourself on your profile page without having to appeal to authority to ban certain interactor or remove certain posts.

4. You can create a parallel civilization for the positive sides of chowkies by going to your profile page. Nobody should leave just because arjun is insulting Mohammad and echoboom is typing angry invectives against Muslim atheists like kaka. Just type the words `arjun` and `echoboom` in the ignore space and watch their bakbak poof away.

5. You can maintain that `critical balance` by taking a chance on some interactors and letting them froth while putting others on the `ignore` cruise mood or whatever. Others shouls also have the right to keep their own `critical balances` by toggling with profile pages. The point is, there doesn`t need to be a comprehensice chowk control about it.

6. Chowk does not have to be a mirror for everyone. It could be a plyground for others too.

7. The question is, do you want to work towards an ideal which limits Freedom of Expression? Do you want to work towards a Draconian ideal or an Islamic Ideal or whatever ideal? Sure the ideal probably cannot be achieved, but if you are looking for a homogenized, monolithic that everyone has to subscribe to, then kaka is going to keep writing against that ideal.

Stop whining about the rating system. It`s been used successfully on slashdot...and slashdot has a thousand times as many users as chowk...and 10K times as many whiners..


And people complaining about their ``freedom of speech`` being violated, you don`t know what you`re talking about....

Wow.

Very thought provoking. After seven years at Chowk, I have a few thoughts on these issues.

1. The real world has a structure where unsuitable people are banned from ordinary interaction with others. Prisons and detention centers are created to keep society safe.
2. The real world is constantly being adjusted by Government, Society and Associations, to be a more fulfilling place for all of humanity. UNO, UNICEF, Charitable associations, medical doctors, newspapers, religious institutions and myraid other places contribute to this grand ideal.
3. Is the nebulous ideal of civilization as an ideal good? I believe Yes... and that I`d love to go into with you over a cup of coffee--perhaps several would be needed. In a nutshell we the people need civilization to survive.
4. Civilization with some of its contraints or actually `standards` is what Chowk needs to survive. Otherwise it will not be a safe place for people to exist as a community because it is too biased towards the negative side of humans.
5. A critical balance needs to be maintained, between throat strangling civility/suppression on the one hand and freedom.
6. Chowk is a mirror. Yes. But its reflection is powerful too.

Now the other concern that I felt you had in the sub-text..

1. Will Chowk lose authenticity by becoming civilized?
A. Since 1 is an ideal, it is never achieved, it is a constant process, and human nature will always fight it, I am not afraid that Chowk will become a less authentic place--there is a healthy mix of the bold and the outrageous.

If you want a metric, you could count & display the number of times any response was viewed.
It would be like -
veeresh (155) read--omar_quereshi (53) read-- veeresh (20)read

---

tahmed32 (39) read-- veeresh (15) read-- tahmed32 (8)read
soysauce(3) read-- harimau(3) read-- soysauce(3) read-- harimau(3)read--, etc.

The bold parts are the links that allow you to read the response in the current window or a new, popup window.
You get the idea.

..hehe.......echoboom got hit by a bolt of lightening from a representative of ba ba black sheep herd....now put a balm on the wounds made from the translation of Iqbal`s poetry, however the translation of Noon Meem Rashid`s random mix of short and long lines would be more soothing and possibly rewarding in the future......

abey oh ehmaq, aqal say paidal insaan
maghrib ki karamaat ki qadar pehchan
nehmat darazi-e-umr ammi-o-abba jan
nahi ba taur-e-wajdan-o-hadis-o-quran
bunyadon mein khirad kay qadar daan
azad khyali-e-falsafian-o-tehqeeq daan
kyun nadani peh makhmoor aye nadan
chal phoot ja kha sada ilachi wala paan

Oh and, there`s no longer any need for the preview panel under the new system. It also screws up author attribution.

chowk-staff,
I`m a cheerleader for your new system. I also agree that you have to start somewhere as far as scoring interactors goes. However, may I suggest that a good starting point is one where everyone starts out at the same point and evolve from there?
Another option would be where you show the names of the posters only without displaying the contents. A link on the side would then take you to the contents associated with that particular interactor. This would be as if we set the threshold at level=5 except that you don`t have to change anything globally to see what any particular individual has said. The advantage of this method is it would be self-governing with no human intervention, no moderation and no formulas. What do you think?
A more elaborate system would thread the interactions but that might be a huge undertaking for an established site like this one. Blog sites automatically incorporate threading feature.

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unkil veeresh: ``e) Omar will continue to try to attract my attention``


yawn -- u wish unkil -- btw i wonder if india airline meal reviews are rated this way too

#192 by Saminasha on January 25, 2005 5:25pm PT Score=2
Re: # 189

1. I mean just because Urs has a fetish for painted feet doesnt make chowk a repository of foot cleavage.

2. we`re just trying to get some justice and equality over here,


1. saminah, don`t you have the ignore button and the threshold controls? How can you claim chowk exclusively for non-kaka behaviour? Why can`t echoboom call kaka gora-goo-chaater? Why can`t he spew hatred against the llikes of kaka? If you don`t like, please please please please use the ignore button. kaka likes to read all this stuff just as he likes to watch Fox News. kaka just wants to see what the crazies are saying..

2. Does kaka have the right to ignore justice-loving people while spreading his hate messages and encouraging echoboom to hate? Would it be too much for you to put both of us on your ignore button and threshold your monitor to exclude us? kaka like to hate and incite and stuff, thankyouverymuch.

Re: # 189

Kaka,

If Kaka fancies himself the multifaceted sport, he should take his man eating, sock sniffing, pyromaniac, porn dog self to all the various sites all his Ivy League foodchain college friends frequent...I mean just because Urs has a fetish for painted feet doesnt make chowk a repository of foot cleavage. Kaka should understand that women never liked it when grown men baby talk them nor are they amused by big butt and rubber protusion jokes that seem to typify the range of Kaka and Raka and their contemporaries...we`re just trying to get some justice and equality over here, and frankly all those fart cushion jokes are kind of third grade.

Nor is Saminasha amused by Kaka`s thinly disguised attempted at dragging her female sistas into his little teapot tempest...Saminasha knows Kaka likes nothing better than to set the sistas in jello so that he can sit back and chortle to his buds how women will never get anywhere in the world because they just cant get along, but as Sadna, Farzana and Saminasha have proven time and time again, sistahood is more powerful than maxim jokes.

Finally, if it behooves Kaka to be compared with Depends Sahib, heres just another instance in which Kaka will have to learn how to share with the other kids at juice and snack time. If both Echoboom and Kaka had the idea to play with the bouncy yellow ball, then they`ll just have to learn how to get along, wont they?

And going back to the main topic......

What Chowk did is childish.... BTW i notice that FP now works like UP...... Is Chowk-Staff a bunch of slackers....... they don`t want to read peoples post and have created a system that will do their job for them....... ;)

They started this ignore feature on UP and guess what.... it backfired on those that had requested/dreamt for it. The very people that complained are the ones that have been ignored the most......

Rahul...... agreed..... read 187 for a response.

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Re: # 183
Yeah doublec, read that again.echoboom did not write that, he just bolded and underlined a few words here and there.

Re: # 185

Does not matter Echo..... how can you preach Islam and then use such language...... it sounds hypocritical......
She spoke her mind you do the same without insulting a women.......
Islam does not teach such things and you know that.

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doublec:183
Did you read #174? Do you really READ!
Please check out #169 first!

You cannot erase your post now. a few words would be fine!

There you go again. Another opinion poll?!! Another scoring scale?!!

Who came up with this negative marking system? What`s wrong with a scale from zero to ten? Or better yet, make hamidm happy and have score inflation... start with zero and go up in increments of ten: 20, 30, 40... 100 Its a lot nicer to be a 20 than a 0, or a 100 than a 5. I`m sure all reasonable people will agree.

Moreover, can this system also be manipulated? Also?? What do you mean also? I mean like the star system for articles: faded stars to bright stars. Its democratic right? People power, voting rights and all that... right? Yes, right. But then Adolf Hitler and George W were also voted in were they not?

#174 by echoboom on January 25, 2005 3:40pm PT Score=1
Boombox wrote: saminah chutya aurat,


Boombox...... good job buddy.... great job...... what a hypocrite... you talk about Islam and all the bad things that are happening to it by the west and then you use such language..... dumb bloke..... go read the Koran and you`ll be shocked to know that you are not in the ``in crowd`` that you think you are part off.

You need help dude......

Re: # 178
My objection against attacking people is not ethical, just utilitarian. There are some people who feel comfortable talking without gali galoch and some who feel uncomfortable talking without gali galoch.So, in a free for all exchange of ideas, if personal gali galoch is allowed, only the latter will prevail.So, now we talk about a mirror of real world and the norms,in interest of exchange of ideas between the largest majority of people.And we are not talking about screening of posts here, but screening of interactors.One can never know when an interactor will start doing gali galoch.Everybody can do that sometime or the other,even those who do not do it everytime they disagree with someone.
While your right of gali galoch is valid in itself, it does not work out well at a place where ideas are supposed to be discussed. And about debating your statement, I thought you meant it as some form of axiomatic truth,so I asked for precedents.My bad. Now I see that it was just your opinion.Most of the discussion on that statement would follow from the above,but I may comment more on it later.

Depends Sahib,

Dont laugh too hard...diapers cost money...

Re: # 174

Re: # 173

ana,

didnt know all these factors. However, I do hope you stick around as well.

Kaka Uloo

Re: # 176

``unbridled expression and unpcness...`` ``because I have to be respectable in my real life``...yes, Kaka, Saminasha understands..and she wishes you actually had to spend at least three days as a woman, gay, progressive, person of color, or intelligent person so that you`d have something to REALLY complain about...I mean, desi, what fetters are keeping YOU from being Master of your Universe...and I mean this in the way you hate-as an entitled Desi Het Male in North America...unless your brown backside is sitting in Gitmo or in certain sections of Pakistan, you need to deal...and if your backside is in Gitmo, aint no free market gonna liberate your tired, terrorist ass, it`ll be one of those crunchy granola pc lawyers Depends Sahib is constantly expectorating about...

So unless you can explain why we have to put up with your cyber sublimation- and I mean really...I cannot believe you are WHINING about having your life...because you have some misguided notion of what ``freedom of speech`` is -which ironically something your diaper bud would outlaw The Very Second he was made Ayatollah, you need to scrape together some legitimate ideas before you get the gasface...


Note to Echoboom Sahib: Do not try Urban Slang at home without Adult Supervision.

#177 by rahul_capri on January 25, 2005 4:08pm PT Score=2

1. `You dont seem to want to realize the difference between attacking ideas and attacking people. But that actually figures. Most of your cheerleaders are because of your gali galoch.`

2. ``The `freedom of expression` is EXACTLY FOR THE PEOPLE who might be seen to violate the normative standards of respectful conduct.``
Can you give some examples from history?`

1. kaka realizes the difference and he wants to admit both attacks to be free from editorial/technological based removals. Why should the cheerleaders not enjoy kaka`s amazing facility in gaalum galoch. O mairay bhy, you have the `ignore` and `set your own threshholds` controls now. Using those controls, what the fukk do you care if a tree fell under the chowk thicket and YOU DID NOT HEAR IT? Why do you care? kaka`s awesome fluidity with gaaliyaaN and insights delights and educates a certain audience. What is saminah`s problem if she can use the controls on her profile page NOT TO SEE IT? Yay kyaa nosy maa-zoori hay k, you have to read every friggin` thing that kaka posts.

2. There are exactly zero point zero examples of what kaka is talking about. Or maybe there are some... Why does kaka have to quote Quran, hadeeth, history and Nehru`s speeches to support a great idea which on the face of it seems good. What kind of intellectual maazoori drives you to look for precedents. It is a good idea because because.. let kaka see you argue against it..

maazoori = handicap

Re: # 169
You dont seem to want to realize the difference between attacking ideas and attacking people. But that actually figures. Most of your cheerleaders are because of your gali galoch.
``The `freedom of expression` is EXACTLY FOR THE PEOPLE who might be seen to violate the normative standards of respectful conduct.``
Can you give some examples from history?

`1. I would certainly wish you the experience of being treated the way you think can treat other self respecting interactors...


2. ...here`s my question-where else in society do the pervs run the system?

3. I mean, if the pedophiles are actually restricted from children so that they cant assault them, why on earth do you think you should be given run of the children`s hospital corridor?

4. Reading your posts is like watching a really bad Law and Order Suv episode...`



1. kaka knows it can be bad. Maybe kaka has gone through it, maybe not BUT BUT BUT BUT the Freedom of Expression overrides all such hurts.. Your agenda of womanhood and respect is great and wahwah but do not champion or explain away the Freedom of Expression cause, because you are not worthy. kaka is ready to concede that he fails on championing the women`s rights too. Not that you have to reciprocate.. but just know your auqaat in the intellectual discourse..

2. Why does the discourse on a website have to mirror the society? It could easily be worse or better. The appeal to correspondence to society is an intellectually negligent AKA `first thoughs.. best thoughts` argument. You have trained yourself to be intellectually negligent and scraped up some pride in it.

3. `Why on earth, you ask?` BECAUSE BECAUSE BECAUSE BECAUSE, this is a marketplace of ideas. Of unbridled, non-PC discourse. Of words and pictures. Not real life of tsunamis and theaters with compromising fire exits. Echoboom needs the freedom. kaka`s crazed head needs freedom. kaka is too respectable in real life to mouth off his kakaness. kaka has great ideas which nobody in real life listens too cos kaka is just too cute to be taken seriously. etc.

4. You need to grow up and quit deriving moral lessons from TV, chile! Keep on reading what kaka has to say and uneducate yourself.

all of echoboom`s posts are cases in point as to how the front page will continue to be polluted, and people will just leave him be. is everyone going to ignore the great boomblast according to this system. . . i suspect the answer will be no.

and kaka. . . you really do need to grow up. heckling and harassing to the point of verbally assaulting certain women as if you were standing on the streetcorner of sharah-e-quaid-e-azam next to a coca-cola stall really is asinine and infantile. obviously decorum and discipline are completely lost upon you. but one needs a mind for that, doesn`t one?

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samina,

keep wondering. :)

even the loveliest and cleanest of parks have people who are a dangerous menace to women. and i make my choices who to avoid and who not to, which park to go to and which one not to. some people do pick up after their doggies, and yanni is not godforsaken to everyone. . .

i have been on the verge of being assaulted in a park, heck in my own lawn, and i turned around and hightailed it out of there. it wasn`t for wearing a burqa or jeans. if you are in any way suggesting that i would be supporting assault by objecting to this silly scoring system, i would suggest that you think again. . . i don`t like what a lot of people particularly the men have to say here on chowk in regards to women, in regards to races and cultures. and i have made that known. but i am not going to support a system here that will judge an interactor`s opinions to be valid or invalid by keeping numerical score.

one of these very abled staff people of chowk told me once when i complained about a certain interactor, that he had the right and the freedom to express his opinion here. i don`t see this current implementation as supporting such a stance. it isn`t just about weeding out the assaulters who should have action taken against them. i think some people here see that.

of course feel free to arrive at what conclusions you may about my response, just as i have about this system. i, however, will not be around to respond to your wonderings any longer. thanks.

Hello Everybody:

I came on Chowk after a long time and decided to see if I have not been kicked out. It seems that all is well.

And Chowk looks great. It is showing lot of creativity.

Although I agree with the writer, I also hope that this scientific methodology of scoring works. This methodology bodes well for the future. If successful, it can be applied to determine the scores of political and religious leaders, journalists and what have you, bringing in income for the Chowk staff who designed the system.

However, I have a question for Chowk staff: Is this scoring subjectivly done by say 1 person or 2 or a group of your staff or do you have a business intelligence (or comparable) tool supporting the methodology? :-)

For the rest of us posters, I suggest that we be ourselves and forget all about the scores. For example, if this writer Godot had written an article claiming every thing is wrong with Pakistan (which I distinctly recall he once did a year or so ago), I would have forgotten all about the scores in a jiffy hahaha.

Btw, compared to Australia, the weather in the northern USA and Canada stinks. I feel aweful for Americans living in the New England states and those living anywhere in Canada. I wish you all a very happy shoveling of snow ;-)

Re: # 169

Kaka,

I would certainly wish you the experience of being treated the way you think can treat other self respecting interactors...but you get off on it, and thats the trouble...here`s my question-where else in society do the pervs run the system? I mean, if the pedophiles are actually restricted from children so that they cant assault them, why on earth do you think you should be given run of the children`s hospital corridor?

Reading your posts is like watching a really bad Law and Order Suv episode...

Re: # 167
O khotay!
Just hang around. The fun has just started.
You won`t be disappointed by the new gali gloch.

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Re: # 164

Ana,

In which park do you prefer to walk?

One where you will be assaulted for wearing your jeans and/or burqa or one where it doesnt matter and you are respected? Are your parks du jour filled with ``representatives`` of ``authentic`` nations, or people who are just hoping to go for a run, feed the birds, exit a quick dash, or smell the flowers? Is your park filled with people who throw trash everywhere, refuse to pick up after their dogs or insist on playing their godforsaken Yanni all day? Do you have a position for or against the teenagers smoking weed by the bench near the trees, or do you think the bird droppings on the park founder`s statue should be left on it for ``reality``?

Just wondering, here...

rodents. code coolies, carpet weavers and ayatollahs ..........

......now that everyone has vented and the code coolies who dwell with the rodents in the subterranean sewers that lie beneath the chowk have had their fun, let`s all get on with the usual mudslinging, muckraking, baiting, jugglery, pedantic sophistry, intellectual chicanery and plain old name-calling ............

....... and echoboom, you can keep up your rant against the gora-goo-chaaters (white shit lickers, for the convent educated) but you need to come up with some new invective (gali, for the madrassa educated), vituperation (galoch) and terms of endearing approbrium (laanat malaamat) for the baa baa black sheep ......... your usual tirades do not seem to bother dheet (shameless, for the convent educated) farangi-parasts (whiteman worshippers) ........... actually i kind of like the name abdoolamreeka and am seriously thinking of adopting it as my nick on chowk .......

........ as for the chowk code coolies - guys, you are doing a great job, but just don`t get carried away ......... i know you little men with thick glasses and bad hair are always striving for perfection with your little jars of java beans, but like the carpet makers of qum, who deliberately weave in a flaw, don`t forget that only god is perfect ........ don`t be like the ayatollahs who live on the other side of the tracks and who think they know everything ................ they don`t know goo ..........

Deleting posts is one thing, but kicking people out all together is different. So yea, this makes chowk suck quite a bit. It`s almost like an on-line totalitarian government :) But anyways there is no real purpose for this post, I jsut wanted to see how this new rating feature works.

This article must be a real record setter, 165 posts on an article that`s been up for only two days.

CHOWK-STAFF:
If you are sincere and truly believe not be an oppresor (like western THUGS) then:

Get rid of your Vardee. Let the inter-actors wrest from you the ability to comment or rate
posts.

Let other interacors rate posts . You already have the star-rating system in place. Just move that to where you have the ``set reading options``, the shudar-brahmin ,,system.

If you want others to speak their minds just get the hell out of their way..do not make your oppressive presence like the U.S``let more bodybags come`` THUGS.

Also if you keep CHOWK desi, get rid of this leafy-glade inn , Gymkhana kind of farangi-hangup ghulaam-mentality. Put Bano bazaar, Anarkali, Sadar Bazaar, Quisaa Khwani, Darul-Uloom etc instead.

Introduce or facilitate Urdu and Hindi sections..even others, if demanded. It is time we remove this illusion & delusion that to look/talk western=necessarily modern/educated.

with all due respect to the ``good`` intentions of the chowk-staff, there is no such thing as an unpolluted park, or an unpolluted environment anywhere. and what sameer rightly refers to a ``quantitative favoritism mix scale`` that has been developed is not going to change the environment.

of course certain interactors who refer to weeding out the trash mouths here, sound hypocritical at best, but if they are the ones happy. . . i wish them the best. as for me, my participation at the front page was minimal at best, and this numbers system has taken care of that for me. i too, will not be part of a ``quantitative favoritism mix scale``.

happy fortune to chowk.

p.s. sameeroo, you are missed!

The feedback here has been incredible, which can only mean that we will continue to improve this system.

The goal simply is to keep Chowk as the most open, free, and thriving environment for interaction. The fact is that Chowk has been growing steadily at a rate of 20% per month. The challenge for us is to sustain this growth without letting it dilute the quality of interaction, which is what we are trying.

In our role as facilitators we have seen over and again that Chowk is a self correcting organism (if I may call it so). For this reason, instead of emphasizing moderation we have favored these new features which are meant to be tools in this process.

One way of looking at it is that, while some of us like all the smells and sights of a Chowk, others prefer a walk through an unpolluted park. The reality probably is that we all like these things at different times. And the flexibility of these features lets us do exactly that.

So thank you all for your feedback, we will work with it for we are in this journey together with you.

#145 sameer singh JB

``Chowk is helpless in stopping people from choosing usernames which are an invitation to bad language............ Chowk and chowkies do not seem to have any problem with these usernames....... The person, by vitrtue of choosing a provocative id is inviting people to discuss matters related to id.``

I agree with you brother .... talking of provocative ids, there was this douche nozzle who created this nick ``allah_mian`` and tried to bait people with highly provocative/degrading posts.

Do you happen to know the real identity of this idiot?

see chowk staff, I told you.....

It`s all Pakistanis around here now, talking to and with each other. You have alienated Indoos and it seems that they have all left after venting their spleens/other internal organs. There is still time, some of them might be lurking around, so why don`t you add +2 or more to all Injun sounding nicks? You can start by adding +5 to anyone with the last name Lingam.....

Re #145
Hey Sameer.. good to see you back and Amen to wat you wrote.

cheers

RE: 147.
``Ever notice how interactors who can conduct themselves articulately and respectfully never complain about their ``freedom of expression`` being denied them? Its only the really abusive interactors who do...``

This is an argument no person who value free speech will ever make. I can see these very same words used by a Mulla in a Karachi masjid. Change the social background and this argument falls apart. Pathetic.

echosqueek aka farangi obsessed aka afaqui the arab worshipper aka chawwal: ja mooN dho, leecher.

saminasha: please diligently apply yourself to your studies. i have every expectation of your attaining the black belt (=5).

hamidm #154 congratulations on reaching level 3. i knew you could do it. (of course i was there all along). ha! ha!

and i see sameerjb has been reincarnated as freddy kreuger. he must have done some mischief in his previous incarnation. anyway, welcome back sameerjb. hope you are not mad at me still.

Re: # 154

Now now, Brother Hamid, you know I`m a ``first thought, best thought`` kind of writer...I cant even bother with punc most of the time...and I have nothing to do with any of this, neither do I know the chowk staff and nor do I have banning power, despite what mice like catch out say when their friends start posting explicitly obscene interacts...and you are right, I cant get it up for echo sahib, no matter how I try to bother him....I get distracted by this world of manifold richness...

Dear Chowkies,

Please note that I received a 3 on my post #148. It was a proud moment that fizzled out like froth on a pint of beer (froth on a puddle of camel piss, for the madrassa educated) when on the very next post i was relegated back to a one. It proves my theory that the chowk staff has come up with an ingeneous engine that screens your posts for proper punctuation and automatically gives you a 3 or better if all the commas and periods are in place. The corollary to this theory is that Saminasha is an advisor to the chowk and is out to get people who mess with her sensibilities as an english teacher.

So to be on the safe side you don`t have to watch your p`s and q`s but watch out for commas and hypens. This is so much fun !

sameerjb,

........... good to see you are still ``lurking``......... i think you should come back to chowk to get echo riled up enough so that he will blow himself up and put himself out of his misery ........... saminasha tries, but she is not half the man you are, even though according to islamic law she is ....................and who is going to take up the cudgels on behalf of panjabiyat ? ........... i can`t even remember what they call those darn things that the pehalwans carry around...........

What win happen to Ms. Ban sha? How will she threat those who are not on her side of wall?

Re: # 149

``friends for Depends!``

Re: # 145

Sameer,

I completely misunderstood your post-please ignore the previous response. I also hope you decide to come back to chowk.

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Chowk Staff,

I would like to thank you for trying to instill some discipline and order on chowk.

In my opinion, things were getting a little out of hand, with every aira waghaira Nathu Khaira (Tom, Dick and Harry for the convent educated) polluting the limited cyberspace. It is my understanding that cyberspace pollution is not only using up te finite number of bits and bytes, but also contributes to global warming.

There were just too many jesters, clowns and social upstarts who were engaged in mere lufange-bazi (cockamamie, for the convent educated) as opposed to serious dialog and discussion. This scoring system will ensure that we are not exposed to the rantings and ravings of lunatics like arjun and echo and, over time, we will begin to appreciate the intellectual stimulation provided by true intellectuals like Dost Mittar, Vereesh, Farzana, Tahmed, Romair and Urstruly. Unscrupulous people who violate the laws of english by ignoring proper capitalization and punctuation will be banished to protect our children.

We must remember that writing on the chowk is a privilege and not a right - a lot of people have abused this privilege in the past. We must make sure that the sanctity and purity of this site is preserved for future generations. I am sure that, over time, all the nay-sayers will see the folly of their errant ways and, instead of criticizing the chowk staff for instituting this much needed discipline, they will strive to improve the quality of their posts. I, for one, am prepared to do my part.

Sincerely,

HamidM

Re: # 145

So YOU say...no female interactor uses these terms as freely and easily as male interactors...in other words, you want to curse and act the Raj...and it really bothers you when boundaries are set up to limit your flaming...which amuses you and no one else...all behind the ruse of ``freedom of expression``...


Ever notice how interactors who can conduct themselves articulately and respectfully never complain about their ``freedom of expression`` being denied them? Its only the really abusive interactors who do...

This system is good..... very very good..... anything that lights a fire under so many Indoo tails must be very very good.......

God help Sri Lanka though!

Desi-ism has failed to live up to the challenges of interactive, discussing and debating on the internet. No matter what chowk-staff tries, the desi-ism has limited to perhaps its current optimum level. It was greatest tragedy of desis to be put under one roof during 1000 years of turk-afghan-anglo colonisalism and under two roofs for the last 57 1/2 years. For such a diverse mix of people, this tragedy has left them to limit discussions to India, Pakistan, Islam and Hinduism because there are no other least commom denominators except of course poverty, immature, nasty and snbbish behavior.

There are at the most 2-3 thousand desis involved in any kind of interactive discussion and debate on all the exclusice desi websites wth about 100-200 at chowk. Most desis use internet for e-mail, music, games and abusing each other. In one of the recent scientific survey of number of hits, chowk came a bit lower than a website apnaorg.com where only 10 people are involved in discussion on the back page but the front page provides music, articles and poetry.

However, it does not mean that chowk is totally innocent and chowkies are wholly responsible. This rating system devised by chowk reveals the shortcoming of chowk. It reveals the total number of active participants (about 100-150) as well as a rating system that is 66-75 percent quantitative and 25-33 percent favoritism with zero qualitative contribution.

Additionally chowk is better off without guidelines than the following guidlines.

1. Please refrain from abusive language and swear words
2. Please refrain from personal attacks on writers and respondents
3. Please refrain from frivolous statements that are inflammatory towards any race, nationality, ethnicity or religion
4. Please refrain from abusing the interaction spaces with plugs and unsolicited publicity for other websites and on-line and off-line services

Chowk can not implement guideline number 1, no matter what. They can not retrieve the arrow back to the bow that was released 3 days earlier. It is a joke to delete post or suspend a username on delayed basis.

One can not refrain from personal attack once an interactor asks, request, incite or challenge others with fists clinching. Chowk is helpless in stopping people from choosing usernames which are an invitation to bad language, such as shaitan, devil, iblees, khanzeer, child-molester, incubus, succubus, harami-ka-pilla, semen-asha, nigger, slave etc to name few. Chowk and chowkies do not seem to have any problem with these usernames, then what is the use of asking others to regrain from using bad language. The person, by vitrtue of choosing a provocative id is inviting people to discuss matters related to id.

Guideline number 3 is utter nonsense. It is lopsided in favor of religions. It does not provide a level playing filed for free debate. One can love religion but not hate, one can like religions but cant dislike and one can highlight virtues but not the vices and one can promote hate for other under the cover of morals and ethics of judeo-christian-islmic faiths but cant criticize and ridicule for the bizzare nature and extensions of these values. People can justify endlessly the allowance of 4 marriages to a man according to islam but stating ``mohammad would have allowed 6 wives per man, if viagra was known and available to him`` would cause immediate outcry from chowk staff.

Since chowk is following more or less judeo-christian-islamic ethics with a twist of 18-19 century Lucknow in UP, India, easiest way to wake up chowk staff to action is sex talk and use of sex related words. What is more harmful to a person, sex talk or promotion of religion - islam? A 15-16 year old lurker here could satrt taking religion seriously, starts praying regularly and getting involved in other religious activity and ending up making a ``B`` or ``C`` grade instead of an ``A`` grade. A lurker might start hating everybody in civilized world and one day rises to a decision-making position in Pakistan, thereby hurting the interest and lifestyle of Pakistanis. A lurker might become a zombie reading echoboom, urstruly, mbz isphani, naqshbandi, atif2, catch-22 or dr. batti (32). But this is all ok for chowk staff. Whereas sexual language and open sex talk can do none of the above. Chowk is dead wrong in allowing proselytizing and promoting islam than coming down hard on sex. A mullah preaching from hispulpit can destroy the lives of many perishoners who take his sweet talk seriously but the naked and nude figurines on temples in Ujjain and few other places have never casued increase in rape, incent, infidelity or unwanted pregnancies. Sex talk is bad but promotional religion talk is worse: it could be a fatal attraction as well.

For few who might not recognize me, I am sameerJB and not coming back to participate or put myself to quantitative and favoritism mix scale.

Response scoring is one of the best ideas Chowk Staff has come up with. The readers who rate an article are far more biased (it’s a given that some of them rate an article “1” the moment they see who the author is) than Chowk Staff who is going to score responses.

The scoring system places no constraint as to which responses the readers want to read. The readers are empowered. What the system accomplishes is that it separates those who tread the low road versus those take the high road. It separates the noble from the ignoble, good from bad, fresh from rot. The scoring system makes it clear who we are from inside. It’s quite obvious, then, why some interactors are going to hate this system!

No banning of people and no censorship of what one has to say and how he/she says it. The scoring system says it all about the interactor!

This is brilliant! Congratulations, Chowk Staff! It’s a winner! It’s democratic, it’s open, and it puts the interactor in his/her place. One more compelling reason why Chowk is so much better than any other web site to visit and interact.

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CHOWK-STAFF:

This is nothing but Unplugged with orange/red alerts of ashcroft[which some mistake as score card]. Shut down unplugged and i-logs now.

It will be mayhem here . You`ll soon find out.

Your desire to be westoxicated on Desi territory will never be accepted or tolerated.
You may call it a ``SQUARE`` or ``ROUNDABOUT``--but please, do not call it ``CHOWK`` if your craving is to be a goraa-goo-chaater.

Re: # 127
rahulmal :

as you are having a dialup connection giving you lagging time for downloading pages having graphics mostly due to pics of interactors on chowk. So a remide is that go to you Internet Explorer menu `Tools` Go to `Internet Options...` And in it go to `Advanced` And in `Multimedia` section uncheck `Show Pictures` box.
By doing this you will not be able to download pictures no matter which site you visit.

So that would be a good idea to make chowk graphicless than change your browser settings.

Re: # 76

Amit,

Listen, we`ve been trying to send Echo to Afghanistan for years...but he insists the REAL oppression occurs at Starbucks and Burger King...

Re: # 126 he is indeed a fine poet.

Should auld acquaintance be forgot,
And never brought to mind?
Should auld aqcuaintance be forgot,
And days o` lang syne?

For auld lang syne, my jo,
For auld lang syne,
We`ll tak a cup o` kindness yet,
For auld lang syne.

And surely ye`ll be your pint-stowp
And surely I`ll be mine,
And we`ll tak a cup o` kindness yet,
For auld lang syne.

rahul: as one who posts pics sometimes, my apologies for slowing your dial-up connection down. i know this is a problem for many posters, particularly in pakistan (and i assume india as well).

i dont post pictures too frequently though, and will become even more careful in future.

Oh now i get it. i need to change my reading options. :P
#130 Who gave Chowk staff 3? and how are our scores determined?

Re: # 1

well okay...its Day Two...and the conversation here is lively...and so I am willing in all goodwill to Give This A Try...esp. since the scoring system has added yet another component of unintentional hilarity...thanks Chowk Staff for trying to make this a site that is responsive to its readership-this is a prfoundly admirable trait.

In addition,

I would like to make a very public apology to Godot for any unpleasantness in the past on my part. Godot, I saw your picture and you seem like a really nice person. We have different ways of looking at the world, and I accept that and the fact that I can live with that and still appreciate you. Best in all your endeavors, esp. your writing.


(chowk staff, dont you dare give me a higher score for this post!)

woh sub tau theek hai... but whats wrong with ciprams interacts?

Here`s what I think will happen:-

a) The moaning and groaning on interact levels shall go on and on, but I don`t see it impacting matters.

b) Much of the intelligent and instant gratification stuff that was going to iLog and UP will now get back to the Front Page.

c) Some hard-working chowk-staff validating interacts will get a much needed break.

d) The ``nick`` or ``handle`` will take on a value which will be lost if the nick/handle is banned. Ahem.

e) Omar will continue to try to attract my attention.

f) I shall run book on the first person to reach 5 stakes.

I don`t know about rounds and squares. I just know chowk is organic.

Happy Republic Day to everybody . . .

Re: # 31

chowk staff,

why did this post get a ``three`` when my overall score is a ``2``?

Goshdarnit, this is bringing out the approval needing Lisa Simpson in me...

Re: # 125

misunderstood everywhere, are we?

Re: # 71

abey shankar dr. sahib, is that really you???

Re: # 52

chowk staff gets a score of three? why not five? so cute...

i don`t like this scheme.
it means we have to interact only to please chowk staff.

so i failed in test i accept.

Chowk-staff,

I would appreciate if you can also do something about the pics uploaded in interacts. For people like me who use dial-up connetion, the loading of page takes much longer due to pics. If someone must post images as part of interacts, they are welcome to put that in their personal space and put a link in the interacts.

124, yes, tahmed32....burns is nice ...a similar sentiment here....

And surely ye`ll be your pint-stowp,
And surely I`ll be mine,

I think staff should remove abusive and ojectionabe post but not banned them.
individual should have intellectual and emotional liberty for the full flowering of his genius.
please don`t behave like our society.and not snatch the right of self-expression.

rsridhar #85 In response to your post, let me repeat the poem by John Burns:

O wad some Pow`r the giftie gie us
To see oursels as others see us
It wad frae monie a blunder free us
An` foolish notion

You may think that Romair or Urstruly dont deserve a 3 or a 4, but the referee does not. And I am prepared to accept the referee`s decision on chowk like I would on the cricket field - one has to be a better sport about it and have the humility to appreciate what Robert Burns is talking about above.

I think what overrides any perceived incorrect ratings is the fact that Chowk Moderators are providing some incentive to write more maturely (not start off with abuse and referring to other posters one does not agree with as ``dogs``, for example, as echoboom does) and intelligently. And I just love the fact that arjun gets a 0, which is exactly where he stands in my view. Perhaps the rating system will lead to some posters leaving chowk (and good riddance, as far as I am concerned), or better yet lead them to do some introspection (and thus improve the quality of their posts) - and also encourage the truly fun, intelligent posters to come to chowk. Bottom line - chowk could well increase its ``user base`` as a result over time.

One make make constructive suggestions to make the ratings system more objective over time. But let us not throw the baby out with the bathwater.

See post 120 to see what I mean!

urstruly see it from the chowk staff POV. They need to do two things simultaneously-

(a) reduce their current overheads
(b) increase hits

They have to do this without the abusive, racist, bigoted and plain boned-headed content increasing (purely from a commercial PoV). And so far 120 posts tell me that it has not as yet happened. Even UP is silent. Tell me which other methods would a better job. They have hit upon a very good scheme.

My pont is how long before the whole thing collapses under the weight of its contradictions. As other have pointed out you are going to get groups form who will hunt to tgether to generate the posts and scheme to get their ratings up. This is bound to happen withing the next month or so. My prediction is before long (just as it has happened to the ignore function - where everyone was monitoring everyone) everyone will set the level in the filter to -1.0 - just to see the fun.

To all those wanting to leave, I guess you are on the same level as those who wish to ``improve`` their interaction quality to improve their rating.You are choosing to get affected by the rating system. Besides, I would stil give chowk-staff about a week to see what they make out of this. Not that I would leave after that, but maybe this system may make more sense or it maybe shelved . I certainly hope for the latter.
One more thing, chowk-staff, please dont try to change interactors for something as facetious as a chowk-rating.If somebody starts posting differently because of this, they probably do not believe in what they write and dont belong to such a forum.
Cut out explicit personal abuses, but I cant think of anything else that should be stifled or rated for.

Re: # 116

Chowk Staff,

Unfortunately I can still read dotty`s and urs`s posts. And since I`ve become the cyber version of a rubbernecker, I cannot help but witness their lethal doses of personality as I scroll by. Please do something about this, thanks!

This is the biggest cop-out since the allies tried appease the nazis. The way I see it is

(a) chowk staff found banning almost impossible
(b) chowk staff found that filtering poststhemselves lead to long time delays - which at times was not acpetable
(c) there was not enough managedcontroversy on chowk to generate the heat and interest.

So they came up with this little trick. Give the punters the ownership by having a filter - this way they can see what they want to see - at the same time reduce their overheads and also at the same time generate the desired managed controversy.

They have managed to do all of this with one sleight of hand. Bravo brains behind this. You guys are amazing. You have done all of this through the filter, and ensure that there will controversy by the ratings mechanism. Now people will

(a) talk to kingdom come here and on UP about this ratings business and who is doing what
(b) Generate more immediate interest - esp after the banning episodes and interact ignore lists did not generate sufficient interest.

I must commend you whiz-kids for this wheeze. Bravo. Bravo.

Now just one more request please add some smilies (emoticons here as well please).

I feel embarassed by my score. Any system which gives a `1` to hamidm and a `4` to yours truly is patently absurd; that the chowk staff says that hamidm rocks just confirms the absurdity of the system instead of proving its fairness.

Re: # 116

I would rather use my scroll key. The current method stifles debate.

115, URSTRULY I agree with your sentiments here.

however, note that there is freedom for the user to select the posts he/she wants to read.All you need to do is to set the level in the filter. To see all the posts just set the level to the last level and viola yousee all the posts. I found seting it at a high value just demeans the whole experience of sitting on the neighbourhood chowk.

That way I see it , chowk, is like the local road intersection, and I am sitting in the chai-shop at the junction watchingthe world go by and occasioanlly interesting things happen. If I dont like what is there I turn my back and face the kitchen to see what is happening there (in this case UP).

The reallly serious censorship was when the chowk staff at the behest of a few liberal arts mafia started banning all and sundry at a mere whim. That was bad. Now this lame mafia doesnot have much to complain about. Ofcourse they are going get involved in the ratings - but so what - the posts are there and it up to us to read them or not.

Chowk Staff

This morning when I turned the PC on, I was shocked to see that this scoring system is still in effect. I thought it was just a bad joke that will go away overnight but......

What in God`s good name you people are doing. They way you are muzzling people, is is unacceptable. I would appeal to your good conscience in the name of humanity that you must dismantle this system of gagging people. Please re-instate all interactor`s account and allow them to interact. You may keep the scoring system as a tool for peer evaluation but do not use it to stifle us. We have come from countries where we have seen times where ``bhonknaiN ki azadi bhi nahiN thi`` as the Quratulain Haider once said. please do not let those dreadful days come back. Why it has become our second nature to re-invent wheel for every little thing we do.

Please re-instate all interlocutors` accounts.

Thank you

and i see that I am a #1

do i still rate a mention?

Re: # 103

That is a typical reaction to this scoring system...........It is going to ensure that people change their opinions in a manner they appear respectable to the Chowk profilers...........good heavens..this is a subtle way to force the square pegs into the round holes...............but, I am in no mood to take this..............It appears that people want the Chowk to be a nice little Pakistani club where everybody agrees that secularism is about Islamizing the Western Institutions.....................Sorry, I am out of it.................

I remain whole-heartedly supportive of the ratings system. Way to go, chowk staff!! I think the ratings system is exactly what chowk needs to end the evil reign of Gresham`s Law on chowk (``bad currency drives out good``), whereby vocal but empty-headed and/or rude posters dominate while decent and intelligent posters are driven away. In due course this may well make Chowk the kind of a website where one can invite one`s real life friends and family to join for some real humor, real discussions on political and social issues.

CHOWK STAFF: Even as many people say that the rating system should be taken away, the vast variety of chowk interactors who have written posts indicates that it has gotten their attention. Because posters do care about how they are perceived by others. Maybe this will get them to start behaving a bit better on chowk and thus improve the quality of the chowk experience for all of us.

POSTERS: Lighten up. This is not the S&P or Moody`s rating which translates into financial loss or gains to you - this is merely an index of where the Chowk Moderator places you in terms of the quality of your posts. As one who is disgusted by the attitude of those who come to chowk only to insult Pakistanis, I am delighted with the rating scheme. I dont agree with all. For example: Jay getting a 2 or something?? this man whose express purpose for coming to chowk is, as he himself as proudly claimed, ``paki bashing`` should get a minus 273 (which is Absolute Zero temperature)!! But I am prepared to accept the Chowk Moderator`s ratings (even if this puts me behind Romair who I see got raised to a 4!, but what the heck - this isnt the S&P rating as I said. Something is better than nothing, and I dont buy this democracy nonsense that some posters have put forward - in sports everyone accepts the referee`s ruling even if they dont agree with it. They dont ask the sports fans in the stadium to vote.

Oh,
I must say this stupidity of Chowk Staff as ``Pre-Mind Control Strategy``.

I am just checking that what an interact initally scored. I hope it should be `nys`= `not yet scored` , as now the post gets instantly apparent on board.
And how chowk staff is mangaing every interact :
-By checking the content of each and every interact if working well with the conversation going on or with the topic going on.
Or there is an application running which is so much artificially intelligent that can give number by sensing the quality of the interact , but it must be then having many parameters and grammatical and phrase analysis that could shape intellect counting game in a programmatical way.

It seems an advanced Neural Networking application in an Artificial Intelligence manner.

I second Mr.Mitter. This is getting silly.

Chowk Staff:
Please realise your mistake and end this silly game.

Re: # 59

hey sac

i think chowk liked your ``country club`` idea ...

toodles ... dL

the bear gets an interact rating of 4 ! will wonders ever cease -- this doesnt even fit the index-matches-writer`s-(so-called)reputation category

I am not sure, to be quite honest, how to react to this new upgrade of Chowk or whether to respond at all to the newly installed interact filtering/grading system. In many ways, this change seems to be a case of shutting the stable doors after the horses have bolted.

I am not sure what is the hope, which is sought to be accomplished by this new interact grading system, because in theory this approach and the reason behind it makes sense, but nothing theoretical ever works out in reality and reality has always disappointed the most well wished hopes. Leaving aside the issue of judging interacts and assigning a numberical value to them, it would be a sad day for Chowk when its interacts are measured more by their score than by their content.

Chowk`s interact guidelines proclaim, ``please remember that the other Interactor is a person with a valid opinion...`` but to which it adds the post-script that we will judge the validity of that opinion by playing a numbers game. Chowk has embarked on a slippery slope, because it has just opened the door wide to influences of bias and even more importantly, each time a numbers game is played it de-personalizes everything. Chowk interacts were personal opinions and profane they may have been, but they were still valid opinions.

I fear that these new grading system will de-personalize the opinions and only help in creating a segregatated apartheid of opinions on Chowk. The editors were seeking to improve the level of the interacts but it seems that they have caused more damage, instead of preventing damage, to Chowk. For what it is worth, I hope that Chowk editors will remember the old irony, which suggests that tyranny always comes dressed as a savior.

In the end, there will be those who will complain and a few may even leave Chowk and there will be those, who will disregard this grading system and still speak out on issues, with which they identify strongly. In the end, this system will not matter much, because despite the numberical value of the interacts, most people on Chowk will still remember the content of a particular interact more than its arbitary numberical value and thus, Chowk will still be resisting the assult on its ``unflinching idealism``.

Ciao

Interesting new system... I am glad that I am viewed highly by the chowk staff.

Re: # 68

Welcome to the new world of profilers.............now everything would get profiled...the idea is to use the scare of the few (Salim bin Laden) to police and control every one........

Re: # 100

Oye, what`s wrong with chai-paani and maska? See it as a unifying factor. Nothing unites subcontinentals more than chai-paani & maska: it`s a truly subcontinental specialty! Chowk Zindabad!

Re:mubakr#99

First we saw someone offer a bribe. Now we have flattery!!

So this is the strategy to improve your score?

CHOWK IS A GREAT SITE. NO MATTER WHAT.

We should all be grateful for having a place to vent out instead of criticizing it left, right and center. Most of the sites I have visited are bascially a plethora or content and details. Juxtaposing them with Chowk would be unfair given the sense that precedes the basic idea of this site.

AND finally, Chowk, to the best of my understanding and knowledge, has never absolved itself to improving the site. After all, we do WE, the interactors, really give them back with?

THANK YOU, THE BRAINS BEHIND CHOWK!

i am disappointed, dejected, discouraged, and depressed that chowk staff deems my valuble interacts to nothing more than a score of 1. i demand re-rating. i also demand to know the identity of those who rated me. some heads need to roll here.

this is a test. nothing but a test. so help me god.

(dear god, let my rating be at least 3)

Re:Romair#95

Romiar, you ingrate!! You forgot to thank the vast hordes of Indians who relentlessly debated you and sharpened your skills as a debator/orator. Without us, your only intellectual challenge would be debating the hadith with urstruly, another 3 by the way :-)

Hmmm........I am a 3......I don`t want to rub it in. But well, what the heck..3 baby, 3,3,3,3!!....I don`t see too many threes out there. Quite the honor.

I would like to thank my parents for always telling me to never settle for being a 1 or a 2. I would also like to thank Bulleh Shah and Mirza Ghalib. I would like to thank my agent, my director, my publisher, my high school teacher, my producer, and my co-stars, without whom none of this would have been possible. I would also like to thank the Hollywood foreign press. And of course, I would like to thank Chowk Staff (whomever you maybe) for this great honor......

To the 0s, I say, while I may be ranked much higher than you, I will always fight for your right to speak. Chowk Staff, if 0s are cut, do they not bleed? Do they not turn into 8s?....To the proletariat 1s, I promise you I will never forget you - the common man. For I started out as a 1, myself. To the bourgeoise 2s, I would like to say, keep at it, and someday you may also be a 3 (probably not, but well....)

To the 3s, lets meet at the country club, where we must decide our secret handshake....

I do not like this system. As chowk management from USA management they are doing like western food processing. First you take food, devitaminise, deminaralise it , decolor it then add again good elements vitamins and minerals etc but then its not real tasty organic food, but just plastc food. But management is one who has put effoert and money so they have write to decide. Take it or leave.

hello.........this is a test........

Interesting, smart move by Chowk staff!! Back on chowk after a real long time and find lot of good work happening.

Re: # 89

LOL.;. Please tell me where and when the line forms.

Re: # 86

hamidm, at least there is a new topic to post about. veeresh and dost-mitter are 4, there is definitely a bias towards indian who do not post anything provocative against the pakistanis. If one had been to pakistan, claim some pak heritage, that also definitely counts, no other way that the above two could have got rating 4. Boring and insipid posts may rate highly.
poor arjun, he may as well thrown down the bow and arrow and wait for cosmic interpretation of chowk from tahmed.
hamidm, dont loose heart, your rating will go up with so much of support.

Pssst chowk-staff, score badha sakte hain? Chai paani ho jaaye? Sifarish doon?

#85 rsridhar
<< Makes me feel it is time to grow up ... >>

The only intelegent thing you have ever said.

This rating system is pretty lame.
More often than not, the articles on chowk are mediocre,to say the least.One can find infinitely better articles elsewhere.Lets face it, most of the people come here to interact and exchange thoughts.So,rating interactors based on articles submitted is lame.
This has succeeeded in putting off many people.I dont know what useful purpose has it served other than that.The whole concept of grading is so kindergarten. Plus, there should be some more transparency in how the interactors are rated. Perhaps a case study of how some interactors are rated zero and below?
I have set my threshold to the lowest level and pretending that this thing does not exist. If it is like a necessary evil and cannot done away with, I would support everybody starting at a common level.

arjun,

sorry, but i can`t read your posts any more ..........i refuse to read anything written by a zero !............. it was good knowing you........ i hope you can find another hobby ..........

......... and saminash, stop smirking because you received a 2 on your report card - pride hath its fall !

re:#51 by tahmed32
Urstruly, Romair get scores of 3,4 on an average. I consider them both below average. However, some genius sitting on Chowk staff thinks otherwise. Makes me feel it is time to grow up and leave Chowk.
Sridhar

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With the new policies, I think ``Guantanamo Bay`` is a better name than ``Chowk``. For the lexically challenged, one could use a shorthand such as ``Gitmo``.

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echo,

....... why are you so angry ?.......... it is not our fault that you were abused at the madrassa ........

I ignore posts from certain folks because they are predictable. I ignore posts from certain folks because they cannot write sentences in legible English. I think as a poster I need to have the choice of reading or not reading certain posts.

Re:jay#78

Holy Cow!! First urstruly at 3 and now jay at 2. Looks like we are living in bizarro world here :-)

Chowk staff

I have noticed with dismay, the number of interacts plummeting on chowk. It is not due to the presence of obnoxious posts, it is rather due to the absense of provocative posts. This is chowk, a typical south asian street with its chaos, confusion and the variety, not a street with dress codes and behavioural norms.

By this rating system, you are killing chowk, at best addressing a non-existing problem.
Finally a rating system that rates hamidm lower than urstruly does not reflect the expectations of chowkies. This rating system may be a great programming gimmick, but can only stifle chowk.

I think the first casuality of a dogmatic religion is morality. How can you expect civil behaviour from those whoes God himself preaches hatred of his own creation through messengers who condone lynching of those who are accused of blasphemy against them instead of believing in Allah Who is `Rehman and Raheem` and the Prophet (PBUH) who is `Rehmatulaalimeen`.

Re:echoboom#75

So you are not a Ba Ba Blacksheep? What are you then - a mountain mujahid or a kabaab vendor?

It is easy to sit at your terminal in the comforts of the west, sip Starbucks and type absurd stuff in support of your so-called Islamic ideal. Why dont you put your money where your mouth is? If you have any intellectual honesty, put your own worthless neck on the line and join a jehadi outfit to fight for your cause. Dont expect others to do all the dirty work while you just sit here and say - wah, wah.

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I am guessing the most happy people are the Chowk programming team :-)

Set reading option to ``level=-1`` to see all interacts, otherwise I may have missed out on:
``#8 by kaurasach on January 24, 2005 9:14am PT Score=0
I came to CHOWK because of its liberal policies. Had other websites where I could interact. This site exposed me to secular diversity. It gave me the opportunity to confront opposing views.
However, the latest ``scoring`` system is biased and irrational. A single moderator decides the value of your content. This is a devious design to channel a particular way of thinking. All I can say is the idealism flinched. And I don`t know if at least the ``Front Page`` is worth visiting anymore.
Peer rating may be more appropriate, yet peers often rate on likes and dislikes agreements and disagreement not necessarily the value.
CHOWK please rethink this bad system - to preserve the credibility of this site. ``

Hey, i like this new commenting engine..

hamidm,

i`ll gladly exchange my level with you,
but dont you dare leave!

After editing my profile, I like the new system.

Especially, because the interaction will be real time from now on.

I have set my interaction level to the lowest so that I can catch all posts.

ha ha!
the rude 20-something Indian jokers are filtered out! But then how do mullahji urstruly & his bhatija ali_1 filter through!?

Re: # 57

really hamid...you know everyone loves your posts (eyes rolling)...

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Hamidm (#45) : I cannot start a petition but express my support for the highest score for you.

Anil

Re#52 chowkstaff
``Chowk-staff is not biased! Personally I think your responses rock! ``

sounds like soooo MBZ-Ispahaniesque... not biased?? (what exactly Is a ``not-biased`` Thing?) and wait chowkstaff transitioned into a one-person?


AlephNull - i figure it is to score more hits to this site than the average.

cheers.

basically this is charter for the arts and liberal mafia to create a group of people to rate themslevs highly. ANd corner the market for their weird ideas.this is not new to them. They have more experience of this kind of stalinism.
Watchout when the likes of the very learned professor that most brilliant mind of chowk Professor saminasha and her cohorts start getting rated highy.

The concept is prone to manipulation aka mushism.
Other than that, the filter sucks and can`t get to a specific page with specific filter setting, the stupid gets reset to one.
Need hacker`s manual to work around.

This is great. The concept is fine but a few problems.

You can rate the the people and the interacts. But then it is funny that you cannot read the posts of the people who level is below yours. So for instance I cannot read any one with a level 0 score.

You should show everything warts and all.
Okay the grading is done by the other interactors. How do you avoid concerting here. It is well known that such systems are prone to concerts of people. Even academic journals (esp the arts and humanities one ) face this problem. When this happens the charm of chowk disappears. leave a free for all....

#55

“Have any come forth and volunteered themselves for that onerous duty? Given past Chowk history, I can think of some who might do just that ...”

Like arjun_m, Sadna, Alephnull/Blasphmer, Jay and more of the same ilk….

In view of the chowk staff posts, I am beginning to warm up to the whole idea of levels and rating an secret scorers and the whole enchilada. I hope they stick to it.

Hamidm, It is nice to be in your league!

hamidm: here is a poem from Robert Burns to make you feel better:

O wad some Pow`r the giftie gie us
To see oursels as others see us
It wad frae monie a blunder free us
An` foolish notion


ha! ha!

But seriously: like chowk staff said, you are always fun to read, often come up with some great lines. They have explained the basis for their ratings, and that is fine with me. So, be a sport about it and dont scare us all by threatening to leave.....or else you will get extra points deducted if the referee does this:

This is the typical response of a decision taken by a commitee. A whole elaborate structure with so many holes that it will either finish off Chowk`s remaining readership of 31 or spread creation of multiple nicks like wildfire. I bet it will be discarded within 2 weeks.

Systems have to be simple and need not be too flexible in order to be popular. Why not just ban IP addresses that breach Chowk guidelines and be done with it?

later
-sac

hamidm: quit complaining about your poor grades and write an article for chowk!!

chowk staff,

........... is there a special rating scale for mbz isphahani ....... what were you guys drinking when you dreamed him up !!! ? ........ can you ban him and put ahmed madani back on again ?

I have discovered today that the true happiness is the happiness of the little man inside us, eveything else is merely a shakespearian act on stage of life.

chowk-staff #52

Would you let us know which interactors have been honored with the exalted privilege of being invited to grade others` posts? Have any come forth and volunteered themselves for that onerous duty? Given past Chowk history, I can think of some who might do just that ...

Re: # 48

Echoboom Sahib,

I dont have to wait until Jumma Prayers to offer my plea that your rating be altered to its rightful score: a negative 3.

My criteria:

1. Vocabulary that shows little imagination or deviation from the Khomeini Torture Guard handbook: ``munaFIQUES, wesTOXIFICATION, HIJRAS, babablablah blacksheep, Commies, etc.``.

2. Composition Skills that are unvaried, fairly predicatable format: ``SCOURGE the munaFIQUES so that they FEEL THE WHIP of the ISLAMIC BROTHERHOOD and sisterhood!``

3. Metaphors that rely on fairly extensive knowledge of S&M bars...I mean...all that whipping and grovelling...it aint happening at TGIF`s...so I`m assuming you get your material elsewhere?

4. Armageddon for: 1. moderate muslims 2. progressives 3. women who might have a career 4. religious minorites 5. people who can read...

5. Kandy Kolored links on your ilog page all bunched up together and causing for the reader, a kind of visual disorientation akin to comics. We are talking sleight of hand visual aesthetics here...

6. Refusal to acknowledge a variety of news sources like the progressive media you use to slander the US govt while in the next post you call for the beheading of all progressives...I believe the rhetorical term for that is ``lack of ethos``

7. Maintaining correspondence from the 12 Century. Why do you post into the future if you are so unhappy with it?

Thats enough for me.

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hamidm2,

Your Interact Index (i2) proves couple of things:

1. Chowk-staff is not biased! Personally I think your responses rock! and if only you had written an article you would have started out with atleast a 2.

2. Formulas don`t work - unlike the perception the new system is not automatic scoring. Yes, the initial numbers are a result of factoring in some variables and assigning a number. But going forward the scoring will be qualitative and as explained earlier by a diverse group to avoid individual baises.

chowk staff #46 What a smart way to encourage people to write intelligently on chowk!! Congratulations.

hey hey hey finally - it a filter especially for Mr.Arjun :) - obviously hes the trouble maker and someone who will be effected most by such filters

---

ARJUN FILTER

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May I suggest that friday be the day ( before week-end) set aside for ranking and rating by the readers. That (aggregate)number should then be used for the following week.

I hereby offer myself to be ranked and rated by the readers ( fully knowing the ones who hate my guts here)

Please rank me on your next post : between 1 and 10: Number 1 being the best
Please give me a rating between -1 and 5.0
Let us see if CHOWK-STAFF `s biases show or not.

If other`s volunteer as well similarly their true worth would be known as well.

#43 impressions
Don`t forget Veeresh & DMji. At any rate, more than likely you will set the default level at yours so you can read your post and that of your ``superiors.`` We do need a better system something that will evolve from here.

#42 arjun_m
Here`s an example of why this current system needs improvement. You have a very informative post and yet you have been automatically filtered. Chowk can never be Slashdot.org. There is too much contention and acrimony here and the atmosphere is too politicized. May be each post can be rated on its own merit and who is going to do that?

There are a lot of comments and questions being raised which we will try and address/clarify so that we can all get comfortable with this new system and learn its pros and cons.

For those who are familiar with slashdot, yes this system is designed like slashdot with some variations/customizations as appropriate to Chowk.

1. Firstly the initial scores assigned to existing registered users is a formula of number of interactions posted/rejested and number of articles published (we had to start somewhere). However moving forward your Interact Index will be determined by the average score of your most recent 10 posts. In other words if your most recent posts were constantly marked down then you Interact Index could go down from a 4 to a -1. However if your posts are marked up then even a -1 could move to 5. It will be determined by the quality of interacts posted by each interactor.

2. Who will score the the interacts? - besides the initial score which is determined by your Interact Index. Some members will have the privilage to score other replies. The pool of these members will be diverse and large enough so that any baises are balanced out.

3. To set your threshold level to your desired number simply go to edit profile (link in the header) and set your options.


Will get to more questions through the day.

..........i am pissed!......actually, i am so heart broken i think i`ll go get pissed ...........

....... i am boycotting the chowk for giving me a rating of one and rating urstruly a 3 when all the man does is quote from ancient arabic texts that nobody is interested in (since this is my last post i am not worried about the dangling participle) .........

goodbye people, it was nice knowing you ! .......

p.s. i might reconsider my decision if somone starts a petiton to have my rating raised - i`ll settle for a measly 2

impressions: ``Not that we have anything against Urstruly or Ansari its just that the resultant view is devoid of any context and vigor.``

Girls seldom make passes at boys who wear glasses?

Soyji, great post! We think that the biggest blunder in the new look chowk is the ‘level’ filter. We have no problem with grading interactors on persistence and not on quality but lets not set a viewing filter based on that!

The presumption here is that if one set their viewing level filter at 3, they would get a good quality sampling of the various posts. If you applied that filter on this thread it would yield only posts by Ansari & Urstruly. That’s not much fun reading. Not that we have anything against Urstruly or Ansari its just that the resultant view is devoid of any context and vigor.

So the viewing filter sucks and we agree with you in that a filter that allows readers to block specific interactors would be very handy. If a view filter like the current one must be persisted with then we suggest a better system that accurately reflects the quality of the interactor.

Unfortunately this cannot be done by machines and must involve humans. To that end we recommend the formation of a multi-gender, multi-ethnic, multi-national, multi-religious, multi-racial, multi-sexual-orientation & multi-lingual committee of chowk volunteers who will define the interactor index based on quality.

Sigh….

For people who don`t know about slashdot, this is how it works there: Each interactor has a karma associated with his profile. The more posts you get modded interesting/informative or funny, the more is your Karma. Posters with excellent karma also get a chance to be moderators for a short recurring duration. They can also be meta-moderators i.e. rating moderations(a post is assigned a score of +5 by urstruly...if i`m the meta moderator, I can rate this moderation as over-rated).
On each thread, each post has a rating that starts off with the posters default karma i.e. if my karma is excellent, all my posts start with a rating of +2. the rating can get modded up or down subsequently and this feeds back into my Karma.

So far i guess i`m the only one favoring something like this. No more censorship which is a mighty good thing. They have chosen to replace selective publishing with selective displaying. Another good thing because the new system is liable to result in a lot more interacts which could become overwhelming. Now what criteria do you use? What they have chosen to start with again is not a bad idea. Perhaps over time, we`d be compelled to rate interactors which is something I have not bothered to do thus far and create a dynamic list that is ever changing. Are you allowed to keep rating an interactor so that no one is permanently condemned or commended? This is a tricky thing because they have to keep track of how you rated someone and allow you to replace your old rating with the new rather than add to the rating.

I like this system, I support this article and I am indeed very delighted with the interacts. Many lurkers have come out and given fresh views without resorting to the usual Nehru-Jinnah, Kashmir-Kashmir and Hindu-Muslim stuff.

ps: Urstruly/28-I am your friend here! You have stirred the dormant Hindu & Muslim in me I never knew existed.

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Re: # 14

Now this post should get a rating of 5 :)

Please do away with this stupid point system.

It doesn`t work anyway. It looks like I have to constantly keep changing the interact level to -1. Why does it keep resetting itself to 1?

I don’t care either way. But first chowk promoted ethnic slurs, religious name calling, personal attacks and in fact at times it seemed that chowk staff was taking pride in watching people debase themselves.
Most people are fine middle class folks and would not behave they way they do on chowk unless they get the feeling that this site is all about abuse.
You cannot change the rules of the game that you determined were fine, abruptly.
Chowk staff considered it okay to allow posters to call the prophet “ a child molester” or allow some posters to continually use “Paki” in their posts. When most of the Indians and Pakistani consider that an ethnic slur in England and would not use that word. The chowk staff also allowed people to be addressed by religious identity like one poster continually uses “Hindu” in addressing Indians.
Once you gleefully allow these transgressions, people would not stop at that and would go even further.
Now, chowk wants to control all that.
It is my decision whose interact I wanna read. If chowk thinks that interactions need to be patrolled then it should moderate the site in a consistent manner. These childish pranks of level and rating don’t mean much.
They also need to look at other discussion sites as to how they are moderated and then formulate chowk’s interact guidelines and enforce them.
They recently put the ignore feature and did not give it enough time to see the results and now have this system.
On the current system, I think it is not a bad idea to start everybody at level one and then let him or her make an effort to move up. (It may hurt some egos. See post #25)

The ratings of Interactors is not the brightest idea that came out of the chowk staff. It seems to be nothing more than a reflection of someone`s personal likes and dislikes. Although the whole idea makes no sense, it would perhaps be more appropriate to rate a post than an interactor.

Another thing - AFAIK chowk does not have ANY banned words. True it warns you when you`re about to hit the submit button but in my experience bigots are allowed to be called as such.

OK, it IS true that they have chucked out human moderation and are trying a new method. Kudos to the chowkidars for trying.
Perhpas we should make some constructive suggestions.
What they are trying to do is set up a filter so we are not overwhelmed. This is an excellent idea. I cannot even see some posters because they are below the default threshold level. Unfortunately they may not be the posters I wish to avoid but someone like Urstruly who pretty much is some AI program that regurgitates the same thing and has little that is interesting to say.
By the same token, I`d be surprised if even 10% of the people visiting an article are interested in what i have to say.
Therefore, what would be nice is to be able to customize your list so you can filter out people that you don`t care to read. This may be too much to ask. There must be another way.
At any rate, this is a good beginning.

OK, it IS true that they have chucked out human moderation and are trying a new method. Kudos to the chowkidars for trying.
Perhpas we should make some constructive suggestions.
What they are trying to do is set up a filter so we are not overwhelmed. This is an excellent idea. I cannot even see some posters because they are below the default threshold level. Unfortunately they may not be the posters I wish to avoid but someone like Urstruly who pretty much is some AI program that regurgitates the same thing and has little that is interesting to say.
By the same token, I`d be surprised if even 10% of the people visiting an article are interested in what i have to say.
Therefore, what would be nice is to be able to customize your list so you can filter out people that you don`t care to read. This may be too much to ask. There must be another way.
At any rate, this is a good beginning.

Re: # 25

Alephji we think you have something here. But a little correction pliss. We just went back and logged in though one of our several other handles, a handle under which we have been published here but one which we haven’t used in many years. And that handle has an interact index of 2 and not 3 like you purported.

But we think you’re like totally on the right track, dude.

The scoring system is a gradation of persistent interaction and contribution on chowk while maintaining cursory civility. It is not a gradation of intellectual fortitude. If such were the case, then indeed as Amit says a rating of 1 ought to be a badge of honor what with the great chowk jester himself rated 1.

Anywhodeedoo.

Ali Sahib,

Please do not misquote out of context. What I recently commented on Unplugged was:

1. These scores, when we consider the manipulated system used to tabulate them, are at this point arbitrary. Your friend ``Salim`` (of whom you are incomprehensibly short sighted) has about 14 nicks which he has used to drive down the interactor ratings of people he dislikes. It doesnt particularly matter to me what my score is, I`m just pointing this technique out amd what effect it might have on the score average.

And do I deserve a ``6``? Considering that the score index is 1-5, a six would imply extraordinary self confidence. It seems you have misunderstood the post in which I pointed out I received a ``6`` (the highest score) for my logic, analysis and written explication of exam text for my GREs...I also remarked that those scores pay me rent, not chowk scores...try to stay focused, ali...

Urstruly,

We have truly reached the zenith of Dubya intellectualism if your scores are higher than mine...thank your Salim friends for the jacked up numbers...And no, as the womenfolk in my fam remind me, the last place for an educated Pakistani American women to look for affirmation is with most Pakistani men.

All the best!

ansari,

must you spoil all the fun with your moral anecdotes at this time. But the damage is done; You laid a guilt trip on me and now I have to go back to my old habbit of being nice to all people. why everybody is against me?

Here goes

I am appalled to see that I am being used as a benchmark for the Chowk scoring system by every tom dick and harry. I resent that. Every little thing I do at chowk is frowned upon by every one. Even if I write a short story, it is not the story but me who should be taken to the task. I feel like such an outcast here. I have no friends. Why? Why?

This is the for the country club-by the country club-of the country club chowk we have been told several times that Pakistanis wanted back. A microcosm of Pakistani society and governance, microcosm of the Ahmedi allegation and mandatory sentence for blasphemy imposed by insiders on nonconforming outsiders.

In my five years I remember first it was a spy fatwa, then it was a bigo_t fatwa then it was a hatemonger fawa, then it was a whore fatwa then they moved on to a CRIEP fatwa. In between someone wanted to call in the FBI too. All this was to avoid answering any point raised or acknowledging any reference provided. Now chowk has institutionalized the fatwa via the moderator-rating fatwa.

For example, I would point out that Jamat Ul Fuqra could kill Indians in the US since 1980s and hide out in Pakistan, and poster would refuse to acknowledge the information. I would differ on some Indian or Pakistan issue and be called a RSS fanatic. This would be done by a group of posters who wanted to invalidate my views and stop the discussion.

Now a chowk moderator is doing it for them and rest of chowk, by rating my arguments and relieving anyone I am arguing with of the need to counter them. On the other board, an interactor simply disappeared after making nasty allegations, now the chowk moderator is telling me on that interactors` behalf what he thinks of my reply.

The question remains, is there any meaning in my spending time in Pakistani society, with Pakistani mores being forced on me, subjecting myself to Pakistani fatwas? No. Thanks to chowk staff for clarifying the issue for me as never before.

I just saw that hamidm`s rating is 1. So urstruly`s ratings must be some kind of a software bug - a statistical outlier. We all know that comparing urstruly to hamidm is like comparing Sri Lanka to USA in terms of intellectual capability. Anyway, if it makes urstruly happy, good for him.

friend #12

It’s not too difficult to figure out how Chowk staff assigned the initial scores. Interactors who are also published Chowk authors were handed a default initial score of 3, those who are not were given a default initial score of 1. Chowk staff then went over the pool of current interactors boosting some favoured people up a peg and lowering some undesirables a rung (or in at least a couple of cases, two rungs, into the hell of –1). The default initial score rule plus Chowk staff-applied perturbations seem to adequately explain what you have observed.

I don’t think Chowk staff have begun to score most of the individual posts yet – all interacts by a particular interactor are displayed with the same score value. You would have to wait for a few days or weeks (depending on how prolific each individual poster is) for interact indices to converge to values more representative of long-term limits.

OK, so we’ve been on this site guised under one takhallus or another, pretty much since its inception. We are afraid that we have to interrupt our self-imposed hiatus today and in light of these extra-ordinary events issue a joint statement.

This scoring system idea blows! But the reaction of the chowkies blows even more! Who gives a rat’s tadoodle what score Urstruly gets and what score tricky nicki gets? In an Internet chat forum, the public discourse establishes stature or lack thereof. You chowkies need to simmer down. Yes, the scoring is a bad feature but we’ll all get used to it like our noses get used to the smell of our own wind-breakings. To carry that analogy forward, we may even grow to like it in a curious sort of a way.

This does mean that the postings are real time, which is great! Safwan Shah and Company have every right to make this site self-patrolling and self-sustaining. They have given enough of their very valuable time to all of us losers already!

So stop bitching Chowkies, stop complaining to the now non-existant chowk staff about the scores like little snot-nosed kids complain to their mommies about candy. Mummy, mummy how come pappu gets three and me only two, waaaaaaaaaaa! Snap out of it frochrissakes!

Signed Jointly,

Left & Right

Why cumulative rating? I don’t think an integrator’s history should matter when one is rating one individual post. Ali1, for example, is an asshole; but he does manage to come up with some great gems from time to time in spite of himself. But according to current chowk policy, even his good posts will get a rating of 1 because of his historical assholicness.

Urstruly,

We had a buzurg once who told us this story about an old man who used to live in a neighbourhood with these hooligans. Every time the man went out, the punks made it a point to ridicule him and every time they did that, the man responded in the most gracious and decent way by asking how they were and some such. One day a passerby happened to notice this exchange. He stopped the old man to ask how he could possibly be so civil with those punks when they made it a point to humiliate him. The old man replied, smilingly, ``If they can`t abandon their bad habits, how can I abandon my good ones?``

Does this mean that interacts are posted instantly without having to wait for them to go through some moderator? If that is not the case, then filtering is being done at two level. That does not make sense. If moderators think that a post deserves -1 or 0, why post it in the first place? Why not reject it outright? I hope that is not the case.
Secondly, posts should be rated by the readers. Peer rating of posts is more desirable than the rating given by some Godlike moderator, who, being a human will obviously biased. If ratings are made democratic, it will more likely represent the general view of chowk interactors than that of just a few elites.

chowk staff... I think you`ll lose most of your Indian readership. Every nathu ram thinks he is an intellectual, so either you assign an automatic score of 5 to any Indian sounding name, or say good bye to your Indian interactors.......

My personal preference would be ``good bye``....

Urstruly gets a 3? Why?

some egos have been hurt really bad......

on a scale of -1 to 5 saminasha thought she was 6

kaurasach thought he was 5

friend of course at 5

who are the other vain idiots around, please raise your hands/heads

Posting is in real time now

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Ansari

`Vanity` or not, but don`t you just love to tell people like Amit and Friend ``In your face you conniving, back-stabbing, carriers of knives under armpits - in your face`` aa haa.

Anyone who spends even a little time at Chowk can figure out for themselves who everyone is. Chowk is a relatively small community of interactors, which incidentally is one of its strengths, and it doesn`t take very long for people to reveal themselves. It shouldn`t be too difficult to pick out the interactors who you enjoy reading and interacting with as well as, conversely, those whose presence you don`t care for. Sort of like real life, where we meet people whose company we enjoy and stay away from the people who bore/bother us.

A point system seems a little childish to me because you cannot assign arbitrary numbers to interacts. Intellectual content is not quantifiable. Anyone reading is bound to have his or her own opinion and it would be quite naive of Chowk staff to assume that readers will comply with Interact scores or interactor ratings. The people who interact at this site are all educated (if not educable) men and women and to grade them for their contributions is a reductive and indecent exercise. I am not sure what purpose it will serve except to pit interactors against each other in a ridiculous contest of vanities. Personally, I think it`s the complete antithesis of the dynamism and goodwill Chowk seeks to promote.

dear chowk

thank you for your new policy - it works wonders. you people are so smart, if you weren`t mbz i would have kissed you.

Amit, Kauray
Chowk is a private venture, created by a select group of people, and they have all rights in world to promote what they think is correct.

This system must be good for them, where ana is at 1, and Urstruly is at 3. Sadna is at 1 and tauheen-ahmek is at 3. And temporal and farzana versey are at 4.

So now a caste system is in place. You are free,/i>, but you are also branded, by some unkown god like creature.

I guess it is time to say bye to this site.