Why are upvotes anonymous?

[Honorless]

I've seen this issue discussed elsewhere, here iirc:

https://www.17thshard.com/forum/topic/66588-discussion-about-forum-moderation

The mods suggested bringing in reactions to replace the upvote system but wouldn't it make much more sense to make upvoters' names visible? Wouldn't bringing in reactions recreate the problems that occurred with the downvote system?

Knowing that other people would be able to see who's supporting what, rather than anonymously giving support to things they agree with would encourage more thoughtful responses, would they not? 

Edited February 18, 2020 by Honorless

[Chaos]

Not necessarily. In a big argument people might just upvote only their "crew" and then that leads to a lot more hurt feelings and cliquishness. I go back and forth as to whether reactions or these being public would actually help. Seeing who upvoted what definitely could worsen things in contentious situations.

[Honorless]

So you're afraid that it would widen the divide between two sides of an argument? I mean, wouldn't these people already express their side of the argument in their posts? Seeing who agrees with them in responsibly written reaction posts would be better than just seeing your opposition seemingly being the more popular one, wouldn't it?

Most of us on here are already hiding behind the anonymity of our usernames, I think making upvoters visible would only contribute to more conscientious upvoting, which would if this change goes forward transform that into supporting, in the long term.

[Karger]

It seems like it would lead to a lot of mutual upvoting.  I upvote all of your stuff you upvote all of mine type deals.  Also it would encourage pandering to specific groups of people rather then the form as a whole.

[Scion of the Mists]

1 hour ago, Karger said:

It seems like it would lead to a lot of mutual upvoting.  I upvote all of your stuff you upvote all of mine type deals.  Also it would encourage pandering to specific groups of people rather then the form as a whole.

That's what I thought too.  I always side-eyed the "Upvote for you sir!" posts.  They seem like they're fishing for a reciprocal upvote.  

[Nuatoma]

As a long time lurker, 22 time poster, I enjoy the anonymity of upvotes 

 

Edit:  Corrected amount of posts I've made lol

Edited February 18, 2020 by Nuatoma

[Honorless]

Hmm, maybe I'm thinking of forums too much like social media like FB. I see what you guys mean.

I'm not the one who'll have to deal with the fallout if it goes wrong. Thank you, Chaos, for taking the time, maintaining all of this, dealing with so many completely different people and keeping so much of it open to discussion. It's a massive undertaking and a headache, I imagine. I don't think you get enough thanks for all of this

[+ILuvHats]

My opinion’s not unrelated to the OP, but it’s a bit out there. Might as well take the opportunity to share it though. If I could make a change to the system, I’d allow users to modify their ability both to see their own reputation and the number of upvotes they get on posts. It would be nice to be able to see others’ upvotes but not my own. 

I’m an approval-seeker, so my relationship with the upvote system is kind of toxic. I have an unfortunate tendency to contribute to threads motivated by reputation mining rather than wanting to genuinely contribute to the discussion. It’s usually subconscious, but if I take a step back and look at my reasoning, it makes me sick. Eliminating the system just for myself would help, and hopefully I’d get to a point where I would be more genuinely contribute to discussions. Of course, I’m definitely in the minority here, and the work needed to implement such a feature probably wouldn’t be worth it for the community as a large. Still, it’s nice to imagine.

[Honorless]

@ILuvHats, don't be so self-deprecating! It's human nature to seek approval and I can imagine that everybody's been guilty of doing this to some degree at some point. I'm not opposed to the idea you pitched though, hmm...