Hello, everybody!

We’ve been discussing the commission review system that we’re developing, and there are a few potential difficulties with a review system. Most of these deal with the politics of a review – simply put, giving someone a rating for their work carries weight, especially when certain benefits may be given to users who have a history of great reviews.

Here are a few of the issues that we’re focused on when developing this system.

Consistency

Reviews are often highly subjective – one person may give five stars to an average experience while another may give three stars for an excellent commission. While this can’t always be avoided, we hope to help move reviews towards a standard.

One way we may do this is by having wording appear that reflects what the user feels about that commission. The wording isn’t set in stone, but here’s what we’re throwing around:

☆☆☆☆☆ – Amazing. The user did what they could to make the commission go well.
☆☆☆☆ – Great. There may have been a few problems, but we managed to get through them.
☆☆☆ – Okay. More could have been done to make the commission process go smoothly.
☆☆ – Bad. There were quite a few problems throughout the commission process.
☆ – Terrible. Everything went wrong.

With this scale, we’d expect for good commission experiences to be rated either four or five stars, and users granted benefits for strong great reviews would be expected to maintain an average of at least four stars. This could be changed, but we do want to reward any users doing an excellent job.

Fairness

While reviews can be a great way to help people find products they want, there’s also the potential for slander or lies to be posted. We don’t want outside rumors or drama to affect reviews, so we’ll have some guidelines to ensure this fairness while remaining factual.

Reviews must be about the commission – We have a long-standing policy about keeping outside drama off Furry Network, and this will be true with reviews on the site, as well. Reviews that focus on things outside of the commission can be flagged for review by staff.
Reviews only happen after a commission – Users won’t be able to come en masse to give positive reviews to a popular artist. We expect everyone to start with a clean slate, and reviews will only be available for those who participated in the commission process.
Rules against extortion – We discussed the issue of extortion in an older blog post, and we will have clear policies to prevent this. Because some users’ livelihood can be affected by reviews, we will ensure that reviews are not being used to get favors in return.

As a buyer or a seller, what do you worry about with a review system? What problems do you think could arise? Let us know on Twitter!

Thank you all for your enthusiasm with the upcoming additions to the commission system.

Digby