VaM account not required for downloads? No incentive to rate.

[VamChic]

So... I just realized that you don't need a VaMHub account to download stuff from here. So, you can download stuff without an account but you need an account to review and react to stuff. Does this not break the incentive to rate or review anything?

I know this comparison is brought up a lot, but it is an extremely popular site that is very creator/modder friendly. NexusMods requires an account to download stuff which I think helps encourage people to leave feedback. Daz is also a site that requires accounts to download.

If clicking a reaction icon is a spur of the moment thing, if it cannot be used than that might be why these numbers are currently so low. So many people downloading, but few of them have accounts. If you look at the total members vs total guests, there are over double the amount of guests than members. Those guests are viewing and downloading stuff, but unable to react or review. I think this might be why there are items with hundreds of downloads, yet with 1-3 reactions.

Should an account be required to download stuff or even to view the site at all?

The other solution is to allow anonymous reactions and/or reviews. Kind of like how pornhub does it. I think it limits ratings based on IP, so you can't upvote something more than once from the same public IP.

Don't view this as a complaint, but more of an observation based on experiencing different systems used by other sites. I'm just considering the future direction of the site as it's still in it infancy.

 

[haho]

if they don't care enough to make an account they will definitely not care enough to leave a review or rating.

I don't see problem with this

 

[VamChic]

That's exactly the point though. If they have to make an account, they may be more likely to rate/review as well.

The other side is that if they aren't required to make an account to rate, they will be more likely to do it.

Of course, as someone who isn't concerned about ratings as you aren't a creator, what is the value of your opinion on this topic? Not meant to be an insult, just an observation based on the circumstances.

 

[haho]

I am not insulted at all

As far as I know VAM has over 10 000 users and the "creators" are about 60, so the creators are very very small part of the community - important part, but very very small.

If you don't want my opinion as an end user on a matters like this , why would you want me to review or rate your products ?

 

[VamChic]

You are right, and was the wrong way to look at the issue. I suppose the concept could be pushed in a different direction as I think an active participant community is much healthier one. A users incentive to review and rate is to provide the rest of the community with feedback that let's them know more about the quality and issues the resource might have.

Otherwise, every click is a shot in the dark which could be a waste of time, HD space and possibly money with the only idea anyone has of whether it's worth downloading is an image and the number of clicks on the download button. All that means is the creator did a good job marketing the product with images that could have easily used a reshade pack or photoshop to make look better. It's quality is still up in the air if it's never had a single review or reaction.

Also, another good reason to incentivise users to rate is that at this point, it's very easy for creators to create a single alternate account, put a 5 star rating and reaction on their own resource. This makes the review system currently useless to anyone. Unless the review is from a decent number of users and not a bunch of creators patting each other on the back, the rating system might as well be removed.

 

[meshedvr]

There isn't a critical mass of users here yet, so don't expect a lot of reviews yet. There might more incentives for users to register/login once we have Hub integrated into VaM 1.20. I would expect a much larger user base here once that is out. We also plan to add a way to do reviews in game, but it will still require login. This forum software does not appear to allow anonymous reviews or reviews by IP, and I think that is probably a good thing otherwise there could be gaming of the system.

 

[VamChic]

@meshedvr If downloading from VaMHub from VaM requires a VaMHub account, then that would totally solve the issue.

When you say "mass of" users, do you mean accounts or just any visitors to the site? Maybe I'm being impatient, but when you have a resource that has been up for 4 days and has had 1,424 views and 525 downloads, you start to wonder what's going on.

Either way, I'm just brainstorming solutions. but it seems your next patch provides the solution anyways. Especially if someone can rate from inside VaM.

 

[meshedvr]

I'm saying there are only about 700 registered users on the Hub now, compared to 10000+ on Patreon and reddit. I think people have not yet taken the time to register an account on here yet. Unique visitors the Hub in June is already over 10000 though.

Let's see how it plays out over next month or so and with 1.20 integration before we take further action to encourage people to register/login.

 

[VamChic]

Sure, I can be more patient. And I also apologize calling 1.20 a patch, just a slip o' the tongue.