pyrrho's Journal: Update: Karma and Game Theory

What I'm calling Game Theory is really my own theory of gaming from being a gamer and working in the game industry and studying how games are build from elements.

I don't really prefer mathematical statistics in general over more subjective things, like words, both are very interesting. If you force me to prefer one or the other, numerical methods have proved most abstract and therefore, to me, most interesting.

The real reason I think that numbers make sense is that karma on slashdot is a game only. Don't assume I'm saying it's a good game or a bad game, just that it is a game by nature.

To justify that claim quickly let me just say that the moderation system exists to raise and lower posts themselves, mainly to lower them I think. That does not require a karma system in itself.

Karma is a point system to act as an artificial motivation to post well and want to get highly moderated posts, based on the fact that this is what nearly every game does, generally in various areas. In real sports, statistics are calculated for the same effect. Giving points is like setting up a genetic algorythm tuning itself, some will post just to increase points.

That is, they give up forwarding an agenda. Or they mimik others. Or they conform to the group opinion (abstract mimikry). Or possibly they role play and draw cotangent arcs with their karma(t) function. Who cares, with karma, you can trash your karma for fun if you want... by definintion it means that it was moderated low and easy to ignore. Karma may imply that you are invited to troll, etc. It's like the cathartic excuse for violent computer games, only in the case of messages. You can be nuclear flame on and who really cares because the killfile system is working on a post by post basis.

As a word it seems the game has changed. It is now a qualitative opinion about me. It's kind of like a closed box, just a hint of what is undoubtably still a numeric entity, presented as the machines idea of me.

But then, the moderation system itself is what motivates posting the sorts of posts the community of moderators praises (or for the troll, what it condemns) and not the karma. So what does karma mean to the designers of this game, I wonder?