Dear Community,
We would like to take this opportunity to inform you that from now on we will be introducing an obligation to activate reviews in the filebase. After the clear notices and the subsequent banners did not solve the problem with rampant and non-factual reviews, we now have to take further measures.
What will change?
Almost nothing will change for you. The way a review is submitted remains the same as before. However, once the review has been submitted, it will remain in a kind of "waiting state" until a moderator activates it, just as with new files (see Activation obligation for uploads).
What are reviews (and what are they not)?
Reviews objectively evaluate the quality of a download; points of criticism should be sufficiently explained so that they are verifiable for everyone and can be taken up by the author as a suggestion for improvement. Detached from personal feelings, a review should only evaluate the download itself. The review system offers no space for personal differences or reactions to other reviews. (Example: someone writes a positive review only because someone else wrote a negative review).
How long should reviews be?
We do not specify a minimum length for reviews. Sometimes 1-2 sentences are enough, sometimes it can be a bit more. However, at least one coherent sentence should not be too much to ask for. (Negative examples: "Good.", "Great map, everything fits." - instead: "The design of the map is very well done, also the installation is easy as everything is included.")
What happens to existing reviews?
Reviews written before 22 November will of course remain, as the rules only came into effect from that date. All other reviews have been subject to the review guidelines since the announcement (see Innovations until 22 November 2020).
We also hope to strengthen the constructive climate in the WebDisk here by unlocking it, so that bad reviews are less likely to lead to frustration and can be taken as suggestions for improvement. Below are a few suggestions for (fictional) reviews that make the distinction between reviews and comments clearer.
With kind regards
James
on behalf of the WebDisk team.
Quote5 stars - I can't understand why there are so many negative reviews. The repaint is great.
This statement is not objective and refers to other reviews, consequently there is a comment here.
Quote5 stars - The design of the map is very well done, also the installation is easy as everything is included.
Questions that can be used to further concretise the review could be, for example:
- What exactly is "well done"? Is it high-resolution ground textures, level of detail of the scenery or the degree of realism of the enacted region?
- What is included? Are repaints for buses included? Or logos, colour palettes etc. to create your own repaints?
Quote1 star - the repaint is a disaster
This is neither objective nor does the statement contain suggestions for improvement. Questions could be, for example: Are the (real) colours well done? Are logos or fonts distorted? Has the transparency of the windows been modelled correctly? Suggestions for improvement could also be links to (video) tutorials or hints such as "Using the repaint template that can be found <here>, will make the repaint better".
