Meaning of Kudos

[littlemousling]

Poll #10088 Meaning of Kudos

This poll is anonymous.
Open to: Registered Users, detailed results viewable to: All, participants: 369

When I click the Kudos button, it most often means (one or more of) the following:

View Answers

Good job!
261 (70.7%)

I liked this!
339 (91.9%)

I finished this and didn't hate it!
60 (16.3%)

I ADORED this!
204 (55.3%)

I like clicking buttons and assign no meaning!
4 (1.1%)

None of these options apply
6 (1.6%)

This is a sort of follow-up to bethbethbeth's great Kudos/Comments poll here. There are a number of comments there discussing the various reasons people click the Kudos button, some of which may be more common reasons than others.

Feel free to expand on your answer!

Comments

[ex_mek82]

I'm not a fan of the feature at all. It gives me too many mixed signals.

At the very least, if there's going to be no way to disable them altogether, I'd like to have some sort of toggle so only registered users can leave them, like signed reviews on FFNet.

[littlemousling]

The idea behind this poll was exactly that: to find out just how "mixed" a Kudos is, as a symbol. Given that 90% of respondents most often use it to mean "I liked this" (and half to say "I adored this!")--it doesn't seem very mixed to me, actually. It seems to be a pretty universal positive.

[melusina]

It seems to me like a lot of the dislike around Kudos is based on 2 premises, neither of which appear to me to be supported by any data:

1. The one you've debunked with this poll (that Kudos mean so many different things that they're meaningless).

2. Kudos "replace" comments, because people who otherwise would have commented leave comments instead (in fact, the data I've seen from AO3 indicates that people have left MORE comments since the Kudos feature was introduced.

I doubt debunking these notions is going to suddenly change the way people feel about Kudos, but I wish they'd stop using these ideas as rationalization for their dislike. . .

[melannen]

There also seems to be this premise that, unlike kudos, if someone leaves a comment, the author will know exactly what they really thought of the story, because comments are a source of inerrant truth.

And that's so inaccurate I don't even really know where to start with debunking it.

[qem_chibati]

I know I've left a lot more comments because of kudos, than I would have done otherwise.

I've had a couple of negative run-ins with some authors based on reviews I've left, (And I'm a squee only reviewer, pretty much.) so in order for me to leave a comment I need to be in a very positive mood, leaving no feedback tends to make me feel more negative about myself.

I'm very much of the belief that comments are much more about the people who left them, than the actual story.

[qem_chibati]

Just turn kudos alerts off then.

[ex_mek82]

I do. But I still would like a feature to turn off anonymous kudos, though. =/

For what it's worth, half the time I _do_ check out an author if they leave a kudos while signed in.

[littlemousling]

Do you dislike guest Kudos because you interpret Kudos as something other than praise, or for another reason? I'm not sure I've seen your POV before, and I'd like to understand it better.