usability question: ranking commissions proposals

Um, so if the number of proposals each user is asked to rank is 25, they
rank each of the works on a scale from 1 to 25? If you use radio buttons
you can easily make it so each of the numbers can only be selected once.
Be sort of messy though, having a page with 625 radio buttons. Otherwise
you could have each project on a seperate page and track what the user
has already selected with a cookie. Yeah, I think that would be the best
way to do it. The user enters a page with the first proposal, ranks it
selects ok and the info is added to the cookie and the user moves on to
the next. Before entering the next proposal page, the cookie data is
parsed and validated. If something is wrong the user is informed and
sent back etc.

pall

> So in the final stage of the Rhizome Commissions, users are asked to
rank a group of ~25 proposals from most favorite to least favorite.
What's the best way to do that with a web form? The quick-and-sloppy way
to do it is with a bunch of drop-downs, but then it's easy for the user
to rank two proposals as 3rd place, which isn't an answer that the
system can use.
>
> Has anybody seen a web form that solved this problem well?
>
> Thanks,
> Francis
> +
> -> post: [email protected]
> -> questions: [email protected]
> -> subscribe/unsubscribe: http://rhizome.org/preferences/subscribe.rhiz
> -> give: http://rhizome.org/support
> -> visit: on Fridays the Rhizome.org web site is open to non-members
> +
> Subscribers to Rhizome are subject to the terms set out in the
> Membership Agreement available online at http://rhizome.org/info/29.php
>
>

–
Pall Thayer
artist/teacher
http://www.this.is/pallit
http://130.208.220.190
http://130.208.220.190/nuharm
http://130.208.220.190/panse

are you going to use this same system for ranking the "TOP FIVE" favorites
of the rhizome artbase? in other words, give rhizomers a chance to rank
their top-five favorite net.art pieces submitted to the rhizome art base
from jan-98 to march-98, april-98 to june-98, et cetera??????????

of course, whatever you do … don't call it a "contest". just call it a
ranking system.

"voting contests" are impure and will sully our pure artistic community

"ranking systems", i guess, are just fine.

f_ucking semantics

meanwhile the rhizome artbase remains [practically] inaccesible.


davidf goldschmidt


—– Original Message —–
From: "Francis Hwang" <[email protected]>
To: <[email protected]>
Sent: Friday, January 02, 2004 8:39 AM
Subject: RHIZOME_RAW: usability question: ranking commissions proposals


> So in the final stage of the Rhizome Commissions, users are asked to rank
a group of ~25 proposals from most favorite to least favorite. What's the
best way to do that with a web form? The quick-and-sloppy way to do it is
with a bunch of drop-downs, but then it's easy for the user to rank two
proposals as 3rd place, which isn't an answer that the system can use.
>
> Has anybody seen a web form that solved this problem well?
>
> Thanks,
> Francis
> +
> -> post: [email protected]
> -> questions: [email protected]
> -> subscribe/unsubscribe: http://rhizome.org/preferences/subscribe.rhiz
> -> give: http://rhizome.org/support
> -> visit: on Fridays the Rhizome.org web site is open to non-members
> +
> Subscribers to Rhizome are subject to the terms set out in the
> Membership Agreement available online at http://rhizome.org/info/29.php
>
>

I don't have a problem thinking of how I'd program such a thing, I just have a hard time thinking of how to make the prioritizing experience one that's easy to manage.

When I think of how I'd do this on a desk, I'd probably write the names of each candidate on an index card, and then start going through each candidate one at a time. As I added a candidate to the stack of already-ranked candidates I'd ask myself "Do I like this one better than that one?" Once you've done that 25 times you're done.

If I were designing, say, a desktop application it's easy to imagine how to do that: I'd do it with a list of selections, and you could select any of them and click up or down arrows to move them up or down. That's a lot more cumbersome in a web interface, though, because every up- or down-click involves reloading the page. (Unless you use lots of Javascript or Flash or something, which I really really really don't want to do.)

F.

Pall Thayer wrote:

> Um, so if the number of proposals each user is asked to rank is 25,
> they
> rank each of the works on a scale from 1 to 25? If you use radio
> buttons
> you can easily make it so each of the numbers can only be selected
> once.
> Be sort of messy though, having a page with 625 radio buttons.
> Otherwise
> you could have each project on a seperate page and track what the user
> has already selected with a cookie. Yeah, I think that would be the
> best
> way to do it. The user enters a page with the first proposal, ranks it
> selects ok and the info is added to the cookie and the user moves on
> to
> the next. Before entering the next proposal page, the cookie data is
> parsed and validated. If something is wrong the user is informed and
> sent back etc.
>
> pall

David,

I hadn't thought of this idea for the ArtBase. Mostly I've been focusing on the more immediate question of the commissions process. It might work, but then again you're dealing with different sorts of content. Commissions proposals are limited in number: Each time 'round there's a specific window of time where you can submit your entry and then the ( jury | Rhizome Community | Trilateral Commission ) decides which entries get awarded the commissions. The ArtBase is more like a non-stop stream of art, so ranking the best (even by breaking it up into time periods) might be less useful.

Also, I personally don't care much for big popularity contests unless they're really necessary. In the case of commissions it's necessary since, for one thing, not everybody can get the award money. In the case of ArtBase I have to say I don't particularly care what the entire Rhizome community thinks are the best net artworks ever. I care about individuals. I might care about what David Goldschmidt, or Curt Cloninger, or T. Whid, thinks, but I'm not so interested in having everybody vote and all that individual opinion getting watered down in a voting systems. You could say I'm the sort of person who'd rather read ten film reviews than watch one awards show.

Anyway, I do agree with you that the ArtBase isn't nearly as accessible as it could be. Changing that is fairly high on our list of priorities.

F.



David Goldschmidt wrote:

> are you going to use this same system for ranking the "TOP FIVE"
> favorites
> of the rhizome artbase? in other words, give rhizomers a chance to
> rank
> their top-five favorite net.art pieces submitted to the rhizome art
> base
> from jan-98 to march-98, april-98 to june-98, et cetera??????????
>
> of course, whatever you do … don't call it a "contest". just call
> it a
> ranking system.
>
> "voting contests" are impure and will sully our pure artistic
> community
>
> "ranking systems", i guess, are just fine.
>
> f_ucking semantics
>
> meanwhile the rhizome artbase remains [practically] inaccesible.
>
>
> davidf goldschmidt
>

i see your point. not sure i wholly agree but it's reasonable. in my
opinion, one of rhizome's primary responsibilities is to "sell" net.art …
to present net.art to the larger mainstream audience. the best way to this
is to push/highlight/market/advertise/present the best net.artists and
net.art. every piecce that's in the artbase has merit but there are some
that rise above the others. these are the ones that should get presented
and advertised. in fact, they should be made available in the free section
of the Rhizome website. let people see the best of what net.art has to
offer.

more than the TOP FIVE concept … i am very interested in viewing net.art
in a historical context. if the TOP FIVE idea is a bust then maybe Rhizome
could add a third "category" for accessing the artbase: 1) alphabetical 2)
by artist and 3) Time (that is, when the werk was admitted to the artbase)

just a few thoughts.

best

david goldschmidt
www.mediatrips.com


—– Original Message —–
From: "Francis Hwang" <[email protected]>
To: <[email protected]>
Sent: Monday, January 05, 2004 8:45 AM
Subject: RHIZOME_RAW: Re: Re: usability question: ranking commissions
proposals


> David,
>
> I hadn't thought of this idea for the ArtBase. Mostly I've been focusing
on the more immediate question of the commissions process. It might work,
but then again you're dealing with different sorts of content. Commissions
proposals are limited in number: Each time 'round there's a specific window
of time where you can submit your entry and then the ( jury | Rhizome
Community | Trilateral Commission ) decides which entries get awarded the
commissions. The ArtBase is more like a non-stop stream of art, so ranking
the best (even by breaking it up into time periods) might be less useful.
>
> Also, I personally don't care much for big popularity contests unless
they're really necessary. In the case of commissions it's necessary since,
for one thing, not everybody can get the award money. In the case of ArtBase
I have to say I don't particularly care what the entire Rhizome community
thinks are the best net artworks ever. I care about individuals. I might
care about what David Goldschmidt, or Curt Cloninger, or T. Whid, thinks,
but I'm not so interested in having everybody vote and all that individual
opinion getting watered down in a voting systems. You could say I'm the sort
of person who'd rather read ten film reviews than watch one awards show.
>
> Anyway, I do agree with you that the ArtBase isn't nearly as accessible as
it could be. Changing that is fairly high on our list of priorities.
>
> F.
>
>
>
> David Goldschmidt wrote:
>
> > are you going to use this same system for ranking the "TOP FIVE"
> > favorites
> > of the rhizome artbase? in other words, give rhizomers a chance to
> > rank
> > their top-five favorite net.art pieces submitted to the rhizome art
> > base
> > from jan-98 to march-98, april-98 to june-98, et cetera??????????
> >
> > of course, whatever you do … don't call it a "contest". just call
> > it a
> > ranking system.
> >
> > "voting contests" are impure and will sully our pure artistic
> > community
> >
> > "ranking systems", i guess, are just fine.
> >
> > f_ucking semantics
> >
> > meanwhile the rhizome artbase remains [practically] inaccesible.
> >
> >
> > davidf goldschmidt
> >
> +
> -> post: [email protected]
> -> questions: [email protected]
> -> subscribe/unsubscribe: http://rhizome.org/preferences/subscribe.rhiz
> -> give: http://rhizome.org/support
> -> visit: on Fridays the Rhizome.org web site is open to non-members
> +
> Subscribers to Rhizome are subject to the terms set out in the
> Membership Agreement available online at http://rhizome.org/info/29.php
>
>