Rating problems

For some time now, we have been discussing the main two problems of the rating system:

Problem 1) Users do not rate enough.

We have taken a few steps like the AJAX rating that have helped this problem. We can also add a 'Please rate me!' text to popup after a user previews a sound.

Problem 2) Some users feel that their sounds are not being rated fairly.

I have proposed a couple of solutions for the second problem:

- To not show the rating until 5 or 10 ratings have been done. This could stop users that are not serious.

- To make a system that eliminates the highest and lowest rating and makes the average out of the rest ratings. That way, people that are trying to harm others, will get discouraged.

Question) Sampleconstruct asked a meaningful question: 'What is the rating good for?' Taking that a step further, I wanted to ask: Do you think the rating is needed at all? Does it help you, and if so, in what way?

"Rating here is about "taste" and not quality imo so the only really useful rating system at the moment is the number of downloads a sound has achieved although "mainstream" taste is only one aspect of quality."

i don't know about anyone else, but i have Pro Tools LE open when i'm browsing through soundsnap. because of this, i can't easily preview sounds without closing PT. so i simply download the sound instead. i'm sure i'm not the only one doing this and this would probably negate a bit the importance of download numbers anyway.

if a sound works, i'll use it. it doesn't have to be good quality or popular.

In my eyes, rating sounds makes no sense at all. How to differ a good "slammed door" from a bad one? It always depends on what somebody is using the sound for. Making a "nice" movie, found a "dirty" sound? Destiny. The only thing one can rate is the technical quality.

"The downloads are not representative of the quality of a recording, but only its popularity, which is a totally different thing."

I don´t quite agree with that Tasos - as I said mainstream taste is only one side of evaluating a sound file but in many cases the quality of a sound reflects in the high amount of downloads it has.
When a sound designer/musician/filmmaker is looking for a sound which he/she needs for a current project he/she will type in keywords and check the results in terms of usabilty no matter what the rating is or how often it has been downloaded. So in this respect the whole rating system is obsolete imo.

The downloads are not representative of the quality of a recording, but only its popularity, which is a totally different thing.

We might create a 'better results' algorithm taking both into account in the future and offer that as a sorting option.

I am sure that some users and visitors here use the rating system to "diss" other users for what reasons I don´t understand. Rating here is about "taste" and not quality imo so the only really useful rating system at the moment is the number of downloads a sound has achieved although "mainstream" taste is only one aspect of quality.
E.g. in the NI Reaktor 5 library the user votes and the number of downloads are both taken into account for rating - a much fairer way to estimate the quality of something imo.