Hi all, we had a site update today The bugfixes/features: - We upgraded our harddisks so we have more space to store all the user models. - The markup page wasnt working right now for average/large size shops. - Make guests able to rate models again - fix the restriction set on the creator models to be the same as the creator templates (lightpoem, ringpoem) - extended the API functionality to be able to specifiy if a model can become public/private and allow models to be shown only in certain materials. We will also update the API-documentation for this feature.
Yea as stop4stuff sent me, as I remember it was removed to prevent people from running up their own rating, or running down others ratings.
The stars ratings system should only be used/sent as a link to actual customers for their satisfaction ratings of the models they bought. Only a customer can truly rate a model for what it is.
Yes, product ratings by customers and resulting designer / shop ratings are on the road map. We think the current rating is more a 'like' in the sense of Facebook. I agree that product ratings make sense but we also need enough order volume to make it worthwhile. - Robert
Stars as a rating system is a rating system. People equate stars with hotels - stars that have been assigned by an inspector. People equate stars with ebay - less than 4.n/5.0 average and sellers' search rankings get hit. Stars mean more than like/dislike and now it is again possible to give any model (including your own) as many ratings as you like. If purchasers only rating is not viable at this time, perhaps head back to must be logged in to rate again.
Robert, I agree except for the ability for people to manipulate the ratings if Guests are allowed to rate.
All true guys. But we saw a major step up in ratings -- both in number of models rated as well as total ratings -- when we allowed guest rating. That is the reason we re-enabled it. We get a lot of first time users who are driven here by news items, facebook likes etc. The rating activity is taken into account into the popular items algorithm and the quality of popular items actually was better when guest rating was there. For that I reason I wanted it back. Maybe we should introduce a Shapeways Like button for that and use the ratings for buyers only for product quality ratings.