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dotherightthing.com not completely transparent about rating system
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cnidog
about 1 year ago about dotherightthing.com
I know this web site is new and subject to all kinds of updates as the developers tweak things here and clarify things there, so I am hoping that the lack of information on their rating algorithm is temporary. The short tutorial that explains how to use the site implies that the rating system is a simple average of user ratings, but it is not totally clear.
Dotherightthing.com, of all the issues surrounding this site, you need to be absolutely transparent on the algorithm used for your rating system. If not, users have no way to assess the biases in the rating system and you’ll lose credibility quickly.
I’m confident this will be fixed soon, if the company lives up to the values it espouses.
dotherightthing.com
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Other recent stories about dotherightthing.com
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- Corporations SHOULD "give back"
- This is partly in response to an entry by “Pedrito4809” entitled “Do the right thing is adding to the misguided perception that corporations rather than governments have a duty to address the world’s problems, and speeding up the process by which corporations respond to consumers with phony CSR campains. [read more]
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Comments
submitted by Veinor about 1 year ago
Google hasn’t made their PageRank algorithm public either. And it does seem to be a simple average. Example: before, this was rated -1.7. I rated this -0.1. It’s now -0.9. Looks like an average to me.
submitted by minidore about 1 year ago
hmm…i just changed my rating to 0.0 and it didn’t make a difference. i also don’t see the option to delete your rating…maybe i’m missing something? should definitely be added though…
As dotherightthing grows, its power to influence companies will also grow in parallel... influenced to do the right thing, or beat a methodology?
submitted by ryan (verified representative for dotherightthing.com) about 1 year ago
Ask yourself these questions:
Would I prefer that (1) the methodology by which companies will be ranked and a social performance value revealed, developed by a team of people whose goal is to engineer an algorithm that accurately reflects the perceptions of social/environmental impact (we’ll be revealing the principles and goals using which the algorithm was designed) be hidden, and the methodology kept safe to minimize risk of “gaming?” Or (2) would I prefer not to trust the members of and advisors to the social performance valuation model design team, require that the methodology be exposed, and risk the high potential that companies could someday look not to do the right thing, but instead act in a way that will maximize its ability to inflate its own performance value?
In the second scenario, the dotherightthing team’s goal to give people an opportunity to influence companies in the ways that they impact people and the environment is not realized, which is why we don’t intend to reveal the ratings methodology (for your protection, not ours, despite our significant interest in transparency, in every case that makes sense, including where we get our money from [Rod and Ryan’s life savings], what it gets spent on [servers, development, and t-shirts, so far], etc.).
By safeguarding the ratings methodology, the dotherightthing community influences companies to do the right thing, not the methodology or dotherightthing itself.
Veinor: You are right, the impact numbers you see next to each story about the impacts of a company on people and the environment is the average of its ratings by those who also found the activity of the company important.
Since you asked...
submitted by cnidog about 1 year ago
Thanks for your response Ryan. Of the two scenarios you posed, I am afraid I would prefer option 2. Why? It’s not that I don’t trust you, I’m sure you have honourable intentions, but I do want to assure myself that the company ratings are fair. When a site such as this offers a forum where a sort of social conscience can develop, where users can find help to do the “right” thing, and where they can choose to support or not support companies based on a rating, I think it behooves the developers to make their rating system open and transparent to ensure that the users good faith is not being abused. For all I know your algorithm could be preferentially weighting positive or negative reviews. It’s not hard to imagine what kind of financial gain could come from such a bias in the way the ratings are calculated.
So, if the algorithm was made available for everyone to see, would people try to “game” the system. Sure they would, but people will try to game the system anyway, and at least with an open algorithm users will understand how gaming the system effects the scores and can counter against it. Look, for example to Digg.com. Digg.com has people who game the system by signing up for multiple accounts. Digg has tried to work around this by including a “bury” feature. Perhaps you could do the something similar on this site. Now before you go running off saying Digg doesn’t make their algorithm public, let’s remember that they are not in the game of promoting good practices among companies, and henceforth ensuring that all users’ feel reassured that the ratings are fair.
At the end of the day, I think this site will have far more credibility, leading to greater use, and greater financial rewards for you, if the algorithm is made public.
On a related note, you have implied that the impact numbers next to each story are a simple arithmetic average of the ratings assigned by each user. Can you confirm that for us please. Thanks.
Impact rating of stories...
submitted by ryan (verified representative for dotherightthing.com) about 1 year ago
Yes, I can confirm that the impact rating of each story is equal to the mean of the ratings submitted by users who found the story’s contents important.
I’d like to continue the discussion about the opportunity to ensure that the goal of recognizing companies for doing the right thing could be met with an open algorithm in comments on a blog post. We plan to use the blog for discussions that relate to features and suggestions related to dotherightthing, in order to incorporate your feedback into the site and our activities to the best extent possible.
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