Stop Automatic Upgrades
HaramDingo-ING
Posts: 1,725 ✭✭✭✭✭
The reward of having a nomination be reviewed by people who couldn't care less about an area that doesn't directly impact them is distasteful. I like reviewing, but I hate having to pick out something as a sacrificial lamb every one-hundred or so agreements because even if the nomination is eligible, exposing it to an upgrade gets it rejected for ridiculous reasons such as a playground for explicit content or a nature information sign as a natural feature.
I myself would appreciate either of the following systems as an optional toggle:
- Select a nomination to apply a banked upgrade, or store upgrades rather than just auto-applying it to something, or
- Opting out of the upgrade process entirely (i.e. not receiving requests)
I would rather wait 4-6 months for a nomination to go through, rather than speed it up for people to instantly reject.
"Oh, it's in Queensland? Nope, not going to bother with that, rejected."
Considering that I've explored and witnessed various groups on Facebook Messenger or Discord who actually organise to actually reject nominations that aren't close or relevant to them whatsoever, it just proves to show that an upgrade is literally an express ticket to "thank you for your hard work!"
There was some poll about upgrades and wondered why people would be capped at 10 upgrades and whether it should just be unlimited. If I absolutely was able to, I would donate my upgrades to someone else, or at least redeem agreement points for something more useful. Because really an upgrade is a penalty. "You're reviewing too much, here's a rejection to stop you in your tracks."
And unless you address these poor reviewers who intentionally vote against anything outside of their play area, it's just not working. I would be reviewing so much more if it wasn't for upgrades, because putting in all this work shouldn't result in a rejection. And before you go pounce all up on me and say "we need to know what you're putting in the description/title/photo so we can look at your nomination and criticise it to hell", I am absolutely sure and make sure there are no live animals or explicit activity in any of my nominations.
Comments
My experience is alarmingly similar. It's very disheartening to see that these kind of reviewers are so widespread, and not just a local phenomenon.
Estoy de acuerdo, deberían quitar las mejoras automáticas y que simplemente se acumulen. El otro día me dieron 5 mejoras por el reto de Indian Wayfarer Challenge y las 5 se me pusieron en propuestas automáticamente.
Automatic upgrade is one of the reason why i don't review too often.
The upgrade system need to be reworked:
-Stop automatic upgrade and allow to store upgrade event if we have nomination in queue.
-Allow us to use upgrade to re-submit a rejected nomination
-Allow us to use some upgrades (maybe 2 or 3?) in order to make an appeal of a rejection.
That's the only solution to really reward people for reviewing.
General consensus in my community is the same. If you want it to go through don't upgrade it.
Nothing in Wayfarer works the way it was intendet to. Upgrades were supposed to be a reward but they are a punishment. Cooldowns were supposed to make people take their time but they incentivise evasion strategies, like varying the rating you give. The showcase was supposed to show great POI but often enough it's filled with garbage.
@NianticCasey-ING
Still, I keep saying, I'm not greedy, just let me discard upgrades...
@NianticCasey-ING has made a comment on a rather "question-oriented" discussion rather than this ranty sort of post. So I guess maybe that's a better way to get a response from a Niantic staff member. To bring that here:
Well, as long as they acknowledge this concern that this is in the works and currently in the oven, that is fine.
A couple of months down the line, just hoping that these changes will be baked into this second half that we're in now. I would really love to do away with the upgrades. Can only touch wood that we will see this implementation and quality of life.
While I understand that the upgrade penalty is real for many people, this phenomenon doesn't exist everywhere. Last time I checked a few months ago, my acceptance rate for upgraded submissions was almost exactly the same (within 2-3%) of my non-upgraded submissions. I've gotten bad and fair rejections as well as borderline candidates accepted for both upgraded and non-upgraded submissions.
This is in the United States, so there isn't an issue with submissions being pushed into neighboring countries with different languages, etc.