How can we suck less?

[Mals]

On 10/14/2024 at 1:20 AM, dustyhansen said:

I would really like to see a button to flag a plugin for staff review.

I have several plugins that the devs are completely non-responsive to support requests, discussion posts, etc. and they are no longer working and are still available for sale/download.

It would be nice if there were an easy way to flag a plugin as a problem and leave a note as to what the situation is so staff could review it and possibly pull it or whatever needs to be done.

I also really want a search feature for discussions as others have said. That would be super helpful.

If you find a product you bought is not being reasonably supported, report it. I am all over that! I check the discussion, support pages, and reviews. Regardless, I contact the creator and raise the concern. I also follow up with the reporter. I (currently) have the right to block sale on unsupported content, and will do so if it is not reasonably supported. But please be reasonable. For example, on wipe day, a ton of plugins break. Some people fix them before or the day of wipe (Gold Star). Some might not be able to on wipe day (deployed, travelling, sick, live in the wrong time zone, etc.). But if it is still broken a week later, it is worth following up. I prefer a quick fix for critical plugins, but know not all of them will be fixed within hours of wipe. So reporting a plugin an hour after wipe is going to result in contacting the creator, and allowing them time to action it, which might take more than 24 hours. Many creators do this as a hobby, so can't action it until they are home from work, or might work 12-hour shifts so take a day or two to get a decent rest day to action bugs. Very few creators have this as their full-time gig, and even fewer have support staff on at all hours.

[Mals]

On 10/26/2024 at 10:44 PM, dustyhansen said:

How long do reviews take to get approved? I wrote one several days ago and it is still not showing. I think the review process needs re-visited as others have said.

Hi Dusty. My apologies, I thought I had dmed about that review. I am planning to spend a few hours on reviews tomorrow and catch up.

[Mals]

26 minutes ago, Bubbafett said:

I really appreciate the detailed response from you on this!

I also understand that it is intended to make the user experience with reviews better, however from my standpoint this can have the opposite effect. Seeing a users review, issues, suggestions and all in the review section and a response from the dev on that review increases my trust in that dev. Support request can be private, so I can use that as a true picture of user experience with the plugin either.

I understand removing attacks on devs and abusive reviews as they do not provide any value at all, but I struggle to trust the review process when I have no way of knowing, as the customer, if the reviews are being cherry picked to make a product seem better than it is.

This removed value from the review system as apposed to letting organic reviews and responses to those reviews happen directly between the customer and the creator.

Its not my site, and I understand the goal behind it. I just don't agree with the process.

I do try to resolve customer issues as it is better outcome to solve the problem than have a bad review, and a flawed product. My goal is customer service in getting things fixed, and being fair to creators that they get a chance to fix an issue before getting slammed for it. A lot of creators are not server owners, so they have no clue about how things are going with their creations after initial release until a customer lets them know. Also, as someone who runs over 100 plugins, there are a lot of edge case you only see in running servers.

That said, if it is a critically flawed product and not getting addressed, hello 1-star review. In some cases, if the review has an issue that another person has a support request for that is a few weeks old and not even responded to, straight to approve. I'm trying to be fair, but firm.

Trust is hard. A lot of place don't care if they are selling garbage, so will pump out sunshine and happiness for all products to drive sales. Death cares about the quality of the products and the reviews. I take my role as moderator seriously, I just wish I had more time to spend on it during the week. I don't cherry-pick the good ones, just statistically they are the highest volume of what is submitted. I approved a slew of negative reviews last month, just search for products with 4 or fewer stars and you will find the negative reviews.

[HunterZ]

Idea for sucking less: Improve discord embeds served by the site, so that it actually provides link-specific data instead of a generic CodeFling site description + image.

[Death]

11 hours ago, HunterZ said:

Idea for sucking less: Improve discord embeds served by the site, so that it actually provides link-specific data instead of a generic CodeFling site description + image.

That's not possible. Discord does not have any guild information associated with their invite URL. That's all internal. We could use the API to get this data but the API requires the guild ID and the invite URL does not contain this.

[dustyhansen]

The fact that negative reviews require additional moderation and verification is not a problem, but if the review has sufficient detail and is negative, it should be approved without having to require the buyer to have submitted umpteen support tickets and have a face-off with the developer over the review content. Can you imagine if other products were that way? You buy a new appliance and have to have contacted LG support first before posting an honest review and then have to argue with someone at LG to justify why you wrote what you wrote?

My last review was extremely thorough and I had submitted 5 support tickets prior to writing it and it was still not approved and it wasn't even a bad review, it was 3-stars and pretty optimistic.

Negative reviews are critical to the purchase decision and push developers to fix their product quicker. It is misleading when I go to buy a plugin and all I see are the positive reviews because the negative ones were filtered out of my view so they could be "worked on" and made positive.

Frankly I am getting pretty tired of buying a new plugin and having to open several support tickets for broken things and then having to wait weeks on end for a response to my submission, only to have a dev (most of which lack any form of customer service skills) reply to me that it "works fine for them" and dismiss my issue as if I am a crazy person that just made it up. Sometimes a review is the only tool we have to combat this and you are taking that away from us.

10 minutes ago, Mals said:

Codefling's goals are factual reviews with some details, that talk about the product (good or bad), do not have expletives, or personal attacks. If a review meets those criteria, I approve. I am fine with you saying something suck if it meets that criteria!

You say this is the goal, but then you go on for multiple paragraphs about how if reviews mention broken things, they don't get posted. Or if reviews mention features that are missing, then they don't get posted.

12 minutes ago, Mals said:

Talk about what the plugin does do good/bad, but talking about what it does not do, which is not in the description, seems unfair.

This is the wrong perspective as well. The features that a plugin is missing should be pointed out as shortcomings, because often times people don't realize that they need that feature until they actually use the plugin on a live server. I don't think there is anything wrong with mentioning a reasonable feature/functionality that is lacking in the plugin that influences your opinion of the overall quality of the plugin.

[dustyhansen]

Also, I would like you to have a refund policy posted clearly on the website and a process for requesting said refund. I have 4 plugins I have bought that are no longer being sold because they just stopped working and another 4 that I could never get to work correctly and gave up on dealing with the dev, for example. Are these covered in any way? Are there any guarantees when I buy a plugin? Or is everything sold as-is?

[dustyhansen]

10 minutes ago, dustyhansen said:

Also, I would like you to have a refund policy posted clearly on the website and a process for requesting said refund. I have 4 plugins I have bought that are no longer being sold because they just stopped working and another 4 that I could never get to work correctly and gave up on dealing with the dev, for example. Are these covered in any way? Are there any guarantees when I buy a plugin? Or is everything sold as-is?

I found it after some digging: https://codefling.com/refunds/

[Death]

@dustyhansen That's not at all how it works. If you submit a review for ANY rating that relates to a support issue for which you haven't created a support request for, then it won't get approved until you do, and there's a reasonable amount of time for the author to correct it beforehand. There is an exception, and that's when an issue is widely reported, and no resolution by the author has been made.

The reason for this, as stated above, is to produce a positive outcome for the customer. A negative review is not going to resolve your issue, but leveraging your review for a positive outcome for not only you but other users is. It's also to protect authors from users who leave reviews about support issues but never amend them once the issue is fixed. This is the case most of the time and is demotivating.

Also, reviews about features that are not advertised or even promised should not happen. I get in your head that it's motivation for the author to add those features, but at that point, you're forcing them to do so for the sake of amending your review. That's absolutely abusive and is exactly why they wouldn't get approved.

[Death]

47 minutes ago, dustyhansen said:

I found it after some digging: https://codefling.com/refunds/

As usual, all of our policies are available in the footer. https://codefling.com/legal

[dustyhansen]

7 minutes ago, Death said:

@dustyhansen That's not at all how it works. If you submit a review for ANY rating that relates to a support issue for which you haven't created a support request for, then it won't get approved until you do, and there's a reasonable amount of time for the author to correct it beforehand. There is an exception, and that's when an issue is widely reported, and no resolution by the author has been made.

The reason for this, as stated above, is to produce a positive outcome for the customer. A negative review is not going to resolve your issue, but leveraging your review for a positive outcome for not only you but other users is. It's also to protect authors from users who leave reviews about support issues but never amend them once the issue is fixed. This is the case most of the time and is demotivating.

Also, reviews about features that are not advertised or even promised should not happen. I get in your head that it's motivation for the author to add those features, but at that point, you're forcing them to do so for the sake of amending your review. That's absolutely abusive and is exactly why they wouldn't get approved.

Couldn't disagree with you more on this reply. Appreciate the dialogue and all that, but you are completely off base here and close to losing a customer.

I am fine with you leveraging my review for a positive outcome, but in the meantime the plugin is being sold to other customers without the awareness of the issues and shortcomings that the plugin has and all they see are 5-star reviews that were approved without issue. I would rather have you remove a review that is no longer applicable/accurate after contacting the reviewer to update it, then have you refuse to post an honest and accurate review because you want to censor our reviews, which is essentially what you are doing here.

And posting about features the plugin lacks is not forcing them to add them or abusive. I am offended at the accusation actually. If I review a refrigerator and after using it for a month realize that it would be nice if it had a light in the door so I could see when I was dispensing water, there should be nothing wrong with me mentioning that in the review. That is not abusive nor forcing them to add a light. It is letting other customers know that they may want to look for one with a light, because it is a feature that is missing in this product. Or perhaps a light is not important to them and they can buy it anyways.

I agree that mentioning some missing features would be bogus, but if you say hey this raid protection plugin doesn't include offline raid protection or this kill feed plugin doesn't post when players die by drowning shouldn't be an issue.

[Death]

1 hour ago, dustyhansen said:

without the awareness of the issues and shortcomings that the plugin has

So, according to your reasoning, instead of notifying the author through the proper channels and giving them a chance to address the issue, you should just post an extensive review that took more effort than submitting a simple support request? Your claim that this is misleading to customers is completely unfounded. The support tab is one of the primary places users check to see if a file has active support.

1 hour ago, dustyhansen said:

And posting about features the plugin lacks is not forcing them to add them or abusive. I am offended at the accusation actually.

It absolutely is. You're taking advantage of them by putting pressure on the rating of their file to get what you want. That's abuse. Instead, you should use the discussion tab (or even submit a support request) to propose new features. If your suggestions are declined, so be it. Those features were never guaranteed to you in the first place.

1 hour ago, dustyhansen said:

If I review a refrigerator and after using it for a month realize that it would be nice if it had a light in the door so I could see when I was dispensing water, there should be nothing wrong with me mentioning that in the review.

A light on the door is generally an expected feature of a fridge and would constitute a design flaw or a shortcoming for it. I completely understand a review in this case, but that's just it. It's not the case. You can't make this comparison to a plugin when you want a feature that was never promised. If it's a kill feed plugin that doesn't show deaths from drowning then sure, I could see a valid review for that. It's all based on context, which is why we moderate reviews.

Reviews should be used to assess products based on what they promise and deliver. Criticizing a product for lacking features it never advertised shifts the purpose of reviews away from objective evaluation and toward personal preferences, which can be misleading to other potential users. If users want to suggest new features or highlight areas for improvement, the appropriate way to do so is through feedback channels like support or discussion tabs. This maintains fairness and constructive dialogue, supporting both creators and users without distorting the product's reputation.

[dustyhansen]

4 minutes ago, Death said:

So, according to your reasoning, instead of notifying the author through the proper channels and giving them a chance to address the issue, you should just post an extensive review that took more effort than submitting a simple support request?

When did I say that? I am an avid user of the Support tab. Earlier I stated that I had submitted 5 support requests before my last review and it was still denied. I am simply saying some people rely on reviews to make purchasing decisions. And I will also state that every plugin I have a bad experience with basically has all 5-star reviews, which is complete BS. There are probably several reviews I am not seeing because of your decision to not show me those reviews as they are currently in "negotiation".

7 minutes ago, Death said:

It absolutely is. You're taking advantage of them by putting pressure on the rating of their file to get what you want. That's abuse. Instead, you should use the discussion tab (or even submit a support request) to propose new features. If your suggestions are declined, so be it. Those features were never guaranteed to you in the first place.

I regularly submit feature requests under support tickets (where they get marked as "not bugs" by the way) and in discussion threads where half the time they get ignored. I am not saying that people shouldn't request features through those channels. I am simply saying that mentioning some features that you might reasonably either expect to be present in the plugin or that you find are essential for the plugin to work well in your review is not a problem. Obviously you have some kind of past experience here that is emotionally impacting your response.

10 minutes ago, Death said:

A light on the door is generally an expected feature of a fridge and would constitute a design flaw or a shortcoming for it. I completely understand a review in this case, but that's just it. It's not the case. You can't make this comparison to a plugin when you want a feature that was never promised.

You are totally contradicting yourself here. Was the light promised? No. But you are calling it a design flaw or shortcoming and saying it could be included in the review. So clearly you feel there are exceptions to your "no missing features in a review" rule.

Again, I appreciate your posting this thread asking for feedback, but your seemingly unwillingness to listen to feedback kinda nullifies it. Clearly you are not open to criticism on the topic of how you moderate reviews on this website and clearly there are several people that feel there is a problem.

[Death]

2 minutes ago, dustyhansen said:

You are totally contradicting yourself here. Was the light promised? No. But you are calling it a design flaw or shortcoming and saying it could be included in the review. So clearly you feel there are exceptions to your "no missing features in a review" rule.

There’s no contradiction here. Your analogy isn’t an apples-to-apples comparison, and I pointed that out in case the suggestion was for an expected feature (e.g., a kill feed showing deaths from drowning), which aligns with your fridge light analogy since both are reasonable expectations based on the product’s nature. Reviews are evaluated on a case-by-case basis, and in your example, a review could be justified. However, that doesn’t mean all reviews based on suggestions should be approved. Your argument is a bit misleading.

7 minutes ago, dustyhansen said:

Again, I appreciate your posting this thread asking for feedback, but your seemingly unwillingness to listen to feedback kinda nullifies it. Clearly you are not open to criticism on the topic of how you moderate reviews on this website and clearly there are several people that feel there is a problem.

This policy has been in place since the start and was supported by a community vote. While your feedback is certainly valid, it's worth noting that your stance is in the minority. Even the reviews you've just recently posted highlight issues and suggestions you made no effort to create a support request for or discuss in the appropriate channels. The definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again, expecting a different outcome.

[dustyhansen]

1 hour ago, Death said:

Even the reviews you've just recently posted highlight issues and suggestions you made no effort to create a support request for or discuss in the appropriate channels.

Are you blind? They all have support requests you lying sack of shit.

1 hour ago, Death said:

The definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again, expecting a different outcome.

So you call your customers insane now? I'll be sure to escalate this beyond this worthless thread that you started for feedback you clearly don't want to get.

[dustyhansen]

I have opened nearly 150 support tickets and left over 130 discussion comments on this site and before today I have only posted 3 reviews, of which 2 have been approved. And one of these is a 5-star review. I haven't even been subject to your review moderation until this latest review. And that review had 5 support requests before I wrote it and it was still denied.

I have spent over $1,800 on your site and never asked for a single refund, even though I have 8 plugins that don't work.

I suggest you make this right.

[Death]

2 hours ago, dustyhansen said:

Are you blind? They all have support requests you lying sack of shit.

Your latest review:

1. Default attire (scientists instead of traditional "zombies") can be confusing or immersion-breaking. - Not mentioned in the support request.

2. The default loadout (double-barrel shotgun) can lead to player frustration and rage quits. - Not mentioned in the support request.

3. Everything else seems to be addressed by the author: https://codefling.com/files/support/16814-zombies-not-spawning/

As you've said yourself, you've had other reviews approved with no issue, which means it's not a problem with our process but rather the context of your review. Just like the one above, you're going after it for suggestions and issues you never brought to the attention of the author. The ones you did submit a support request for seem to be resolved. This is not how you communicate suggestions and is likely why your previous review was rejected.

[dustyhansen]

You are so bogus!

How is me reviewing the attire or the loadout that the zombies come with a problem?! It is not mentioning a feature that is not included in the plugin nor is it mentioning a support issue! At this point you are denying my review for being a REVIEW! Why would I open a support request for those 2 things????????????????????????

And for the third thing, it was not addressed by the author? Are you out of your mind? He literally tells me to increase the percentage to spawn more zombies! LIKE I SAY IN THE REVIEW!!!!!!! I am simply saying .10 is not equal to a 10% chance.

You are literally proving everyone's point with this example! Thank you!

It is 100% clear that you do not like a review that is critical of the author or the plugin. You have obviously been jaded by this in the past as a developer yourself. You have no business running this community or making decisions like this. There is absolutely nothing wrong with that review.

[Bubbafett]

4 hours ago, Death said:

So, according to your reasoning, instead of notifying the author through the proper channels and giving them a chance to address the issue, you should just post an extensive review that took more effort than submitting a simple support request? Your claim that this is misleading to customers is completely unfounded. The support tab is one of the primary places users check to see if a file has active support.

Honestly, I think that a lot of my issues with the review system could be completely ignored if ALL support request were public. I again, have no way of knowing if there is 1 or 100 unanswered support request on a plugin that hasn't had a request in a while. Making reviews more transparent would be the way I would expect something like to be handled, however if I could see all support request that would also increase platform trust.

I have spent no small amount of money on this site, and will continue to do so. I would just like to have to a better picture of what I am getting BEFORE i buy it. Some plugins can be $40 or more and this is no small amount to spend basing it off the description, potentially HUNDREDS post in the discussions tab (Many of which will just be rambling of confused users who can't edit a config), a potentially incomplete picture of a support page, and filtered reviews. I understand that no matter what it will be an educated guess on my part on if a plugin will be good or not, however making this guess easier be pretty great.

[Death]

31 minutes ago, dustyhansen said:

It is 100% clear that you do not like a review that is critical of the author or the plugin. You have obviously been jaded by this in the past as a developer yourself. You have no business running this community or making decisions like this. There is absolutely nothing wrong with that review.

Yeah, sorry, I don't know how else to help you. You're intentionally skimming over all of the information I've provided, trying to find anything and everything to become a victim here. Your review is not going to be approved because the review consists of complaints/suggestions/support issues that were not reported. Either follow the appropriate steps or stop leaving reviews.

[dustyhansen]

Just now, Death said:

Yeah, sorry, I don't know how else to help you. You're intentionally skimming over all of the information I've provided, trying to find anything and everything to become a victim here. Your review is not going to be approved because the review consists of complaints/suggestions/support issues that were not reported. Either follow the appropriate steps or stop leaving reviews.

I literally address each of your points! What are you talking about?

You are literally stating that you cannot put anything negative/critical in a review that you haven't brought to the developer's attention beforehand, correct?

[Death]

27 minutes ago, Bubbafett said:

Honestly, I think that a lot of my issues with the review system could be completely ignored if ALL support request were public. I again, have no way of knowing if there is 1 or 100 unanswered support request on a plugin that hasn't had a request in a while. Making reviews more transparent would be the way I would expect something like to be handled, however if I could see all support request that would also increase platform trust.

I have spent no small amount of money on this site, and will continue to do so. I would just like to have to a better picture of what I am getting BEFORE i buy it. Some plugins can be $40 or more and this is no small amount to spend basing it off the description, potentially HUNDREDS post in the discussions tab (Many of which will just be rambling of confused users who can't edit a config), a potentially incomplete picture of a support page, and filtered reviews. I understand that no matter what it will be an educated guess on my part on if a plugin will be good or not, however making this guess easier be pretty great.

Support requests being private is not that common and are usually done for the sake of concealing sensitive information. Reporting exploits, sharing customer/purchase data, etc. The option needs to be there for when you need it.

[Bubbafett]

2 minutes ago, Death said:

Support requests being private is not that common and are usually done for the sake of concealing sensitive information. Reporting exploits, sharing customer/purchase data, etc. The option needs to be there for when you need it.

Maybe put a counter on the page that shows the number of open private request? Or just have number like you do for discussions and reviews that shows the total number of open request.

[Death]

Just now, dustyhansen said:

You are literally stating that you cannot put anything negative/critical in a review that you haven't brought to the developer's attention beforehand, correct?

By negative or critical, do you mean leaving a review based on a support issue you made no effort to reach out for support on? Why are you generalizing it as just negative and critical reviews? You're being questionably dishonest with your responses. You've cherry-picked things I've said to victimize yourself with and have managed to personally insult me 2 times within the span of an hour.

You clearly don't take criticism very well yourself. You still think you're in the right despite the amount of time I've dedicated here, providing you with all the information you need to understand how reviews are moderated. You're choosing to play ignorant, and I don't understand why.

The personal attacks end here, or I'll begin enforcing our terms of service.

[Death]

1 minute ago, Bubbafett said:

Maybe put a counter on the page that shows the number of open private request? Or just have number like you do for discussions and reviews that shows the total number of open request.

This is planned, but I'm not sure if the count would be separate for the two. I think a better solution is to perhaps show the support request but not allow it to be clickable so you know it exists. I'm not entirely sure how we'd approach that, but I don't really think this is really an issue. Have you encountered this? I'm a bit confused.