A lot of users found themselves confused about what reputation is, how it is computed, how it changes, which effect it has on what, ...
I have compiled here all the information I found about reputation and tried to make it easier for everyone to understand how it works on Steemit.
The reputation has two roles:
Reputation points are calculated using the mathematical function Log base 10.
Here is a representation of this function. (note for the purists: I know the X-axis scale is not correct for reputation. I made it as is for simplicity)
As you can see, is it very easy to raise your reputation at the beginning, but the higher your reputation, the harder it is to increase it. In fact, each time you want to increase your reputation of 1 point, it is ten times harder!
The main effect is that a reputation of 60 is 10 times stronger than the reputation of 59.
It is the same for a negative reputation. A reputation of -8 is 10 times weaker than the reputation of -7.
People with a low reputation cannot harm the reputation of someone with a strong reputation.
This explains why creating a bot that systematically flags other posts is useless, unless the bot has a high reputation, something that will be hard to achieve for a “flag bot”. In no time, the bot’s reputation will be ruined and it will become harmless.
There is no lower or upper limit to reputation.
Before continuing to see how reputation points are “computed”, you need to understand the concept of “Reward Shares“
When you vote for a post or comment, you tell the system to take some money (the reward) from the Global Reward Pool and give 75% of this reward to the author (the author reward) and to share the remaining 25% of the reward between the people that voted for the post (the curation reward).
The more votes for the post from people with high voting power, the higher both rewards will be.
But the curation reward is not distributed equally among all voters.
Depending on the timing of your vote, the voting power you have and how much you allocated to your vote (percentage gauge), you will get a tiny part of the pie or a bigger one.
The size of your part is called the reward share
Here is an example of the distribution of the reward share on a comment:
You see that, despite all users voted with full power (100%), they have different Reward Shares.
OK, now, let's go back to the reputation. All you have to do is to keep in mind this Reward Share value exists.
Each time some vote for a post or a comment, the vote can have an impact on the author reputation, depending on:
Let's have a look at the code that is executed each time you vote for something.
You can find it on github here
const auto& cv_idx = db.get_index< comment_vote_index >().indices().get< by_comment_voter >();
auto cv = cv_idx.find( boost::make_tuple( comment.id, db.get_account( op.voter ).id ) );
const auto& rep_idx = db.get_index< reputation_index >().indices().get< by_account >();
auto voter_rep = rep_idx.find( op.voter );
auto author_rep = rep_idx.find( op.author );
// Rules are a plugin, do not effect consensus, and are subject to change.
// Rule #1: Must have non-negative reputation to effect another user's reputation
if( voter_rep != rep_idx.end() && voter_rep->reputation < 0 ) return;
if( author_rep == rep_idx.end() )
{
// Rule #2: If you are down voting another user, you must have more reputation than them to impact their reputation
// User rep is 0, so requires voter having positive rep
if( cv->rshares < 0 && !( voter_rep != rep_idx.end() && voter_rep->reputation > 0 )) return;
db.create< reputation_object >( [&]( reputation_object& r )
{
r.account = op.author;
r.reputation = ( cv->rshares >> 6 ); // Shift away precision from vests. It is noise
});
}
else
{
// Rule #2: If you are down voting another user, you must have more reputation than them to impact their reputation
if( cv->rshares < 0 && !( voter_rep != rep_idx.end() && voter_rep->reputation > author_rep->reputation ) ) return;
db.modify( *author_rep, [&]( reputation_object& r )
{
r.reputation += ( cv->rshares >> 6 ); // Shift away precision from vests. It is noise
});
}
Here you are. Everything you ever wanted to know is defined is those 33 lines of code.
Now that you have read them, isn’t it clear to you?
I you feel like this, don’t worry. I will help you to translate it to a human understandable language.
auto cv = cv_idx.find( boost::make_tuple( comment.id, db.get_account( op.voter ).id ) );
Out of all votes, get the vote info of the voter (you)
auto voter_rep = rep_idx.find( op.voter );
auto author_rep = rep_idx.find( op.author );
Get the reputation of the voter (you)
Get the reputation of the author of the post or comment
// Rule #1: Must have non-negative reputation to effect another user's reputation
if( voter_rep != rep_idx.end() && voter_rep->reputation < 0 ) return;
Self documented, if you have the a negative reputation, the process stops.
You have no influence on other’s reputation.
if( author_rep == rep_idx.end() )
The process check the existing reputation of the author
// Rule #2: If you are down voting another user, you must have more reputation than them to impact their reputation
// User rep is 0, so requires voter having positive rep
if( cv->rshares < 0 && !( voter_rep != rep_idx.end() && voter_rep->reputation > 0 )) return;
Self-documented, if your vote is negative and your reputation is not positive, the process stop.
db.create< reputation_object >( [&]( reputation_object& r )
The reputation of the author is initialized, then ...
r.reputation = ( cv->rshares >> 6 ); // Shift away precision from vests. It is noise
Your Reward Share becomes the new author reputation.
// Rule #2: If you are down voting another user, you must have more reputation than them to impact their reputation
if( cv->rshares < 0 && !( voter_rep != rep_idx.end() && voter_rep->reputation > author_rep->reputation ) ) return;
Self-documented, if your vote is negative and your reputation is not greater than the author’s reputation, the process stop.
db.modify( *author_rep, [&]( reputation_object& r )
The process will modify the existing author reputation
r.reputation += ( cv->rshares >> 6 ); // Shift away precision from vests. It is noise
Your Reward Share is added to the author’s reputation.
That’s it. Easy and simple.
Finally, the reputation is simply a VERY BIG number that contains the sum of all the Reward Shares of every votes associated to your posts and comments.
If someone unvote your post, his Reward Shares get deduced and your reputation is lowered.
If your post or comment gets flagged, the Reward Share is deduced and your reputation is diminished.
To display it as a human readable number , you can use the following formula:
max(log10(abs(reputation))-9,0)*((reputation>= 0)?1:-1)*9+25
The best way to increase your reputation to get votes from people with a positive reputation and, even better, with a lot of voting power.
To achieve this goal:
I hope you now better understand how reputation works and how to build it.
Remember, reputation is a key factor which reflect how you behave and how the members of the community evaluate your work.
As in real life, having a high level of reputation is a hard work and a long run.
And as in real life, ruining it can be very fast. Then it will be even harder to rebuild.
If you aim at top reputation, focus on quality and on a constructive attitude.
Thanks for reading!