The problem with bumping

[Mick]

Howdy folks!

As you know, we've had the ability to bump your threads with the press of a button for many years now. Before this users would reply to their thread with "Bump" which is spammy and annoying to navigate when reading thread replies. The bumping system has never been perfect and since the beginning users have complained that allowing users to bump as many threads as they'd like each day causes problems with drowning out the competition.

For illustration purposes, this is what the Builds products forum regularly looks like:

I don't mean to suggest that what these users are doing is unethical or wrong-- we effectively encourage it with our policies on bumping right now. I think that this is a problem for the builds forum and all other product forums. I knew that this was a problem with product threads already and that introducing resource bumping would likely have a similar outcome, and that's certainly what we've seen already in just the past few days. It's time for us to change our bumping systems for threads and resources, and I have a few ideas for how we can do this.

The main response we've received as a result of the significant bumping issues present on the new site has been "Why bother with resource bumping at all? Switch back to last updated like it used to be". I think that this isn't a solution and has many problems associated with it. Relying on the last updated is problematic because:

1. It encourages authors to release unpolished products so that they get more opportunities to publish fixes to get more exposure
2. Authors update their products with useless and spammy improvements that were done purely to bump their product
3. Graphics, builds, and configs are significantly disadvantaged compared to plugins, setups, bots, and programs since the latter require far more effort to maintain than the former

The bumping system was meant to be a fix for this and I would argue that it is the best solution, but our current implementation needs a minor adjustment made to it in order to discourage mass-bumping. The solution is to make it so that users can bump fewer threads/resources per day, and I have two different options for you:

Option A - 2 bumps per user per section per bump interval​

This option is pretty simple, we limit users to only bump up to 2 threads per forum and 2 resources per category per day (or less time if you have Premium, Supreme, or Ultimate). This would be easier if you offer several different types of services and products since you'd be able to bump several at the same time, but since they'd all be in different sections it'd not lead to poor discoverability for others.​

​

Option B - 1-hour cooldown between bumps​

The purpose of bumping is to make it require effort to get your thread seen again, and the problem with bumping as much content as you'd like per day is that the amount of effort it takes to bump 1 thread is roughly the same as it takes to bump 100 threads since there's no cooldown between bumps. We could remedy this by allowing users to bump far more than just 2 resources/threads per category/forum per day, but with a cooldown of 1 hour between each bump. To clarify, this doesn't mean that you can bump the same thread once per hour (you'll still need to wait the 24 hours between), but you'll have to wait an hour between bumping your Builds product thread before you can bump your Building services thread.​

So what do you think? Do you agree with my perspective of this or do you think that a different strategy should be used instead? Looking forward to hear your response.

Micky

 

[solo]

I think it should be a maximum of 2 bumps per every 2 hours and a maximum of 5 bumps per section in one day. That'd make the section much cleaner with threads not really fixed together but mixed with the rest.

 

[Mick]

I think it should be a maximum of 2 bumps per every 2 hours and a maximum of 5 bumps per section in one day. That'd make the section much cleaner with threads not really fixed together but mixed with the rest.

Interesting, so a mix of the two ideas. My concern with that is that by mixing the two ideas together we're overcomplicating it. I'd rather we were more lenient with option A or B rather than mixing them together and having to explain how it works to others when the limits are kinda convoluted.

 

[Zorino]

I agree with solo else option A

 

[solo]

Interesting, so a mix of the two ideas. My concern with that is that by mixing the two ideas together we're overcomplicating it. I'd rather we were more lenient with option A or B rather than mixing them together and having to explain how it works to others when the limits are kinda convoluted.

I'd say go with option A but change it a bit, make it a maximum of 5 bumps per section with a maximum of 2 bumps for every 2 hours. That way there is less noticeable spam and people are still able to bump their threads

 

[gridloc]

Could do a progressive cool-down:

First 3 bumps have no cool-down
4th Bump - 15 min from 3rd bump
5th Bump - 30 min from 4th bump
6th Bump - 45 min from 5th bump
7th Bump - 1 hr from 6th bump

Two things come of this, it takes more effort than already required to bump your threads, meaning less people will take the time and it won't gum up recent threads as much. It will also incentivize bumping higher quality content first, before spamming copy/paste threads and resources. Additionally, to get to 5 bumps it would take 45 minutes + the time it takes to go bump the threads. Much more manageable than the 2 minutes it takes to press bump on all 5 right now.

Going further with the progression, if at most someone wants to bump 15 threads/resources it would then take a total exponential time of 19.5 hours to get through 15 bumps and their cool-downs. Which means you'd at most have someone bumping 15 a day, since most people sleep for at least 4.5 hours, and they'd be spread out with the 15th bump having a cool-down of 3 hours from the 14th bump.

EDIT: Personally I think this is a little more complicated, but overall it will allow people to still be able to keep their bumped content towards the top, but also allows other users to get in there during the day without being immediately flooded again.

 

[Mick]

I'd say go with option A but change it a bit, make it a maximum of 5 bumps per section with a maximum of 2 bumps for every 2 hours. That way there is less noticeable spam and people are still able to bump their threads

In my opinion allowing 5 bumps per section per day is far too many and will just leave the exact same problems as before. Switching to 2 bumps per day per section would encourage users to bundle several of their products into a single thread and only bump their best resources, thus making the experience for buyers better.

Could do a progressive cool-down:

First 3 bumps have no cool-down
4th Bump - 15 min from 3rd bump
5th Bump - 30 min from 4th bump
6th Bump - 45 min from 5th bump
7th Bump - 1 hr from 6th bump

Two things come of this, it takes more effort than already required to bump your threads, meaning less people will take the time and it won't gum up recent threads as much. It will also incentivize bumping higher quality content first, before spamming copy/paste threads and resources. Additionally, to get to 5 bumps it would take 45 minutes + the time it takes to go bump the threads. Much more manageable than the 2 minutes it takes to press bump on all 5 right now.

Going further with the progression, if at most someone wants to bump 15 threads/resources it would then take a total exponential time of 19.5 hours to get through 15 bumps and their cool-downs. Which means you'd at most have someone bumping 15 a day, since most people sleep for at least 4.5 hours, and they'd be spread out with the 15th bump having a cool-down of 3 hours from the 14th bump.

EDIT: Personally I think this is a little more complicated, but overall it will allow people to still be able to keep their bumped content towards the top, but also allows other users to get in there during the day without being immediately flooded again.

Progressive cooldowns are an interesting concept, but I do think that allowing up to 5 bumps all within the same hour is too many. If we were to do a system like this I'd rather a system like

First bump
Second bump after 15 minutes
Third bump after 30 minutes
Fourth bump after 1 hour
Fifth bump after 2 hours
Sixth bump after 4 hours
Seventh bump after 8 hours

EDIT: Were you talking about these cooldowns being on a per-section basis or across the entire site?

 

[KeystoneBuilds]

Option A seems more reasonable for us.

 

[zArrowTan]

The main issue with resource bumping:
I don't think a cooldown between a person's bump would do anything as there are 100s of users bumping all the time. I understand the reasons to why bumping was needed for resources as a fix but it turned out to be bad as everyday people keep bumping and its a repeated cycle. I remember seeing the latest resources where near to only 10-20 resources were updated (with some useless updates) every day and it didn't really affect much. But with the current resource bumping your resource will never be found. Now if you're thinking "oh they will use the filter feature to find you" Well no, I've tried using the filter feature and still did not find my resources until excessive filters. What I'm saying is that the current resource bumping does no benefit and decrease sales/downloads as its a repeated cycle where your resource is never seen by potential buyers as the resources just keep coming up and up.

I can't think of proper words but if you may ask other resource authors they're gonna share the same view of point. According to me Bumping has just destroyed our way of getting downloads and sales.

 

[nidzoo]

I'm more into option A.

 

[Kjell]

I think it should be a maximum of 2 bumps per every 2 hours and a maximum of 5 bumps per section in one day. That'd make the section much cleaner with threads not really fixed together but mixed with the rest.

Definitely agree with Solo, I get that people still want to bump more than one thread in the builds section for example. This would nicely regulate that.

 

[gridloc]

In my opinion allowing 5 bumps per section per day is far too many and will just leave the exact same problems as before. Switching to 2 bumps per day per section would encourage users to bundle several of their products into a single thread and only bump their best resources, thus making the experience for buyers better.


Progressive cooldowns are an interesting concept, but I do think that allowing up to 5 bumps all within the same hour is too many. If we were to do a system like this I'd rather a system like

First bump
Second bump after 15 minutes
Third bump after 30 minutes
Fourth bump after 1 hour
Fifth bump after 2 hours
Sixth bump after 4 hours
Seventh bump after 8 hours

EDIT: Were you talking about these cooldowns being on a per-section basis or across the entire site?

I was thinking site-wide, but I like bringing it down to each bump has a cool-down.

 

[Kappios]

Option A.

 

[MrAniman2]

Glad to see this issue is finally being addressed! I would go with "Option A"

 

[Leasty]

I completely agree with what ArrowTan said, before the problem was not even serious, because it was only some specific authors who did it (the only thing they had to do was to ban them), but now as a consequence, you can not last even 1 day with your resources on the first page, when before you could last 4-5 days on the first or second page (without updating), now it is a matter of hours for your resource to be hidden and without traffic, meaning no sales.

And even worse! I have seen authors who have not updated in years/months and now you see them on the first pages and having sales, totally disgusting.

This also encourages not to do updates, believe me, I am not even planning to do updates anymore as I have no reason to do them, and although you say that the authors did bump and this has been "beneficial", I think you are generalizing and the problem was with several authors, not all.

For my preference I would simply remove it and go back to normal, otherwise it has more disadvantages than advantages (from my perspective selling on mcmarket).

Post automatically merged: Jan 16, 2022

And in general if for some reason you are still thinking of keeping the bump option I would put a cooldown of 1 week/month per every bump, and that the resources to be updated will also make the "bump" function.

Post automatically merged: Jan 16, 2022

I believe that limiting the number of bumps by sections or hours is useless.

 

[Toaru]

Since this new feature of "Bump" was released, things have gotten much worse, it is no longer profitable to make an effort to launch updates because now they make no sense, because it will be overshadowed by a lot of unsupported and abandoned resources, I have just been almost 1 year in mcm I am relatively new to this but I am already considering selling my resources and leave from the site because the previous conditions were bad, but now they are even worse, no matter how hard I work on my resources it will not do any good.

I also want to add that the waiting time does not work, it is supposed to be 20 hours for the supreme, but in reality you have to wait a full 24 hours.

 

[Sfera Legal]

Since this new feature of "Bump" was released, things have gotten much worse, it is no longer profitable to make an effort to launch updates because now they make no sense, because it will be overshadowed by a lot of unsupported and abandoned resources, I have just been almost 1 year in mcm I am relatively new to this but I am already considering selling my resources and leave from the site because the previous conditions were bad, but now they are even worse, no matter how hard I work on my resources it will not do any good.

I also want to add that the waiting time does not work, it is supposed to be 20 hours for the supreme, but in reality you have to wait a full 24 hours.

As my great friend Toaru mentioned,

Before it was very difficult for your setup to be top resources, but it was achieved with a lot of effort and updates, but now this new "Bump" option doesn't make sense,
I would also like to have a better treatment, not only as a client, but like all of us who are self-employed in our jobs, we would also like to have a better presentation of our product or resource.

 

[FavioMc19]

I think the idea is very good. promoting order will make us all understand each other better

 

[Landon]

It isn't like every use on the forum is synchronized with their bumping schedule. Sure, userA bumps all 50 of their threads, and it floods the top of a forum category. But then, an hour later, userB comes and bumps theirs. I feel it would be a valid problem that needed a solution if users were bumping their threads for it to immediately be hidden by another bumped thread.. But with 24H cooldowns in between bumps, I don't think this is enough for a full re-do of the current system. Bumped threads are visible long enough for traction to be gained before another thread is bumped.

And if it isn't, don't bump all your threads at once. Bump one every hour, maximize visibility. I don't know, this seems like an extreme measure for a problem that really doesn't exist.

Disagree. + Ratio.

 

[Aelin]

I'd be happy with either scenario. My question about Option A though is regarding the ultimate user auto-bump. Would that bump count as one of your 2? Or is the auto bump a bonus perk, allowing you 3 total per day? just a thought. Either way it would be good.