That said I see the problem with negative balls, but I think this could be solved by just showing the total sum on each post, but whenever the sum is negative it should just show 0 (possibly it could show the actual sum for your own posts as this would give you feedback when people disagree too). It should work the same with the grand total, only the sum should be displayed, but whenever it is a negative number 0 should be displayed.
I think this is the part where the -1 fails, it gives you no feedback what so ever. I think that if you find a post that you disagree with, you should explain why and what part you disagree with, in a reply. If a lot of ppl have the same issue with the first post they can simply +1 the reply.
That way you can have a healthy discussion with feedback to the op.
Well, as I see it that has not worked this far, so I have no reason to believe that it suddenly will do. You could reason the exact same way about the plu. If you have something positive to say then say it why set a +1 instead. That kind of implys that if you have something negative to say you are encourage to write it, but if you have something positive you might as well just +1 it. Then of course showing the total negative number, only for yourself and never for someone else, was not the main message in my post, which was the reason why it was within parenthesis and with a "possibly". I myself would think this would be intersting to see for my own posts though.
That said, I would prefer a "no ball" system though, as I think people should be encourage to write because they have something to say, rather than chasing balls and a system with only positive balls for me is the worst alternative.
I think there is a huge difference about how ppl use the +1 and -1.
I think the +1 is most frequently used when ppl agree with the general message of the post.
I think the -1 would be used to tell someone:
"I dont like your name!
"I dont like your country"
"I dont like you beating me in the PL-game"
"I dont agree with you in a different thread"
"I hate you since you said something bad about my player in another thread"
"I just hate you for whatever reason"
None of the above really help anyone. But maybe this is just my bad faith in mankind.
I can agree that we could be better off without any ratings or statistics in the forum. The only catch with removing them is we might get a shit load of +1 messages after some posts but maybe some moderation could keep that from happening.