When I last sought comfort at Mudcat, just after the Colorado high school shootings in April, 1999, the atmosphere was uniformly warm and friendly. Not so these days. Ugh. When did this trolling and sniping begin?

I wonder if a credibility rating system deserves some thought? It's now a common science fiction idea that in the future all creditable news would have to come from people who have built up a reputation over time (and that they'd be able to digitally sign their reports to show that no censorship took place). Perhaps something similar is needed here? We already have passwords.

Idea: postings from catters who have made ten postings and have gone over a year without reputable complaints of trolling or displaying blatant rudeness ought to automatically show up in a different colour? Maybe posts from people who have solved more than ten problems for other catters (such as getting lyrics) could get a reserved suffix added to their name, like "XYZ the Helpful" (this could be done by nomination by themselves or others). Maybe professional folkies could appear as "XYZ the Talented" Maybe people who have helped over a hundred times could get a suffix added to their name like "Joe Offer the Mighty Helpful"

This isn't censorship, it's highlighting; it's recognition.

Initially, a few regulars could have their membership properties manually set to "reputable". They would be the only ones capable of lodging reputable complaints against others. The rest of us could slowly become reputable over time.

Apologies if this idea has already been discussed to death in the forum.

Mudcat is a binge behavior for me. I'm not sure if I'll be able to follow up on any discussion for more than a few days.