UKC

As we approach winter I would like to ask for the capability to flag feedback on UKC logbooks as being either out of date or simply not feedback in the first place.

Feedback is a great way to report conditions on a route for other users to see, but often a winter route will then fill up with hopelessly out of date reports which make it harder to find relevant information. As a random example Dorsal Arête (Winter) (II) has condition reports going back to 2019 in the feedback.

In addition people fairly frequently put comments into feedback which should clearly be in their personal notes. For example on the above crag there is a personal note from 2009 in the feedback.

I would like to see a function like the Beta flag which turns feedback into notes. Is this possible? Alternatively an "irrelevant" flag and the option to always hide as per beta would do the job.

Totally agree with this. Another common example is dodgy bolts/anchors on sport routes, that have long since been fixed.

I've nearly done this by accident a few times. If I'm remembering correctly (??) Feedback used to be above Personal Notes on the logging page, which more or less guaranteed that this would happen frequently. If so it has since been fixed.

Is there actually any detriment to having feedback posted that is no longer relevant or else that is posted erroneously? Personally, I would prefer it not to be the case that other users can ask for feedback to be deleted, as it basically creates the new problem of someone or something being responsible for deciding which feedback to keep and which to delete.

Some information, e.g. out of date conditions report, may be useless from the perspective of current conditions and therefore flagged for deletion. But, from a different perspective, e.g. curiosity about conditions in previous years, it may actually be interesting and useful data.

A further point, is that it is only through feedback that users with hidden logbooks can make a public note, e.g. loose as hell, undervalued route, sandbag. I realise that a strict interpretation of the rules means these comments on difficulty or quality shouldn't be posted, but the ratings system is useless and there are many reasons why someone may prefer a hidden logbook, not least that it allows them to keep a personal record of information that is not for public consumption. The system you are describing basically forces users to have a public logbook or lose their voice.

I would also add that I doubt it can simply be added to logbook notes, as the user will already have a log, possibly with a note.

If I recall correctly, when they added the feedback feature, they populated it with all the notes people left on routes on the old Rockfax site. (I guess because they didn't want it to start out completely blank.) As far as I can see, those notes are no less personal and irrelevant, on average, than the kind of stuff people put in normal logbook notes so it never made much sense to me.

Maybe this only offends my desire to have things in the proper place and so is a trivial matter. That said, I spend quite a lot of time in the winter season poring over condition reports including in the logbooks, and anything that makes this more efficient is a good thing. From my point of view the ideal would be for feedback and comments associated with recent ascents to appear directly on the winter conditions page, but that is a separate request.

I disagree with your point about people who hide their logbooks needing a public voice: surely they have explicitly chosen not to? In any case are the examples you gave not precisely what should be included in feedback?

That is a good point, which would be mitigated by instead having an "irrelevant" tag which allows these posts to be hidden as per "beta" currently.

There is a lot of rubbish feedback - i.e that isnt feedback at all. I think it would help at least to remove the option of copying personal notes into feedback. 

Just re: point about people with hidden logbooks having chosen not to have a voice, 1) that's not quite true; they have just chosen to keep some info private; 2) if you change the logbooks in a way that reduces those avenues that remain for people to have a voice, then you are moving the goal posts.

Anyway, arcane chat, so will leave it there.

Yep, similar points here:

https://www.ukclimbing.com/forums/rockfax/suggestion_a_flag_for_not_feedbac...

(15 upward pointing arrows, no downward pointing arrows, no discussion or comments, thread closed)

suggested something similar in Dec where i was suggesting fading out text (grey) mainly after updating sports routes (eg kalymnos has had lots of rebolting)

https://www.ukclimbing.com/forums/rockfax/logbook_feedback_updates_archive-...

I'm sorry that I missed that one! I guess maybe a steady stream of posts will keep the idea fresh in the minds of the devs...