In it's current form I agree the "Post Rating" should be deleted.
However it is still there and I found this thread helpful to know what it is about/how it works (and to understand the shortcomings...). More importantly, were this feature to be replaced with something better as discussed by multiple people in this topic, that would actually be helpful.
In addition to the previous recommendations I posted, I recommend the following (maybe more important) for consideration (though it sounds like maybe there is no leadership looking at this anyway).
It would be ideal to go through a topic quickly and see which post(s) had the best answers to the question at hand and which post(s) people thought were not relevant or helpful as that would save people's time. Right now people have to spend too much time reading the posts in detail to find the answers(s) and frankly some threads are less valuable than others...
The two things that I (and I believe others) have found helpful in other forums are as follows:
- A voting system for posts in the thread and a color coding for those that are more helpful. One forum I was on color coded the posts that had the best responses to the questions in beige/off-yellow. Very helpful !
- On another forum, based upon their posts, one or more people actually get credit for the answer(s). People can posts questions and based upon complexity and quality of work of person providing the answers points are awarded. I found that also helpful and encouraged people to help others. In a given thread the steps to debug the issue were/are in yellow/orange and the final solution or post where the original poster accepts the solution is marked in green (and points awarded).