as many of you have also noticed, the total score of a thread is the net of all the up and down votes in the thread. so an OP can have a -20 rating because its stupid, but then the first post of the thread (which for example could be making fun of the OP) will have a +70 rating. so the thread in total is rated +50. but thats where my question comes in:
If the purpose of the voting system is for the general quality of the thread, then it might be that the value of the first post makes it that the entire thread has +50 value. that is to say, despite the terrible OP, the thread in general still delivers entertainment, and the voting reflects that.
but I might want to see a stupid thread get a negative rating. If only for the purpose of letting the Original Poster know that his thread sucks.
in general the net value of the thread is not a good reflection of the OP, and i think it should be.
could solve this by showing the rating that OP got separately from overall rating.
just my rambling thoughts here. opinions?