Do you have a link or something that would help me understand this situation a bit clearer. I've been on here for a long time, but I've only been on the forums for a few years. It's such a strange situation for me to wrap my head around. I very vaguely remember reading something about it somewhere on here.
I ask this because without Dave's reviews of WI and IL courses that I played when I first started I doubt I'd have gotten to diamond. Or at least not by now. As a noob course bagger ten years or so ago, I've read SOOO many of his reviews. He was a staple to my course research, along with the other usual suspects. harro, tallpaul, stardoggy etc.
Since you were so flattering here, and you found my reviews helpful, I'll add my perspective on why I got so many :thmbdown:s.....and don't really care.
Exploring new courses and evaluating was a hobby way before DGCR. Matter of fact, course directories were VERY hard to come by back in the day. I had a spreadsheet with all my criteria of what is 'good' to me (analytical engineer type). I did not keep notes of everything that others might find useful (bathrooms, benches, multiple teepads, next tee markers, etc), but had 150-180 courses on my list (if I recall correctly). I am a fan of numbers/ratings, so early on I decided to dump scores and ratings into DGCR. I did that via a cut and paste method....and included my rubric in every review. Not the well-crafted, just-the-right-length & format that people have come accustomed to reading here. Apparently, some people found my reviews insufferable!
After my first batch I entered one evening, I got a TON of :thmbdown:s. Feedback was that many people hated them. But my attitude was that if some people liked them and found them helpful in some way (they did), the addition of my extensive (at the time) list, that was great! If not, people were not forced to read them. So I kept doing things that way with almost all on my played list. After that, I fleshed things out more and people seems to dislike that less.
So, I was never a Gold or Bronze or anything reviewer since timg from the outset had a positive/negative ratio criteria which I never met. My reviews are brutally honest/consistent with my own criteria....and a few started some big debates (Idlewild, Flip, Flyboy). But, hearing what you said makes it all worth it....so thanks! Stardoggy I don't know personally, but tallpaul & harr are awesome dudes - hung out with them both a few years back.
