Negative rep a no no conversation?

[Jilla]

I'll throw out a curve ball of sorts...

Has anyone here, personally, judged the quality of a post by the forum rep or do you judge on the merit of the post itself?

There seems to be an assumption that people are going to judge posts and the people behind the posts by the pips. I just wonder if that really even happens.

I for one judge the quality based on the post itself. I don't care if you have one green pip or a gazillion. I don't even look at it (unless I am going to give rep for the post since the little tool thingy is right there).

However, the flip side isn't true. I do take pause when I see red pips (although even then I usually only make a note of it unless I think it might be baiting to flame me later on--in which case I might refrain from participating in that conversation--but not always).

You know LOLcat pictures get more + rep then anything.

While this is true, I think it's because more people see the posts to give rep than the very specific topics. At least, when I post stuff here in the general forums, I tend to maybe get one or two rep from an individual post I make. But I might post 20 times here in a week. Where a post I make with a guide might get 5 positive feed backs, but since I only posted the one thread the whole week, overall, the numbers are lower. It's a result of population I think, not so much that people value LOLcats more. It's like being nickeled and dimed into positive rep. At least, that's my experience.