Blackwood
Contributor
Yes it is... in a manner of speaking. I guess that's just as fair a use for thanks (and I use for that more than anything else, honestly) button so it makes sense to include that in the "signal" portion of the signal to noise ratio.
Fair enough.
OTOH, perhaps the second most common use of "thanks" is to agree with a subject that's been discussed time and time again.
If there are two parallel threads which have much the same content, does that really increase signal?
In any case, I do agree with the premise that Thanks count is a poor barometer. After all what OWstudent1 finds useful may be irrelevant to OWstudent2, let alone OWstudent1 compared to SidemoutTrimixCCRCaveScooterInstructor1.