As a person that is being rated more and more often lately in varying areas and on multiple sites, I am starting to really despise the star rating system. First of all, the system is entirely anonymous from the recipient’s perspective. This means that it isn’t possible to determine the difference between the overexciting rating of a friend or the hateful ratings of an enemy. Second, it is too easy for someone to rate something that they have not seen/used, just assigning a rating arbitrarily. Finally, if someone gives 1 star, you know they didn’t like it, but how useful is it to know someone didn’t like something? It puts things into a situation of thinking that people don’t like it, so therefore, just give up, as opposed to having actual comments and being able to respond to those comments by making changes to the way things are done in the future. Without an opportunity to improve, sharing artistic or technological creations with the world is pointless.