Clause #3 was chosen to heighten to reward/punishment for especially good or especially bad content. We’re inclined to think that single 100-karma post is worth more than four 25-karma posts and the exponentiation reflects this. (For comparison: 25^1.2 is 47.6, 100^1.2 is 251.2. So in our metric, one 100-karma post was worth about 30% more than four 25-karma posts).
Is the idea behind this that a high-quality post can provide more than a single strong-upvote of value per person, and that total karma is a proxy for this excess value?
Is the idea behind this that a high-quality post can provide more than a single strong-upvote of value per person, and that total karma is a proxy for this excess value?