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Voting is the mechanism by which users signal the quality and relevance of posts and comments on Artemis. Every logged-in user can cast one vote — up, down, or rescind — on each votable item. Votes feed directly into ranking algorithms and accumulate as karma on the author’s account. This page explains how votes are cast, how karma is counted, how the hot algorithm works, and how gold awards relate to community recognition.

How voting works

Each post and comment displays an upvote arrow, a score, and a downvote arrow. Clicking the upvote arrow casts an upvote (direction: 1); clicking downvote casts a downvote (direction: -1). Clicking the active arrow again removes your vote (direction: 0). Internally, the Vote model stores three directions:
DirectionSerialized valueMeaning
up1Upvote
down-1Downvote
unvote0Removed vote
Votes are stored per-user, per-item. If a user has already voted on an item, recasting updates the existing record rather than creating a new one.

Voting via the API

POST /api/vote
ParameterTypeDescription
idstringFullname of the post or comment (e.g. t3_abc123 for a post, t1_xyz789 for a comment)
dirintegerVote direction: 1 (up), -1 (down), or 0 (remove)
rankintegerOptional. The rank of the item in the listing at time of vote, used for analytics.
# Upvote a post
POST /api/vote
id=t3_abc123&dir=1

# Downvote a comment
POST /api/vote
id=t1_xyz789&dir=-1

# Remove a vote
POST /api/vote
id=t3_abc123&dir=0
Voting requires authentication. The API follows standard OAuth2 token authentication — include your Authorization: Bearer <token> header.

Karma

Karma is a running total of the community’s response to your contributions. It is split into two types, both stored as integer fields on the Account model.
Karma typeFieldWhat increases it
Link karmalink_karmaNet upvotes on posts (links) you submitted
Comment karmacomment_karmaNet upvotes on comments you wrote
Karma is not a 1:1 count of votes — the system applies vote fuzzing to prevent exact scores from being exposed, which discourages vote manipulation. Karma is visible on a user’s profile at /user/:username/about.
Karma has no direct functional limit on Artemis by default, but individual branches can set a minimum wiki_edit_karma threshold before a user can edit that branch’s wiki.

Score and ranking

A post’s visible score is the sum of its upvotes minus its downvotes. The raw score is used as input to sorting algorithms.

Hot algorithm

The hot sort — the default listing — weighs both a post’s score and its age. Older posts decay in rank even if they continue receiving votes, giving newer posts with momentum a chance to appear at the top. The algorithm is applied server-side when building the hot listing at /hot or /r/:branchname/hot.

Other sorts and vote influence

SortHow votes factor in
newVotes not considered; strictly chronological
topSorted by raw score descending
controversialPosts with high total vote count but close upvote/downvote ratio rank highest
risingPosts gaining votes quickly relative to their submission time

Vote fuzzing

Artemis fuzzes the displayed vote count on posts and comments to deter targeted vote manipulation. The displayed score is close to — but not exactly — the true score. This is transparent to end users but means you should not rely on the displayed score for exact counts.

Gilding

Gold awards are a way to recognize exceptional posts or comments beyond an upvote. Any user with gold credits can gild any post or comment.
1

Find content worth gilding

Any post or comment can be gilded. Click the gold icon (trophy) beneath the item.
2

Confirm the award

A confirmation dialog appears showing the cost in gold credits. Confirm to proceed.
3

Award is applied

The item shows a gold star indicator. The author receives a notification and gilding credit.
Gilding via the API:
# Gild a post or comment by fullname
POST /api/v1/gold/gild/:fullname

# Give gold directly to a user
POST /api/v1/gold/give/:username
Gilded content appears in:
  • /r/:branchname/gilded — gilded posts and comments in a branch
  • /gilded — site-wide gilded feed
  • /comments/gilded — gilded comments across the site
The branch-level gilding time bank is tracked via the gilding_server_seconds field on the Branch model.
Gold credits are consumed on gilding. There is no refund if the recipient’s account is later suspended or deleted.

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