We have a lot of good posts and discussions that contribute to our sub, but other than the salty downvotes, there aren't many people who vote, so these discussions don't get a lot of visibility. Lately, only the link posts are getting a lot of upvotes.
Which is exactly my reasoning for taking away link posts for a few days.People upvote link posts of fan art because it's easier than reading the self posts. It's understandable -- annoying, but understandable. Forcing people to only use self posts instead of link posts encourages voting on the self posts.
Furthermore, more specifically the line "but other than the salty downvotes". Now, I understand I'm undesirable number 1 on this subreddit. People dislike me because of the way I conduct myself in the IRC and the decisions I make. So I understand if people don't want to vote on my comments/posts. But taking it out on the community is not fair in the slightest.
A sampling of top posts: Top all time: Everyone Needs to Calm Down! (142 points by /u/Waglington)
The timing of this post was very unfortunate. There had been next to no fighting on this subreddit for a whole week (Shock. A week.) But making that post was really unnecessary in my honest opinion. The only reason it got any traction and any success was because it was /u/Waglington whom posted it. If I, any of the other mods, or any other user posted it. It would've got downvoted like every other post similar to that.
It's sad because the only posts that get votes on this subreddit are posts by "official" users. I've brought this up many, many times with the other moderators and we can do nothing to stop it. Comments from those with a verified flair immediately get votes and every other comment gets downvoted or not near the amount of recognition the others do. Don't get me wrong, this isn't another rant. The verified users are not to blame for this. They aren't saying to upvote everything they do. But you have to question a subreddit where the only submissions that get votes are by "verified" users.