Board Thread:Consensus Track/@comment-11008902-20141226235147/@comment-1738746-20150121061200

Atvelonis wrote: My opinion on badgehunting itself differs somewhat from many of yours. When I see a new editor fixing some punctuation, doing some minor formatting, or really making any type of small change on an article, my reaction is never anything like, "Dang badgehunters, something needs to be done about this". I don't see a so-called "useless" edit, I see a well-intentioned contribution. An edit is an edit, no matter how small. These users―whom some of you want to punish―harbor no ill will towards the wiki; they just want to help out in whatever small way they can, and that's perfectly fine by me. It doesn't differ at all- this is exactly what I believe in as well and I agree 100% with you. The problem is those other who do not and then accuse us of badge hunting. What I meant by poor edits were ones that were more harm than good/neutral to the Wiki, such as thinking they're fixing the spelling but they're actually misspelling the word.

The Rim of the Sky said: Like I said earlier, should any pointless contributions (like AAAGamer's) occur, we're there to fix them. Just because there are a few abusers it doesn't mean it's something we can't handle. Considering Timeoin(/other admins) has access to the Wiki's stats, I would like the numbers to speak for themselves before making any definitive comment as to whether badges have really increased activity for the better. "Poor edits" argument aside, a few of you have pointed out that those who do get encouragement from badges edit for a bit and then just leave- isn't that a logical paradox against the purpose of badges in the first place?

All of this aside though, no one addressing one of the main issues raised by the OP that the badge system brings- users being wrongly accused of badge hunting. See the suggestion & question I made in my previous reply...