That seems odd. "I don't want to be here anymore, but I don't want to lose my progress, even though I have no reason to get back. Making this extra effort of course makes me look self centred, but I will log in anyway to keep it up, even though it doesn't really do anything."
It's not that the person doesn't want to be there anymore, but that their life may have changed to a point where they can't visit the site so often (something like school, work, getting older and having more responsibilities, family, etc.). They just can't make that kind of time for it. They can't wait too long and log only when they have freetime, during a vacation or something like that, because they're rep will have decayed. So they log on in a hurry, before school or something, and then make one or two lame posts. When, instead they would have just waited until they had decent free time and then posted quality posts like normal.
I mean even if you didn't care about the rep at first, posted a bunch of quality posts over a period of time and gained a high rep level, I still feel like that person would have some "attachment" to their rep and that walking away from all the achievement just to watch it dwindle would be difficult to do.
I know it easy to say,"Then don't take extended breaks from the site." or "Just post one decent post a week so you don't become inactive." But if you really enjoy the site, but you have a large homework load for your current school year, or have school and work, etc. It's understandable that you would not want to visit the site at all for that period because you need to focus on your study and if you go on the site you know it won't be for just a minute or two. (Like facebook, the good old, "I'll study right after I check my facebook for just a sec." and then "Where did the time go I was on there for two hours?"
I guess with the current system you kind of have to weigh how quality a user is by post count and merits. With the rep system you can use the rep too. But, if you are a really quality contributor, a "legend" on the site, spend a bunch of time on the site and then retire, lose your rep, and then come back, people are only going to know your "legendary" status from your post count and merits. Isn't that the current system we have now? Doesn't that make the rep system pointless?
To say it otherwise: You cannot be a celebrity, if you don't show yourself.
I feel like the
benchmark system I purposed earlier mimics real life scenarios better. (Did I really just say that? and why is this post so long?) An unknown, rookie basketball player has to build up his rep. He does good for two season and local fans come to know him as a decent player. Then He gets injured and can't play a season. The buzz surrounding him goes down, but he doesn't become an unknown again, he has passed that
benchmark. He recovers from his injuries and comes back to play the next three seasons. He proves himself to be a star player and makes the all-star team each of those seasons. His rep has gone up and now he is known across the nation, not just by the locals. But, then he has two bad seasons. He loses some rep, but he has passed a
benchmark, he will always be known across the nation and just by locals. The player gets it together and for the rest of his career he is the best. He wins champion after champion. Scores tons of points every game. He has become legendary. He is known in different nations. Even where the sport isn't so big. He has passed another
benchmark.
Do you see how his rep went up and down, sometimes due to inactivity, but he passed benchmarks were he couldn't really go down past (unless he did really bad, like the equivalent of spamming). At the end he becomes like a " legend".
Does
Micheal Jordan have to come out of retirement and play one game every season to keep his rep up? I would hope not. So to say he has passed a
benchmark. He's rep as one of the greatest players in basketball isn't going away because he doesn't play anymore. (Although I guess after hundreds of years he will be forgotten. But, that's a really long time before the rep decay should take effect.)
Sorry this is such a rant and so long.I guess the inactivity decay makes sense, but i think the
benchmark system is best. That you shouldn't necessarily go to zero rep from just inactivity. (Well, looks like I'm gaining a rep for being the person who can't paraphrase their thoughts and make a short concise post.)
