[Darth-Apple]

Honestly I've never really liked the vote down system for forums just because it is so easy to abuse. It works well for places like stackoverflow, but for forums, I agree, people tend to wonder who voted their posts down and why.

I think it goes the same way for user ratings, which many forums have made use of. On one hand, it encourages users to be helpful and kind on the forums, but it puts them at a disadvantage where one person with a personal vendetta could harm a user's public rating significantly.