whats the new karma thingy?
It’s for e-peen. If you’re familiar with SPUF or Reddit or PWoT or many other forums, I suspect it’s the same system. “Yay” useful/funny posts, “Nay” annoying/spammy posts.
Can be useful for feedback on your posting behaviour. Can also let you lord it over people with less karma than you.
Who thought this was a good idea?
Jesus christ, just ban the spammers and trolls.
We’re just trying it out to see if it’s worth keeping.
And besides, spammers and trolls will be banned regardless.
But my e-peen 
This feature feels pretty useless. It does not really add anything to the conversations we have here, or to anything really.
It’s not supposed to add anything to the conversations we have here, that’s not the point. It’s supposed to instantly show (mostly new) users which members of the community/forums are respected, trustworthy and helpful.
I know it’s not the most major feature of all time and it’s not meant to be. It’s staying, at least for now. Locking the thread.