not the OP but feel about the same as he does about it. never would I ever want to reduce myself and my coworkers to numbers and karma and have this weird scoring system
Not sure where the idea of 'reduction' came from. The way I understand the product, it's an enhancement on top of whatever noisy day-to-day activity happens on chats.
One can say 'well done!' or post a funny custom emoji, but is that appreciation strong enough?
Also, there is definitely a cultural component to this. Some teams are comfortable with _negative karma_. In NZ and AU this is definitely a show-stopper, a tool for embracing 'toxic work environment'. In Spain, for example, it's OK:
"I understand that negative karma might not be the most desirable thing to do. But it happens, at least it happens in our team. And at the end of the month we check the rankings, and we have like a “developer of the month” kind of prize, so it’s cool to take negatives into the equation."
All I'm saying, I guess, is that people and businesses are different. We try really hard to understand our customers.