Reps.

{ Before anyone goes all like spaztastic on me with "omfg wut rite du u haf 2 talk u haz n0 rep!" I, like many others, have been on forums other than this where they also had rep systems. }

The only real use that rep has atm is that when someone is new to the forum, they have more respect for someone with higher rep. Higher rep is a way to tell people who aren't familiar with the forum "What I say has value, heed my words," since people usually give rep to people who say smart things. The only other thing to go by as to who's worth your respect when you're new to a forum is post count, but using that as a method to measure the worth of someone's words is nothing short of retarded. (Admittedly using rep as a way to put value on a guy's words is also pretty stupid, but it's still what users do when they're new.)

What do I personally think about rep? (That was the original question, after all.) I believe it does have some value. If nothing else, it's a way to reward someone when you have no other way. When you receive plus rep, it means someone actually cares about what you're saying. You said or did something of value, otherwise whoever repped you wouldn't have wasted his precious once-per-day rep on you. (Theoretically at least.) Receiving plus rep is an encouragement to keep doing what you're doing. I mean, look at Klown, his massive rep tells us that some people obviously like that he uploads games and helps out with the problems they're having. It's a way of showing gratitude without having to say anything. I don't know about others, but a lot of times I don't feel like posting just to say "Thanks" or "I really appreciate what you do for this forum. It makes coming here worth it" (I mean, seriously, wouldn't it be weird if someone said the second phrase to anyone else?) so instead I plus rep them if I can. On the other hand, a neg rep is like saying "gtfo" for whatever reason. It might have more weight to it than a pos rep (since it's not done as commonly) but in the end it still means the same (but opposite) thing as a plus rep, so I don't think it should be removed. So, do I care about rep? Yeah, it means people I've never met before care about what I'm saying and what I'm doing somewhere; but all in all, besides it's symbolism, it is still just a number.

Since Raze mentioned that he would listen to suggestions to make rep mean something, one thing that's sometimes done is to make how much you rep others depend on how much rep you have yourself. So, you could either have some script to calculate how often you can rep (ie user.t = 24 - sqrt(user.rep); where t = time in hours of rep interval) or have something more simple like

[code:1]if(user.rep<20) then t=24;
else if (20 =< user.rep < 50) then t = 18;
else if (50 =< user.rep < 200) then t = 12;
else t=8;[/code:1]

Of course both codes are just samples made up on the spot, so you might want to change around the values or equation. The point of rewarding people with high rep by allowing them to rep more is that people are reward for something that doesn't have a concrete value with something that doesn't have a concrete value, so people really shouldn't have all that much reason to complain. They still will, but they shouldn't.

There was some other stuff I wanted to mention, but eventually you just have to say to yourself, "Self," you have to say, "You've written quite enough for one post. People shan't read if it's too long."

This idea is also way old. The mods weren't very enthused by it but less adamantly opposed as they were to eliminating negative rep or imposing a rep log. It would be kind of nice but it would just be investing more into a system that generates a lot of inane conflict as it is.