This post stems from a topic that began in another post, but was perhaps a distraction to that important post.

People were mentioning PM's and I had no idea what that was. Now I do. The topic came up as to if there were other functions of the site that were worth exploring. And I do have questions.

The thumb up/thumbs down feature. Are there guidelines as to how to use the feature? Particularly if a post got seriously downgraded - what happens? I've seen some posts mentioning lurkers that are downgrading posts. How anonymous is it?

And how does points work? Is that different than just the number of posts one has made?

In the members area, one of the pieces of information included is distance. Distance from?

And some of the features with each post. What is gained by "Mark as Read", and "Flag", and Permalink?

Thanks in advance. As an old Ayn Rand acolyte from back to the 60's, it is great to see where it is all at these days.

I selected Education as the category figuring that is what I'll get.