archdruid - that seems a bit complex to me.  i think it would be much better if we had, as rosepab suggested,  a "recommended" toggle instead of ratings, and you didn't have to comment to recommend. 

personally, i feel the opposite.  i could love an image and think it's absolutely wonderful, but still a 3.  because even if i adjust my standards to just here instead of the wider world of art (how do you rank compared to picasso or matisse?), i still feel like 2 stars below the absolute best is really, really good. but all anyone seems comfortable giving is 5s or nothing (except some strange person now).  if we're going to be so binary about the scale, we might as well reduce it to being binary.  and since ratings are just averages and not specific reviews, they're not much less meaningful that way.

should we take this over to the suggestions forum?