What do the reputation colors mean?

[Janna]

Obviously green means it is in your favor. But what about black? Does that mean you were negatively rep'd? I thought there were other colors too - like red, which I assumed meant negative.

If the black means "neutral", that isn't an option when you go to rep someone, which would mean that more than one person had rep'd you with equal parts good and bad, right?

I ask because I have 2 black with no comments and the threads in which they were left had nothing negative about them at all. So I'm wondering if there is a "key" somewhere on what the colors mean, since not everyone is leaving comments.

Thanks!

[Robin in Tx]

You show up green on my screen (on a distinguished road). Where are you seeing the black?

Robin

[Janna]

In my control panel - where I have 3 people who gave me reputation points. 2 are black (no comments), 1 is green (with a sweet comment). Total is 11 points. Which is why I think the black is neutral - is we all start out with 10 points, the green one I got would have bumped me up 1 number, while the 2 black ones did nothing. That's my train of thought anyway. I have no idea if it's right though.

[Snickerdoodle]

sorry

[JudoMom]

I don't know! I've got a black one, and I had one that was green this weekend, and then it was black today, and now it's gone. I wish I understood :p!