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NPR Website to Get Rid of Comments

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Re: NPR Website to Get Rid of Comments

#401

Post by js8 »

giancarlostoro wrote: post #297
eddieh wrote: post #233

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Even HN has declined, but what bothers me most is that HN has a definite range of views that are acceptable. This limits useful discourse. e.g. someone should be able to criticize Elon Musk without being downvoted to hell. While HN does stay civil, I think it is too limited in general. Don't get me wrong, the reason I use HN is because the discussion hasn't devolved into /. or reddit. However, HN would do well to enc…

> e.g. someone should be able to criticize Elon Musk without being downvoted to hell. I wish downvoting wouldn't be allowed without a "reply" to parent post, that way if I'm being downvoted nonstop I know why. Sometimes I get downvoted like crazy and have no clue as to why. Or even if I guess it doesn't add to the conversation to just shut me out because you disagree without teaching me why. I wonder how HN would be…

I totally agree, I wish there was a requirement to reply when downvoting.

But I don't think you need subcomments on comments, I think it's just overcomplicated. If the reply with downvote is nonsensical, it can be downvoted as well. Or it can be even flagged.

Re: NPR Website to Get Rid of Comments

#402

Post by js8 »

labster wrote: post #312
dcposch wrote: post #289

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's just not true. For example, universal basic income--a leftist idea even by European standards--has been discussed several times on HN. Lots of substantive comments both for and against.

Are you sure UBI is a leftist idea? The things that go along with UBI read like a right-wing wishlist: eliminate the minimum wage, discontinue welfare and unemployment benefits, and end the food stamp program. In its place, the free market would determine how best to spend basic income.

Yes, it is a leftist idea. Definition of left is that they care about social and economic equality. (The understanding - IMHO wrong - of left as proposing big state ultimately comes from Communist Manifesto, where Marx used "the State" in a certain sense as a shorthand.)

Basic income would mean that part of GDP is redistributed in purely democratic manner - everybody gets the same piece of pie, whether they deserve it or not. It's very similar to democracy, but on economic level. And democracy is in fact very leftist idea (if you look at history of the left), because again, it proposes that all people should the exact same political power (one person, one vote), regardless what they are or what they do or contribute.

The fact that today's right (at least partially) accepts some of these ideas, such as democracy or UBI, is actually a success of left, or manifestation of the reality having a liberal bias. :-)

Re: NPR Website to Get Rid of Comments

#403

Post by nkurz »

enraged_camel wrote: post #385
makecheck wrote: post #320

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Also, I think that replies accompanying down-votes should be displayed directly next to the comment as a sort of tag (i.e. you can’t click a down-arrow alone, you have to type out something like “not accurate” or “flame” or “I don’t like his hair” or whatever the reason is) and then the comment appears as: foobar_user 1 hour ago | -1:“not accurate” -1:“flame” -1:“I don’t like his hair”.

I think providing short reasons isn't enough. If you wrote a long post and I downvoted it with "not accurate" it doesn't help much, does it?

"Not accurate" may be useful feedback even if it's false. For example, perhaps several such responses in a row would prompt the author to link to supporting data, or reword their comment to be clearer. The real question though isn't whether it's always helpful, but whether on average it's more useful than just a bare downvote. While some of the responses will be "not accurate", others will be an extremely actionable "link broken" or "missing word".

I think the real issue of requiring comments on downvotes is that it would either disallow anonymous downvotes, or encourage anonymous comments. Perhaps de-anonymizing downvotes without requiring a comment might be a better first step: if you aren't brave enough to have your name associated with the downvote, then maybe you shouldn't be downvoting. I'm sure this would cause its own problems, but I suspect it would be a net positive. At times I think it might even be good to have all voting and flagging actions on HN to be public record.

Re: NPR Website to Get Rid of Comments

#404

Post by CM30 »

ec109685 wrote: post #384
CM30 wrote: post #270

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Pretty sure Disqus is often set up so comments are also stored in the site's database. That's how it worked when I used it for a WordPress site. So all the comment text is likely being stored on the NPR website, even with Disqus.

That isn't how Disqus works. It is a centrally hosted widget.

Not quite:

https://help.disqus.com/customer/portal/articles/472125-data...

At least for the WordPress plugin, the default functionality is to sync the comments in the database with those on Disqus servers.

Re: NPR Website to Get Rid of Comments

#405

Post by wutbrodo »

overcast wrote: post #213
wutbrodo wrote: post #208

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Hacker News is about the only civil place I'm capable of contributing to a discussion to at this point. Funnily enough, right around the time I made an acct here (4+ years ago, after ~1 year of lurking), I saw an internal post by a well-known Googler talking about the recent drastic decline of HN comment quality and looking for a replacement. I still get value out of HN comments (clearly), but it's definitely chang…

There is always going to be the elitist attitude of newcomers ruining things for the "OG" people. However there is certainly no way HN compares to the rest of the drivel out there. Always going to be a fine line between popularity, and trash.

> However there is certainly no way HN compares to the rest of the drivel out there

Shrug, that just depends on where people choose to set their standards; there are much worse fora and much better ones. As I said, I still clearly find HN comments at least worth reading, but the distinction isn't as binary as you seem to think it is.

Re: NPR Website to Get Rid of Comments

#406

Post by pvdebbe »

bradleyankrom wrote: post #251
eddieh wrote: post #233

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Even HN has declined, but what bothers me most is that HN has a definite range of views that are acceptable. This limits useful discourse. e.g. someone should be able to criticize Elon Musk without being downvoted to hell. While HN does stay civil, I think it is too limited in general. Don't get me wrong, the reason I use HN is because the discussion hasn't devolved into /. or reddit. However, HN would do well to enc…

Re HN: also anything that can be coerced into a political discussion will devolve quickly. Conservative views typically wind up grayed, even when they are substantive arguments.

To me, HN's "bias" is not so much about left/right, but rather the individualism/collectivism aspect of things. "Regulation is a good tool to weed out the bad stuff; free market can't solve this or that; ban human drivers when self-driving vehicles mature; taxes as means of control" and so on. We agree to disagree on many cases very maturely but very often I see just discussion that would warrant to rename this site to "Collectivist news".

Re: NPR Website to Get Rid of Comments

#407

Post by pvdebbe »

overcast wrote: post #216
TheSpiceIsLife wrote: post #205

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's probably due to the nature of politics. It certainly tends to get a lot of people riled quite easily. What's that thing about polite company not talking about politics, religion, or sex. The average person, myself definitely included, probably doesn't have much worth listening to on the subject anyway. To paraphrase PJ O'Rourke: though there certainly are many political commentators who might be worth listing…

It's just not politics, it's anything sufficiently popular to attract a large portion of the general public. Only niche categories, with a small group of passionate people work. Otherwise, it turns into a free for all.

Agree. Only the small subreddits with a tight focus work for me.

Re: NPR Website to Get Rid of Comments

#408

Post by exodust »

frankc wrote: post #59

I propose the following system for commenting on news sites: -comment period open for 3 days after publication -comments are not published until the end of the comment period, then all published at once -you can submit 1 comment per article only After the comments are published, then a voting/ranking system is enabled for automatic sorting, but nothing is deleted except for spam This eliminates any back and forth arg…

Nope, don't like that idea. I enjoy reading replies to comments - that's usually where discussion gets interesting. A static list of "letters to the editor" can be interesting, but there's no life or action happening there. More spice and counter-arguments are found in someone's reply to a comment. Sure this increases odds of domination by few users... so perhaps limiting people to 3 comments per article would be an idea.

Re: NPR Website to Get Rid of Comments

#409

Post by exodust »

overcast wrote: post #172
frankc wrote: post #59

I propose the following system for commenting on news sites: -comment period open for 3 days after publication -comments are not published until the end of the comment period, then all published at once -you can submit 1 comment per article only After the comments are published, then a voting/ranking system is enabled for automatic sorting, but nothing is deleted except for spam This eliminates any back and forth arg…

I like it.

Why can I only downvote some comments here? I don't downvote much, but any time I see a comment such as "I like it" it really deserves a downvote for reasons that shouldn't need to be explained.

Re: NPR Website to Get Rid of Comments

#410

Post by nkurz »

james-watson wrote: post #370
mintplant wrote: post #330

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Wait, what? Really? I would point to the comments on just about any "women in tech" story as a counterexample.

I have had previous accounts banned for stating the following: "Homo sapiens are a sexually dimorphic species of primates, in which the Y chromosome results in differential physiological development between males and females." So yes, HN is quite a hivemind when it comes to gender/identity politics. In fact, I have a feeling I'll get banned for this comment.

Perhaps I live with rose colored glasses, but I do not believe that anyone has ever be be banned from HN for making that quoted statement unless you have left out some essential detail. My guess would be that you made that statement, and subsequently you were banned for something else. Perhaps you could post a link to the thread in question?

Never mind, maybe I found it, or at least the account: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9039872. A little bristly, and I'm not sure if the assumptions are correct (Is it unequivocal that "Status is zero sum"?) but doesn't seem ban-worthy. But since it's a year before the account appears banned, maybe I'm missing a later comment with the exact quote?

Presuming this is the account you are referring to, it looks to have actually been banned for the similarly themed but much more aggressive comment "Sexual dimorphism is real. Your impotent rage and ridiculous ideologies will never change that fact. I will be greatly amused by your kind's zealous need to tilt at windmills." (https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11226294), which when challenged by Dan you defended by saying "I have a policy to return hostility in kind." (https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11227788).

I think this counts as leaving out an essential detail. The problem is not that discussing sexually dimorphism is off limits (others appear to have done so without being banned) but that taking "he did it first" is not a acceptable excuse for rude behavior here. Or maybe I have the timeline slightly off? It's hard to tell when some of the edits occurred.

In any case, I'm going to keep my rose colored glasses on for a bit longer. I'd encourage you to keep making scientifically accurate statements about sexual dimorphism from your new account, but given that some interpretations have sensitive implications, it would probably be wise to approach it as politely as possible.

In fact, I have a feeling I'll get banned for this comment.

No, I don't think you will. You can actually discuss many "controversial" topics here as long as you try to do so politely. Assuming I found the right thread, it looks like the ban wasn't because you raised a forbidden topic, but for your stated policy of returning hostility in kind. "Tit for tat" has it's place in game theory, but in real games (and communities) it has some serious defects if blindly applied.

The main defect in this context is that if all players adhere to the simplest version, it has a tendency to end in a "death spiral" of defection. Eventually, a poorly phrased response is interpreted as an insult, and after that it's a permanent race to the bottom. The strategy can be improved by adding some degree of "forgiveness" to allow both parties to reset to cooperation. Adjusting the trigger to require multiple offenses before retaliation ("tit for two tats") can also help to account for inevitable communication errors.

Welcome back.

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