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Ask YC: Do you care about Karma?

news.ycombinator.com

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Re: Ask YC: Do you care about Karma?

#21

Post by kashif »

jrockway wrote: post #18

I care. Reddit was destroyed by trolls and joke accounts. They get downmodded quickly, but they keep coming back and spamming every article. Even though comments are the main point of Reddit, you get no credit for posting good ones and no penalty for posting spam. Slashdot had the right idea when you were limited to one post a day (or whatever) when your karma got to -10. If you can't write content that other people…

I am sorry, I don't understand your point on how Karma relates to spammers going away and 'joke' accounts not being created, especially if they spammers kept coming back anyway.

Re: Ask YC: Do you care about Karma?

#22

Post by TrevorJ »

No, I think the added impetus to ad value to a conversation that karma generates for some is very helpful in keeping the signal-to-noise ratio at a decent level. Karma certainly doesn't HURT in regards to this and it has the ancillary benefit of quantifying, to some extent the reputation of a given contributor, which, for new users is very useful when it comes to understanding who to listen to.

Re: Ask YC: Do you care about Karma?

#25

Post by kashif »

TrevorJ wrote: post #22

No, I think the added impetus to ad value to a conversation that karma generates for some is very helpful in keeping the signal-to-noise ratio at a decent level. Karma certainly doesn't HURT in regards to this and it has the ancillary benefit of quantifying, to some extent the reputation of a given contributor, which, for new users is very useful when it comes to understanding who to listen to.

Okay, but I am not sure how credible such a quantification is. Perhaps an extremely 'credible' contributor posts quality stuff but very rarely. How likely is it that I miss his submission if I was to look at karma as a measure of credibility. My point is that karma equates more to participation than substance - it is possible to have both.

Re: Ask YC: Do you care about Karma?

#26

Post by xenoterracide »

concealed wrote: post #24
xenoterracide wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

awe come on... it's a joke.

It's not funny when it's true:)

no. that's why it IS funny, 'cause it's true.

It's sad too, though.

If pg says anything he gets at least 50 points for being pg. The rest is because pg is actually smart and doesn't usually say dumb unthoughtful things.

Re: Ask YC: Do you care about Karma?

#27

Post by brlewis »

xenoterracide wrote: post #26
concealed wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's not funny when it's true:)

no. that's why it IS funny, 'cause it's true. It's sad too, though. If pg says anything he gets at least 50 points for being pg. The rest is because pg is actually smart and doesn't usually say dumb unthoughtful things.

pg's median comment score is 4:

http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=166110

More people read pg's comments, so he does get more upvotes than the same words would if coming from someone else. However, to say that you can mention pg in a comment to get more votes is neither true nor particularly funny.

Re: Ask YC: Do you care about Karma?

#28

Post by apgwoz »

kashif wrote: post #16
apgwoz wrote: post #4

I'd love if social news were more like an RPG where you could "level up" to get more features, customizations and other things I can't think of. Last I knew, users with 250 karma were allowed to change the color of the nav bar at the top.

I would personally play an RPG instead - if I was looking for such excitement. From nYC I want the best submissions. :)

But, the best submissions would still exist. People would still vote for the best things. There would just be more rewards for those who submitted them.

Re: Ask YC: Do you care about Karma?

#29

Post by concealed »

gaika wrote: post #2

Yes, I care, as a form of trust metric: For the person: it is a simplest way to see if you fit or not in this community. For the community: quickly judge if the post or comment is spam or not.

The principal effect of karma here is not how it helps you judge your fit, but how it actively shapes the community/content. This effect was clearly visible on reddit as it was realized that the more sensational content was vastly more promoted in the reddit karma system.

So my question:

What is the value of high quality content ordering? Are the present ordering strategies on HN/reddit/[insert karma-based discovery site] good enough? Would the theoretically perfect ordering offer much more value than current systems?

Re: Ask YC: Do you care about Karma?

#30

Post by kashif »

apgwoz wrote: post #28
kashif wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I would personally play an RPG instead - if I was looking for such excitement. From nYC I want the best submissions. :)

But, the best submissions would still exist. People would still vote for the best things. There would just be more rewards for those who submitted them.

Yes, that is indeed the current hypothesis. I am suggesting an alternate one might improve the quality of the submissions even more. And, to test this new hypothesis we must necessarily discard individual karma.
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