Please read the paper before you comment • Hacker News Board

Re: Please read the paper before you comment

#121

Post by chrismorgan » Tue, Aug 25, 2020, 7:03 AM UTC

jhardy54 wrote: post #17

evolve2k wrote: post #2

When I first learnt to program the thing that I really enjoyed was learning to make a terminal app that took in the users input and used it as a conditional. I’d make all these little toy apps where my family had to type in the right word to continue. Eg “Who is the leader of the autobots?” => “Well done. Transform and roll out!!” It strikes me we could encourage better discourse with one word locked comments that th…

I've been considering doing something similar, except with plain CSS: a.paper ~ a.comments { display: none; } a.paper:visited ~ a.comments { display: inline; }

That won’t work. :visited was neutered for privacy reasons a decade or so ago, so that all you can change with it is colours, and if you try to inspect it with JavaScript it will give you the answers it would if :visited didn’t apply (e.g. it’ll tell you that purple link is blue).

The closest you’ll be able to get is a JavaScript click handler on .paper revealing .comments. If you do such a thing, you should probably only hide the comments with JavaScript in the first place, so that users with JavaScript disabled can still see them.

Re: Please read the paper before you comment

#122

Post by unixhero » Tue, Aug 25, 2020, 7:05 AM UTC

JimDabell wrote: post #102

Abishek_Muthian wrote: post #86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm certain that social networks have played a large role, if not the sole reason for this behaviour by encouraging limited attention, FOMO, OCD-scrolling etc. But, I guess we wouldn't able to prove that more people read the content before commenting before social networks without a proper control and besides many visitors of these sites are from social networks. All major News organisations know that only small frac…

> I'm certain that social networks have played a large role, if not the sole reason for this behaviour I don’t think that’s correct, depending upon your definition of "social networks". People were complaining about people not RTFAing on Slashdot in the 90s.

Not to mention RTFM!

Re: Please read the paper before you comment

#123

Post by patates » Tue, Aug 25, 2020, 7:26 AM UTC

chrismorgan wrote: post #118

cgrealy wrote: post #48

Some years ago, Ars Technica ran a story on guns. https://arstechnica.com/science/2011/04/guns-in-the-home-lot... About halfway through a one-page article was this quote. "If you have read this far, please mention Bananas in your comment below. We're pretty sure 90% of the respondants to this story won't even read it first." Sure enough, there were about 3 pages of comments before someone mentioned bananas. Read the…

Alas, this time you haven’t read far enough! The author, on page four of the comments: https://arstechnica.com/science/2011/04/guns-in-the-home-lot... > yak8998 wrote: >> Haha, bravo Mr. Timmer. If IE search is working right, then apparently I am the first. I think its well over 90%... >> "bananas" > That was added after publication, so the first few dozen commenters wouldn't have seen it. Idea credit goes to our edi…

I actually skimmed the comments but missed the one from the author among the massive number of others. Therefore, seeing the surge of bananas a few pages in, I thought once discovered, people kept looking for what those "bananas" were about and then discovered the sentence above themselves.

The real explanation is also interesting.

Re: Please read the paper before you comment

#124

Post by MagnumOpus » Tue, Aug 25, 2020, 7:27 AM UTC

Laremere wrote: post #50

Covzire wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So you're saying we need a platform with both characters/post and post/day limits?! I mean... that's beautiful, because I created a second twitter account just so I can follow a select few people for the pretty much the same reason you gave without having to worry they're getting lost to the noise.

The social network I honestly want is something akin to the tradition of Christmas cards: a rare update (at most once a quarter) about how life is going with the option of attaching a few photos. No comments section, but instead a "I'd like to get in touch and chat sometime" button which helps schedule a video chat. No retweets, shares, engagement metrics.

So Facebook before "shares", with a "poke" button? F.B. Purity can help restore some sanity to Facebook by killing all the shares, but since people stopped doing their own updates and photo albums to do vapid blog reshares instead, it will probably be a hollow experience.

Re: Please read the paper before you comment

#125

Post by liangx4 » Tue, Aug 25, 2020, 7:34 AM UTC

cgrealy wrote: post #48

Some years ago, Ars Technica ran a story on guns. https://arstechnica.com/science/2011/04/guns-in-the-home-lot... About halfway through a one-page article was this quote. "If you have read this far, please mention Bananas in your comment below. We're pretty sure 90% of the respondants to this story won't even read it first." Sure enough, there were about 3 pages of comments before someone mentioned bananas. Read the…

I did a similar thing with recruiting ads, I added a line of "If you are interested in this role, please reach out to me starting with 'Heyyyyyy I am XXX', thanks!" in the middle of the JD. And I simply ignore 99% of the reach out because they didn't start with that line. It's just like the brown M&m thing Van Halen did.

Works way better than I expected.

Re: Please read the paper before you comment

#126

Post by neiman » Tue, Aug 25, 2020, 7:39 AM UTC

cgrealy wrote: post #48

Some years ago, Ars Technica ran a story on guns. https://arstechnica.com/science/2011/04/guns-in-the-home-lot... About halfway through a one-page article was this quote. "If you have read this far, please mention Bananas in your comment below. We're pretty sure 90% of the respondants to this story won't even read it first." Sure enough, there were about 3 pages of comments before someone mentioned bananas. Read the…

To be fair, I'd make it a point to comment and not mention bananas if I saw such a request.

Why? don't look for reason while analyzing the behaviour of the average internet user:-)

Re: Please read the paper before you comment

#127

Post by richrichardsson » Tue, Aug 25, 2020, 7:42 AM UTC

marvy wrote: post #115

Max-q wrote: post #93

Earlier quoted context omitted.

NRK Beta, the tech lab of the Norwegian broadcasting corporation, make you take a quiz about the article before you are allowed to comment. I really like that idea.

Can you still comment if you get all the quiz questions wrong?

I would assume the questions are of the simple, "What facts did we state?" kind, rather than requiring some deeper understanding or inference. So why would you allow someone who couldn't grok the facts to comment? If my assumption is true then it works as a reasonable anti-bot measure, allowing wrong answers would negate that.

Re: Please read the paper before you comment

#128

Post by [deleted] » Tue, Aug 25, 2020, 7:43 AM UTC

Covzire wrote: post #40

PragmaticPulp wrote: post #29

The key to cleaning up my Twitter feed was to unfollow people who were too good at Twitter. That is: People who are working to maximize engagement, follower count, retweets, and likes. In my feed, the highest signal to noise ratio comes from people who aren't commenting on any and every trending topic. Instead, they're busy doing real work, away from Twitter, only occasionally checking in to share something. Likewise…

So you're saying we need a platform with both characters/post and post/day limits?! I mean... that's beautiful, because I created a second twitter account just so I can follow a select few people for the pretty much the same reason you gave without having to worry they're getting lost to the noise.

[deleted]

Re: Please read the paper before you comment

#129

Post by neiman » Tue, Aug 25, 2020, 7:47 AM UTC

This points a difference between Internet public discussions an private interactions discussions.

In private interactions, either chatting or RL, I quote "facts" without references, discuss papers I never read, and in general do things just for the act of communication, knowing I'm often wrong, and knowing the other side knows to take me with a grain of salt.

However, in public discussions you can't afford this liberty. Stating a wrong fact in a public discussion may cause a diffusion of false information which is almost impossible to undo.

I think most people are aware of this difference, and even in the academy the accuracy required in private conversation is not as harsh as the accuracy required in a public forum.

The problem is that for many people, Internet discussions feel like a private conversation. Hence I see even people I highly appreciate throwing the accuracy standard out of the window, and making public Internet comments as if it was a pub conversation over a drink with some friends.

Re: Please read the paper before you comment

#130

Post by raxxorrax » Tue, Aug 25, 2020, 7:47 AM UTC

iliketosleep wrote: post #72

cgrealy wrote: post #48

Some years ago, Ars Technica ran a story on guns. https://arstechnica.com/science/2011/04/guns-in-the-home-lot... About halfway through a one-page article was this quote. "If you have read this far, please mention Bananas in your comment below. We're pretty sure 90% of the respondants to this story won't even read it first." Sure enough, there were about 3 pages of comments before someone mentioned bananas. Read the…

What it demonstrates is that people have already made up their mind on the topic and aren't genuinely interested in new perspectives. This helps explains the inflammatory nature of Internet debates in general.

Someone is always complaining regardless of the message.

You can state that you like strawberry marmalade and someone on this planet will threaten you and your family for that transgression. Problem is the net isn't as anonymous as before thanks to social media and some people without significant personality try to call your employer, who succinctly distances the whole company from strawberry marmalade to underline how important it is to have values.

Employees will be reprimanded and strawberry marmalade removed from the canteen.