Tell HN: Please bring back comment scores • Hacker News Board

Re: Tell HN: Please bring back comment scores

#61

Post by munchhausen » Tue, Apr 26, 2011, 2:53 PM UTC

ignifero wrote: post #42

blhack wrote: post #25

People can be wrong about things, and comment scores are useful information that helps us know if they are. "that is not how mysql works" with 2 Points And "that is not how mysql works" with 102 points Are not the same piece of info. I don't see any benefit to hiding this from people. It also helps newbies understand the customs here (they can get feedback on other people's comments) edit now that I'm not on my phone…

Start with the assumption all comments are wrong; after all there's no absolute truth. The scores are a measure of popularity, which is often right and sometimes wrong. Plus everyone is entitled to an opinion. I don't think scores help anything, it's a measure of someones self-righteousness that i 'd rather not have. It's enough that unpopular opinions float to the bottom, where they belong. If anything i'd suggest t…

Starting with an assumption that all comments are wrong is a prudent approach, which also considerably lowers the utility of HN for certain types of usage.

I read HN primarily for the informative comments, not the opinion pieces. A high comment score on an informative comment that contains a factual statement is a relatively good way how to easily tell that the information has been validated by the community and is likely to be correct.

Re: Tell HN: Please bring back comment scores

#62

Post by ck2 » Tue, Apr 26, 2011, 2:54 PM UTC

Remove scores/points for people entirely.

That way only posts/comments get points/scores, not people.

Re: Tell HN: Please bring back comment scores

#63

Post by coffeedrinker » Tue, Apr 26, 2011, 2:55 PM UTC

Comment scores help me get to the best points (even if they are in disagreement) without spending a lot of time reading the whole page.

I'm reading a lot let now because there are no scores; I just skim the top and then move on.

Comment scoring allows the community to reveal quality.

Re: Tell HN: Please bring back comment scores

#64

Post by jaxn » Tue, Apr 26, 2011, 2:56 PM UTC

cyanbane wrote: post #26

raganwald wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

ABSOLUTELY. Comment scores in the midst of an active discussion narrow thinking. Comment scores on historical artifacts are useful for research.

I think if people in general see a comment that has been upvoted heavily they are less likely to contribute their opinion to it if they agree with it. I like not being able to see its weight as I feel like more readers will comment with their opinions rather than just upvote, which creates more discussion, etc (I have no numbers to back this up, just what I believe).

That sound like it worsens the signal/noise ratio. If a comment is definitive (and ratified by up votes) then there would be fewer comments reiterating the point.

Are we going for more informative or more participatory?

Re: Tell HN: Please bring back comment scores

#65

Post by munchhausen » Tue, Apr 26, 2011, 2:58 PM UTC

abeppu wrote: post #58

blhack wrote: post #25

People can be wrong about things, and comment scores are useful information that helps us know if they are. "that is not how mysql works" with 2 Points And "that is not how mysql works" with 102 points Are not the same piece of info. I don't see any benefit to hiding this from people. It also helps newbies understand the customs here (they can get feedback on other people's comments) edit now that I'm not on my phone…

But two comments with equal points given at different times on the same thread are likely not equally informative; the newer one had fewer impressions but receiving the same points has a higher points to views ratio. Part of the problem with points is that people try to use them like you are -- to gauge agreement for correctness, or who 'won' a discussion or whatever -- but points are a really crappy indicator of tha…

> Points should be normed by impressions, and then smoothed (or given credibility intervals or something).

I agree that this might work better for determining correctness of informative comments than just plain point scores, however point scores work better than nothing at all.

Re: Tell HN: Please bring back comment scores

#66

Post by jaxn » Tue, Apr 26, 2011, 3:01 PM UTC

lotusleaf1987 wrote: post #34

hooande wrote: post #21

The most important aspect of the comment scores was that they let me know what the HN community thought of a particular point or argument. I'm capable of making up my own mind about any topic. I find it interesting and useful to see what other people think. As a geek I miss being able to see that "people agreed with this side of the argument at +20 as opposed to that side at +10". If some people want to treat it as a…

|The most important aspect of the comment scores was that they let me know what the HN community thought of a particular point or argument. I'm capable of making up my own mind about any topic. I find it interesting and useful to see what other people think That seems like cognitive dissonance to me and a rationalization. If you truly make up your own mind about something then why would you care so granularly about h…

Why care? Because up votes are also coming from the community and I believe we are all here because we respect the opinions of the people here.

Also, comments sort within threads. Sometimes the best reply is to a no-so-great parent comment.

Re: Tell HN: Please bring back comment scores

#67

Post by joshuacc » Tue, Apr 26, 2011, 3:02 PM UTC

siddhant wrote: post #39

Cant we have a "showcommentscores" option for displaying comment scores? Personally, I really ( really ) miss seeing comment scores, but its apparent that there are a lot of people who like HN the other way.

The problem is that part of what we like about not displaying the comment scores is the effect it has on other people's behavior. Letting others opt in to seeing the scores would defeat a large part of the purpose.

Re: Tell HN: Please bring back comment scores

#68

Post by acrum » Tue, Apr 26, 2011, 3:06 PM UTC

I like the lack of comment scores (to avoid everyone piling on one comment), but I think I would like it more if I knew what went into how high a comment was on the page. Is it a fact that the first displayed comment will be the one with the highest score? I know some different inputs are used, such as the karma of the submitter, how new it is, etc. but I guess we don't know "for sure".

I don't think the solution is to bring back scores, though. A possible "simple" solution could be to color/star a comment above 50/100 points, etc. Comment scores could also be displayed as percentage or on a scale of 0 to 1, 0 to 10, etc. I'd be more likely to read a comment with a score of 95% than one with a score of 20%. This way you at least get an indication of the helpfulness of the comment other than just its position on the page.

Re: Tell HN: Please bring back comment scores

#69

Post by lwhi » Tue, Apr 26, 2011, 3:06 PM UTC

munchhausen wrote: post #65

abeppu wrote: post #58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But two comments with equal points given at different times on the same thread are likely not equally informative; the newer one had fewer impressions but receiving the same points has a higher points to views ratio. Part of the problem with points is that people try to use them like you are -- to gauge agreement for correctness, or who 'won' a discussion or whatever -- but points are a really crappy indicator of tha…

> Points should be normed by impressions, and then smoothed (or given credibility intervals or something). I agree that this might work better for determining correctness of informative comments than just plain point scores, however point scores work better than nothing at all.

If someone states something that's incorrect, reply to the comment and explain why! ;)

Re: Tell HN: Please bring back comment scores

#70

Post by fname » Tue, Apr 26, 2011, 3:06 PM UTC

lwhi wrote: post #38

blhack wrote: post #25

People can be wrong about things, and comment scores are useful information that helps us know if they are. "that is not how mysql works" with 2 Points And "that is not how mysql works" with 102 points Are not the same piece of info. I don't see any benefit to hiding this from people. It also helps newbies understand the customs here (they can get feedback on other people's comments) edit now that I'm not on my phone…

You can see how agreeable a comment is by how far up the page it is. I think having the scores hidden is a good decision. It means that we concentrate on content rather than a 'karma game'. " "that is not how mysql works" with 2 Points And "that is not how mysql works" with 102 points Are not the same piece of info. " In my opinion, both of those comments are bad comments unless they further qualify the statement. I…

I don't think karma should be used to infer whether a statement is correct.

Completely agree. In my limited tenure here at HN, I've learned that karma scores have never been about being correct, factually or otherwise. Rather, they should be given to comments that help increase and move the discussion around the given topic even if that commenters opinion or assumption on something isn't factually accurate.