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Tell HN: Please bring back comment scores

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Re: Tell HN: Please bring back comment scores

#101

Post by alain94040 »

tolmasky wrote: post #50
lwhi wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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…

Just expand the example: pretend it was "that is not the way mysql works blah blah explanation". I agree that I don't want to read this if it has 2 points but I do if it has 100.

Since we don't see points anymore, instead of upvotting you because I agree with you, I just have to add a comment saying "I agree". Is that what people want?

Re: Tell HN: Please bring back comment scores

#102

Post by joshwa »

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…

You can see how agreeable a comment is by how far up the page it is.

Except if it's nested.

Sometimes the most useful comments are replies to less-interesting top-level comments. In this case the lower-scored item is positioned higher up the page than the higher-scored item.

Re: Tell HN: Please bring back comment scores

#103

Post by mcn »

Removing comment scores seems to have increased the amount of mediocre/poor comments around contested topics: I am noticing more more brother/sister comments that are basically reiterating each other and more debates that veer to uncontrollable levels of indentation when the key points were already covered in the top level post and first child.

The relative absence of these black holes of discussion is one of the things that brought me to HN in the first place, and I think that showing comment scores discouraged them on multiple levels. Public upvoting lets people express their view on the topic without posting points similar to those already expressed. When two comments have a lopsided point spread it lets one "side" of the debate feel more comfortable letting the other have the last word.

Re: Tell HN: Please bring back comment scores

#104

Post by fragmede »

shasta wrote: post #78
patrickk wrote: post #46

My initial reaction was also "just bring em back". With reflection, I think a good idea might be to show the score after you vote. This way you get the feeling of making some difference i.e. immediate feedback, but also the knowledge that your vote wasn't subconsciously affected by a visible score beforehand. The main downside of this would be people voting out of curiosity to see what a comments current score is. Pe…

[...people voting out of curiosity...] If voting reveals the score, then there would need to be a new way to abstain and reveal the score.

Why? If you feel positively or negatively towards a comment, then vote thusly. Abstaining to reveal the score is far too easily gamed with a secondary account.

Re: Tell HN: Please bring back comment scores

#105

Post by jrwoodruff »

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…

I agree. I actually often find myself only reading the top one or two comments on a thread now, whereas before I would scan down the list of comments for high point values. This is especially true of replies-in-replies, where the sort order is less indicative of agreement/value.

I miss the community-provided context of comment points.

Re: Tell HN: Please bring back comment scores

#106

Post by jrwoodruff »

joshwa wrote: post #102
lwhi wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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…

You can see how agreeable a comment is by how far up the page it is. Except if it's nested. Sometimes the most useful comments are replies to less-interesting top-level comments. In this case the lower-scored item is positioned higher up the page than the higher-scored item.

Exactly! Right now it's impossible to tell if more people agree with you, or the person you are replying to. Frustrating.

Re: Tell HN: Please bring back comment scores

#107

Post by alain94040 »

lotusleaf1987 wrote: post #22

I disagree. It forces people to read the comments and judge them on their own merit. Often times the highest voted comment seemed to be highest voted comment simply because it was the first comment and kept being upvoted for being upvoted by others. Also, the ordering of the comments does the same thing as having the comment scores! I do wish there was a way to still search for the highest rated comments on searchyc.…

It forces people to read the comments and judge them on their own merit

I understand your argument. Just keep in mind that there are multiple ways that HN is useful. Some of us want to go deep into a topic, will read all the comments. And some of us are in a hurry and want to a quick feel and extract a summary.

In the first case (I call it "researcher mode"), not having votes is a good thing. But it prevents me from browsing in the second mode (the "quick update mode").

I wish you could set this in my preferences, but it wouldn't fulfill pg's original goal of staving the decline of HN (that I don't see - but that's another discussion).

Re: Tell HN: Please bring back comment scores

#109

Post by grandalf »

I think that people are missing the point. A comment's quality is not measurable by it's score. If anything, that is a rough aggregation. By this logic, Ke$ha is a better musician than Joshua Bell.

Top comments on HN were becoming more "top 40" and something had to be done before people started posting links to Trollface, etc.

One approach would be to use category-based voting, which adds a lot of complexity.

One approach would be to implement some sort of vote weighting sytem (time based, reputation based, context based), but that's ad-hoc and may not fix the problem.

And one approach is to simply hide numerical comment scores from all but each user's own comments. This turns the quest for high karma into a personal battle against one's self, not a sport.

PG wisely chose to make Karma a personal Everest for each individual to care about (or not).

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