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I don't learn anything on HN anymore, bring back the upvote count

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Re: I don't learn anything on HN anymore, bring back the upvote count

#61

Post by zwieback »

ghshephard wrote: post #36
neild wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Without some sort of vote indicator, it's hard to tell who has the most accurate opinion, except often in subjects like law, security, and seo where there are known experts that often chime in (e.g. grellas, tptacek, patio11). You assume that votes are a good indicator of who holds the most accurate opinion. My experience says that they are merely an indicator of who holds the most popular opinion, or who argues thei…

I would agree with you. Most topics don't even really have a clear measurement of objective accuracy. And, even when they do, it's rare that votes reflect expert's analysis of accuracy. Rather, votes on HN typically reflect one of the following: O How well known is the individual - I'm even guilty of mindlessly clicking on a grellas comment when it has to do with Law, Security with tptacek, or patio11 on all sorts of…

Regarding your second bullet - do you have an alter ego to test anti-HN sentiments as well? Not really in good taste, I know, but it would be interesting as a social experiment.

I notice that a lot of posters prefix their comments with a "damn-the-downvotes" remark, which shows that a lot of disussion is skewed toward karma-preservation. Both up and downvoting are fraught and maybe you really need both or neither one.

Re: I don't learn anything on HN anymore, bring back the upvote count

#62

Post by JabavuAdams »

AgentConundrum wrote: post #11

I've noticed the same thing. I'll see a debate which is basically a thread of two people replying to each other with no other contributors. In this circumstance, it's impossible to distinguish between a situation where one person gets 10 upvotes and holds a well-agreed opinion and the other person gets 1 or 2 upvotes and is arguing his opinion just well enough to avoid being downvoted. I understand that we're suppose…

What about a request for comments feature?

I.e. I see a 2-party thread. I can't decide who's right. I flag it RFQ to attract the attention of other contributors.

Essentially "hey, there's a good argument going on here" pile on (not with votes, but with criticism / argument)

Re: I don't learn anything on HN anymore, bring back the upvote count

#63

Post by robertk »

mmaunder wrote: post #33
lukifer wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Idea: a [view count] link. Once clicked, votes are ignored for that comment. You can vote, or get the social proof, but not both.

That's quite brilliant. How about up, down and abstain buttons and if you click any you get to see the vote count and you're done voting. It will encourage voting, remove the social proof influence and give the option to abstain.

I agree so much I'm commenting.

Re: I don't learn anything on HN anymore, bring back the upvote count

#64

Post by wdewind »

Sakes wrote: post #37
mmaunder wrote: post #3

You need to ween yourself off your social proof addiction. The problem with vote counts is that two downvotes can start a cascade of reflex downvotes. Or at best, it won't get upvoted. When vote counts where active, this effect caused many instances where an excellent comment was found greyed out at the bottom of the page until a few smart HN folks with high karma voted it back up.

I definitely agree, having upvotes visible fostered a herd mentality. What I really like is there is less of a knee jerk reaction to assigning value to a post. You can assume it's value based upon placement, but in order to determine it's value you must actually read what they say. What I don't understand is why people need to be told what is valuable. With an ever changing community, I don't see how you could foreve…

You're right about the herd mentality, but that's the whole point: measuring the herd mentality has a value. No one is asking you to put 100% of your judgment in the point count, and you'd be a fool to do so, much as you'd be a fool to believe everything you see on TV.

Showing points does not kill HNers brains. We've already lost if it does.

Re: I don't learn anything on HN anymore, bring back the upvote count

#65

Post by knite »

I don't need to know a comment's score, just the score's magnitude provides a lot of utility. In the same way that a grayed-out comment signifies a poor reply, find a way to show me whether a comment is neutral, slightly positive, very positive, or stupendously positive.

Re: I don't learn anything on HN anymore, bring back the upvote count

#67

Post by calvin »

mmaunder wrote: post #33
lukifer wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Idea: a [view count] link. Once clicked, votes are ignored for that comment. You can vote, or get the social proof, but not both.

That's quite brilliant. How about up, down and abstain buttons and if you click any you get to see the vote count and you're done voting. It will encourage voting, remove the social proof influence and give the option to abstain.

Perlmonks.org does this. They only show you vote counts for nodes you've voted on. It always seemed effective to me -- I'd vote on comments I thought were good, and after I voted I'd see what their vote scores were.

Re: I don't learn anything on HN anymore, bring back the upvote count

#68

Post by rriepe »

I could see this change working for other sites, but HN actually does have a sort of collective wisdom.

I've also stopped looking at comments entirely. Before, I would sometimes click through to just read the comments. There was value there. It's not necessarily gone now, but it is much harder to find.

Re: I don't learn anything on HN anymore, bring back the upvote count

#69

Post by AgentConundrum »

neild wrote: post #22
AgentConundrum wrote: post #11

I've noticed the same thing. I'll see a debate which is basically a thread of two people replying to each other with no other contributors. In this circumstance, it's impossible to distinguish between a situation where one person gets 10 upvotes and holds a well-agreed opinion and the other person gets 1 or 2 upvotes and is arguing his opinion just well enough to avoid being downvoted. I understand that we're suppose…

Without some sort of vote indicator, it's hard to tell who has the most accurate opinion, except often in subjects like law, security, and seo where there are known experts that often chime in (e.g. grellas, tptacek, patio11). You assume that votes are a good indicator of who holds the most accurate opinion. My experience says that they are merely an indicator of who holds the most popular opinion, or who argues thei…

That's a very fair point. Unfortunately, when I don't know the subject matter at hand, social proof is pretty much all I have to determine good opinion from bad. Keep in mind that the title of this submission has to do with learning from HN, so that's the perspective I'm taking as well. If you don't know anything on a subject, the most popular opinion isn't necessarily a bad jumping off point for further research. I'm also not saying that you should ignore lesser voted answers on that basis alone. I'm simply saying that in a vacuum of other indicators, vote count works in a pinch.

Re: I don't learn anything on HN anymore, bring back the upvote count

#70

Post by wdewind »

neild wrote: post #22
AgentConundrum wrote: post #11

I've noticed the same thing. I'll see a debate which is basically a thread of two people replying to each other with no other contributors. In this circumstance, it's impossible to distinguish between a situation where one person gets 10 upvotes and holds a well-agreed opinion and the other person gets 1 or 2 upvotes and is arguing his opinion just well enough to avoid being downvoted. I understand that we're suppose…

Without some sort of vote indicator, it's hard to tell who has the most accurate opinion, except often in subjects like law, security, and seo where there are known experts that often chime in (e.g. grellas, tptacek, patio11). You assume that votes are a good indicator of who holds the most accurate opinion. My experience says that they are merely an indicator of who holds the most popular opinion, or who argues thei…

No one should be suggesting votes = accuracy of opinion, this is demonstrably incorrect.

What I'm arguing is that how popular an answer is is actually a valuable piece of information, outside of its direct tie to how truthful a comment is. Having nothing there doesn't help me determine how truthful a comment is more than knowing popular opinion.

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