Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

The value of downvoting, or, how Hacker News gets it wrong (2009)

stackoverflow.blog

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

211–220 of 475 posts

Re: The value of downvoting, or, how Hacker News gets it wrong (2009)

#211

Post by II2II »

TheManInThePub wrote: post #135
CDRdude wrote: post #102

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think slashdot’s voting system was well equipped to avoid that problem, but they faded anyway. Maybe it was the redesign? I think many of their innovations in 1999 would go a long way to resolve political downvoting today—-new accounts were unable to vote on comments, you were unable to vote and comment in the same posts, metamoderation to ensure fairness, and up or downvotes having to fit categories like ‘insightf…

Frankly, I couldn't agree with this more. I've seen intelligent and insightful HN posts down voted simply because they went against the status-quo. If this is allowed to go on, people will be afraid of making controversial (but intelligent) posts, and this place will become another reddit.

I suspect that events outside of HN would have more of a chilling effect than the environment of HN itself. I know there are times when I felt like presenting a contrary view on a story but did not. I suspect that a fair number of HN members may even accept those points of view. Yet I have also seen enough of those "conversations" to know that they rapidly go downhill.

Re: The value of downvoting, or, how Hacker News gets it wrong (2009)

#212

Post by TheAdamAndChe »

kodah wrote: post #187

I've been downvoted to [dead] before, though I've never gotten mad about it. One trend I have noticed is that on HN you won't necessarily be downvoted for your idea but you definitely will be downvoted for how you present it. If you come off as vitriolic or angry, you can expect a proportionate response. Frustration seems to be tolerated intermittently.

You can definitely be downvoted for ideas here. Comments that go significantly against the political norms of the site seem particularly prone to this.

Re: The value of downvoting, or, how Hacker News gets it wrong (2009)

#213

Post by TigeriusKirk »

dang wrote: post #23

Getting it wrong for 12 years now: The Value of Downvoting, Or, How Hacker News Gets It Wrong (2009) - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25633668 - Jan 2021 (1 comment) 10 Years In, Was He Right? “Value of Downvoting; How HN Gets It Wrong” - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23409231 - June 2020 (1 comment) The Value of Downvoting, or, How Hacker News Gets It Wrong (2009) - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=…

>Getting it wrong for 12 years now

What do you think HN does get wrong?

Phrasing it in a more positive way, what could you do to raise the quality of conversation on HN even higher?

Re: The value of downvoting, or, how Hacker News gets it wrong (2009)

#214

Post by downandout »

0xEFF wrote: post #190
downandout wrote: post #144

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I used to be incredibly active on here, and then I started getting downvoted on virtually every comment, likely for political reasons. I have all but stopped commenting compared to my previous activity. It just stopped being fun. Even posts I make that have nothing to do with politics, that only point out provable, factual information, get downvoted. I have over 13K karma, even after losing a few thousand points over…

Down voted you because of your about me.

I believe it's an honest assessment of the current state of HN.

Re: The value of downvoting, or, how Hacker News gets it wrong (2009)

#215

Post by pessimizer »

ryandrake wrote: post #122
amznthrwaway wrote: post #106

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The notion that HN is well-moderated is bizarre. HN is exceptionally hostile to those who hold beliefs contrary to HN-acceptable norms. If you want to get banned quickly, criticize pg portfolio companies (even politely, with valid criticism), point out that white supremacist and other hate speech is welcomed so long as it is polite; point out that responses to hate speech are _not_ tolerated..... The community here u…

> These days, that doesn’t happen. The discussions are lower value, less open minded, and more strident. It’s a pile of shit. The decline of open-mindedness is what I've noticed the most. The assumption of good intention on the part of someone with an opposing view. The willingness to at least entertain a thought or argument, even if you ultimately don't accept it. Much easier to just hit the down-arrow and move on,…

> Much easier to just hit the down-arrow and move on, satisfied in knowing that wrongthink was punished with a nice -1.

This is good, do this. The worst thing in threads IMO is endless subthreads attached to low-effort troll comments. Just downvote and move on. If the comment contains a factual misstatement, maybe post a quick note saying why it is incorrect, with a reference.

Re: The value of downvoting, or, how Hacker News gets it wrong (2009)

#216

Post by cryptoz »

I used to read Coding Horror but stopped paying attention to Jeff Atwood after his anti-coding rant. He repeatedly insisted that "learning to code" is a really dumb thing to do unless you intend to make a career out of it. A really shocking opinion that I was surprised to hear from him, and made me lose all respect for his coding-related opinions.

Re: The value of downvoting, or, how Hacker News gets it wrong (2009)

#217

Post by cassepipe »

baryphonic wrote: post #137
amznthrwaway wrote: post #106

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The notion that HN is well-moderated is bizarre. HN is exceptionally hostile to those who hold beliefs contrary to HN-acceptable norms. If you want to get banned quickly, criticize pg portfolio companies (even politely, with valid criticism), point out that white supremacist and other hate speech is welcomed so long as it is polite; point out that responses to hate speech are _not_ tolerated..... The community here u…

> If you want to get banned quickly, criticize pg portfolio companies (even politely, with valid criticism), point out that white supremacist and other hate speech is welcomed so long as it is polite; point out that responses to hate speech are _not_ tolerated..... > > The community here used to be absolutely amazing. 10-15 years ago the discussions here were actionable, and I was able to make valuable professional c…

Hate speech is a priori not very reasonable so getting rid of it is not a matter a censorship but of getting rid of what stand in the way of thoughtful discussions.

Also I don't think "in my house" metaphor has had much success. Which seems fair : Hacker News is not PG's house, although it is his baby, he handed moderation power over to the users, the algorithm and the moderators. Which is why we like it and trust it and use it. You can't just compare anything to one on one relationships, it does not work like that.

Re: The value of downvoting, or, how Hacker News gets it wrong (2009)

#218

Post by ROARosen »

TheManInThePub wrote: post #135
CDRdude wrote: post #102

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think slashdot’s voting system was well equipped to avoid that problem, but they faded anyway. Maybe it was the redesign? I think many of their innovations in 1999 would go a long way to resolve political downvoting today—-new accounts were unable to vote on comments, you were unable to vote and comment in the same posts, metamoderation to ensure fairness, and up or downvotes having to fit categories like ‘insightf…

Frankly, I couldn't agree with this more. I've seen intelligent and insightful HN posts down voted simply because they went against the status-quo. If this is allowed to go on, people will be afraid of making controversial (but intelligent) posts, and this place will become another reddit.

> I've seen intelligent and insightful HN posts down voted simply because they went against the status-quo.

It is not possible to download posts on HackerNews, no matter how many karma you have. Did you mean comments? Because I think that actually one of the strongests points of HN that all posts will get equal footing. (they can be flagged though)

Re: The value of downvoting, or, how Hacker News gets it wrong (2009)

#219

Post by TigeriusKirk »

downandout wrote: post #144
joering2 wrote: post #73

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Would actually like to see a list of largest karma-wise HN members who left. By leaving I would say over 180 days inactive. Dang can you post the result please: SELECT hn_name, hn_karma, hn_last_active FROM comments WHERE TIMESTAMPDIFF(DAY, hn_last_active, NOW()) > 180 ORDER BY hn_karma DESC LIMIT 100

I used to be incredibly active on here, and then I started getting downvoted on virtually every comment, likely for political reasons. I have all but stopped commenting compared to my previous activity. It just stopped being fun. Even posts I make that have nothing to do with politics, that only point out provable, factual information, get downvoted. I have over 13K karma, even after losing a few thousand points over…

I agree it's a good place to find interesting articles.

I also think reading the comments is rarely a good use of time. Just feels like the median discussion site in that regard.

Re: The value of downvoting, or, how Hacker News gets it wrong (2009)

#220

Post by rocqua »

tpmx wrote: post #153
wvenable wrote: post #145

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Individual comments are rarely flagged for anything other than outright spam or harassment. I browse with "show dead" turned on. I have seen entire heated topics killed but that kills both sides of the argument equally. What value is a 500-comment talk-over-each-other argument, fundamentally about politics even if on-topic, on this site? I doesn't seem like something we should waste time on.

The fallacy here: when you're only exposed to stuff that everyone agrees about, you're missing out.

I have recently found a whole lot of value in figuring out what everybody agrees about. A lot of the time that is right. And when it is wrong, it is good to know, and encourages (me at least) to really figure out why the fence is there before I remove it.
Post reply on HN