151–160 of 553 posts
One problem with downvotes, at least the way they are implemented in reddit and HN, is that they cancel out upvotes. You are not able to see how many upvotes a post got, only how many upvotes minus downvotes.
There are interventions you can make on the interface to improve civility of discourse, but they're more complicated than just trying to crudely stifle anger.
> Reddit moderators who run subreddits are given the choice to allow the function. When it’s enabled, it’s used as a filter to sort out divisive posts from the rest but also leads to problems like abuse based on opinions and introducing a feeling of negativity into the communities. Just want to clarify this: reddit inc. doesn't really offer communities a way to "disable" downvoting. The subreddits referenced at the l…
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I've been in academia for awhile, I'm used to getting serious criticism. I'm a man, my whole life I've been told to toughen up. There's really almost nothing you can say to me that is going to hurt me. I really mean it. But downvotes? I pretty much won't post on HN or Reddit because of them (and the culture associated with it). I've got no problem being wrong, but when I spend a significant amount of time trying to r…
My main issue with downvotes is they are almost always used incorrectly. Including here at HN. They are not meant to be an "agree/disagree" button, but rather a way to filter out content that is not relevant to the discussion at hand. Disagreeing does not mean it is irrelevant, especially if it is well written and in good faith. We should allow all viewpoints that are put forward with proper intentions. Upvotes are e…
I've been in academia for awhile, I'm used to getting serious criticism. I'm a man, my whole life I've been told to toughen up. There's really almost nothing you can say to me that is going to hurt me. I really mean it. But downvotes? I pretty much won't post on HN or Reddit because of them (and the culture associated with it). I've got no problem being wrong, but when I spend a significant amount of time trying to r…
> If downvotes don't matter Votes don't matter. Upvotes, downvotes, they're just fake internet points, they don't mean anything. Don't sweat it. Some of my most upvoted posts/comments in various fora over the web have been quick low-effort in-joke references, or throwaway gags, whereas my carefully nuanced and referenced technical explanations have got a handful of upvotes. They're totally arbitrary, and the crowd is…
This is one of the more frustrating parts of the whole thing. I try not to care much about votes, but when a "throwaway comment" gets 50+ upvotes, while a carefully thought out, heavily researched, link/citation supported post with a lot of "meat" to it gets no votes at all, or even a downvote... that's just kind of grating in some sense. Well, it is to me anyway.
I've been in academia for awhile, I'm used to getting serious criticism. I'm a man, my whole life I've been told to toughen up. There's really almost nothing you can say to me that is going to hurt me. I really mean it. But downvotes? I pretty much won't post on HN or Reddit because of them (and the culture associated with it). I've got no problem being wrong, but when I spend a significant amount of time trying to r…
It sounds like you have a lot more fear and assumption than experience here. In reality, crazy unfair downvote bombing is not even close to the norm here in my ~decade of experience. What makes you certain that someone with multiple accounts has downvoted you? Are you sure you weren’t just wrong and didn’t know it? I’ve been wrong in good faith and gotten fairly downvoted for it far, far more often than I’ve been unf…
But that still doesn't invalidate what GP was saying. They perceive a difficulty in contributing to the conversation because they're afraid of being downvoted. You're telling them not to worry and that they'll be fine ... but it's still a legitimate concern for them and for many other people who lurk and don't participate in the conversation directly. And there are plenty of lurkers. In my limited experience of receiving visitors from HN on my website, the number of clicks is 100x the number of comments on the thread.
And this is exactly why Facebook doesn't have a downvote button. It's trivial to add it. I've even seen it implemented in internal versions. But it only takes a couple of bad experiences of being downvoted for a user to get turned off from the platform. TFA does some handwaving about how it'll save democracy, but it's a crock of shit. All it does is make fewer people participate. crazy_horse tried to tell you that. The solution to saving democracy isn't reducing participation.
What's more, this experiment of having downvotes does exist. It's called reddit. Plenty of people use it. If the author could use examples from reddit to illustrate their point, it'd be great. Like the thriving, polite, constructive exchange of ideas that took place on /r/the_donald for instance?
Earlier quoted context omitted.
It sounds like you have a lot more fear and assumption than experience here. In reality, crazy unfair downvote bombing is not even close to the norm here in my ~decade of experience. What makes you certain that someone with multiple accounts has downvoted you? Are you sure you weren’t just wrong and didn’t know it? I’ve been wrong in good faith and gotten fairly downvoted for it far, far more often than I’ve been unf…
Ideological issues get people to use downvote. Technical discourse is more civilized, upvotes are more likely than downvotes.
But discussions on health, religion and culture that is where the downvotes are used.
If you can accept that premise, then HN is a great place to be. Reddit is just not in the same league when it comes to thoughtful, well-articulated discussions where you get some great insights.
I've been arguing that websites should only allow users to downvote.
I've been in academia for awhile, I'm used to getting serious criticism. I'm a man, my whole life I've been told to toughen up. There's really almost nothing you can say to me that is going to hurt me. I really mean it. But downvotes? I pretty much won't post on HN or Reddit because of them (and the culture associated with it). I've got no problem being wrong, but when I spend a significant amount of time trying to r…
You realise downvotes are a big deal for managing information on certain sites that we frequent...
Earlier quoted context omitted.
FWIW every time I have ever flagged something on HN it’s been a fat finger mistake on mobile. Probably a drop in the bucket but worth considering that the signal is still polluted even with perfectly good faith user behavior.
I’m entering grey beard territory, been on HN for years, and I still don’t know what the [-] button does. Is it a downvote? Or does it just collapse the parent so I can read more without clutter? You’d hope downvote UI would be more explicit.
When logged in, I have upvote buttons on all comments, and I believe downvote buttons are enabled at over a certain amount of karma.