Trolls (2008) • Hacker News Board

Re: Trolls (2008)

#231

Post by georgemcbay » Thu, Dec 15, 2011, 1:47 AM UTC

teej wrote: post #203

nirvana wrote: post #162

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You had 3.5k karma before beginning this experiment and you're a cofounder of a YC funded company! You're already part of the "in" group. The first comment prior to this one on your comments feed starts of with: "Your entire comment is bullshit and it pisses me off. You've never worked at Zynga, so to purport that you know exactly what it's like to work there is bullshit. Your comment reflects exactly what Silicon Va…

To be clear, my "foundership" of a YC company wasn't publicly knowledge until 4 weeks ago. My last comment isn't my greatest accomplishment. I'd hope that my behavior would be looked at in whole, instead of cherrypicked. That being said, I was characterizing the general feeling of HN as a whole. Of the 100k+ readership of HN, very few are actual Zynga employees. So in that light, I defend my comment. There is a large…

Of the 100k+ readership of HN, very few are actual employees of any single company. Does that mean we can't discuss any companies here?

Re: Trolls (2008)

#232

Post by earbitscom » Thu, Dec 15, 2011, 1:53 AM UTC

to3m wrote: post #217

m0th87 wrote: post #202

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Are you suggesting HN's ranking algorithm biases toward YC-related content? Because that is a serious accusation. I realize YC job posts can disable comments, and there is a separate tab for open jobs. That's no big deal because the behavior is externally visible and obvious. If HN actually re-ranks articles to support YC content though, that is a big deal. And it's scary how that might subtly affect the Valley, give…

Interesting viewpoint. I'd always assumed that YC-specific "stuff" would get automatic preference, or would at least be marginally sticky. Is that not the case? While this site does permit random people to submit random links, and then allow more random people to comment on the articles, I'd just assumed it was fundamentally a source of marketing for Mr Graham and his activities. After all, it IS part of ycombinator.…

I think the preference stems primarily from two factors:

1. There are hundreds of YC companies now, each with multiple founders, almost all of whom are HN readers. Each person here votes on topics, articles and companies they find interesting. I follow a lot of YC-related news because it's fun and helpful to be informed about YC and the alumni. Therefore, I'm more familiar with YC companies and founders, so I will tend to vote on their news slightly more often. With hundreds of founders from YC, it only takes a small bias like this to create a slight lean toward YC news getting better results here than other similar news.

2. This same bias isn't exclusive to YC alumni. Most people on HN familiar with YC like it, respect PG, and are interested in YC companies and the progress of the portfolio. So, in addition to a small bias on the part of the alumni, I have also seen that YC news gets more votes and comments from the rest of the community.

While that might mean that YC news gets more exposure and other news less, more people seem to be interested in it than not, so it seems the forum still works as it should.

Re: Trolls (2008)

#233

Post by zedshaw » Thu, Dec 15, 2011, 1:59 AM UTC

m0th87 wrote: post #202

zedshaw wrote: post #179

I normally find that, unless an essay is about mathematics, if it is based on a binary argument then it's just false because it's too simplistic to be based in reality. In this case saying there's only "trolls" and "super awesome people!" is childish. There's a much more interesting spectrum of human behavior online that doesn't fit into these convenient categories. To then say there's only two types of "trolls" is a…

Are you suggesting HN's ranking algorithm biases toward YC-related content? Because that is a serious accusation. I realize YC job posts can disable comments, and there is a separate tab for open jobs. That's no big deal because the behavior is externally visible and obvious. If HN actually re-ranks articles to support YC content though, that is a big deal. And it's scary how that might subtly affect the Valley, give…

Never said ranking algorithm. I said, there's a bunch of links (like job postings and YC company PR posts) that get privileged front page status with their own decay algorithms, yet they aren't flagged as "promoted". They're just mixed in as if it's actually relevant news a bunch of people upvoted to the front page. Or how about all that crap that was on scribd back when nobody knew what scribd was? If you think this isn't a manipulated news source then you're high on a metric ton of horseshit.

Re: Trolls (2008)

#234

Post by VonGuard » Thu, Dec 15, 2011, 2:06 AM UTC

I dunno guys, there seems to be a big worry here about HN degrading, or trolling being more prevalent and mods banning non-troll entities...

If you've been to Reddit recently and tried to engage that community, you might not be so worried about things here at HN. It's like hot and cold running compassion/rape over there. They either flood you with love, or ransack your house and ruin your life. Dangerous stuff, that Reddit Hive Mind.

It's just something that happens on the Internet: more people = more trolls and perceived-but-not-really tolls. I wonder if someone could do a paper on the average parts per million for trolls in any mass of words on the Internet.

Re: Trolls (2008)

#235

Post by m0th87 » Thu, Dec 15, 2011, 2:20 AM UTC

zedshaw wrote: post #233

m0th87 wrote: post #202

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Are you suggesting HN's ranking algorithm biases toward YC-related content? Because that is a serious accusation. I realize YC job posts can disable comments, and there is a separate tab for open jobs. That's no big deal because the behavior is externally visible and obvious. If HN actually re-ranks articles to support YC content though, that is a big deal. And it's scary how that might subtly affect the Valley, give…

Never said ranking algorithm. I said, there's a bunch of links (like job postings and YC company PR posts) that get privileged front page status with their own decay algorithms, yet they aren't flagged as "promoted". They're just mixed in as if it's actually relevant news a bunch of people upvoted to the front page. Or how about all that crap that was on scribd back when nobody knew what scribd was? If you think this…

If YC articles have their own decay rate, then they remain on the front page longer. How is that not toying with the ranking algorithm?

I've been on HN for a long time (longer than my already pretty old profile suggests), and I've never heard about this. Apologies for the need for clarification, but this is important. It would greatly affect my attitude toward the site, and I think others' as well.

Re: Trolls (2008)

#236

Post by ggchappell » Thu, Dec 15, 2011, 2:22 AM UTC

jshen wrote: post #159

edw519 wrote: post #147

Discussions like this remind me of my favorite scene from "Roadhouse", the best bad movie ever. Discussion forums are kinda like bars and hackers are kinda like coolers... All you have to do is follow three simple rules. One: never underestimate your opponent. Expect the unexpected. Two: take it outside. Never start anything inside the bar unless it's absolutely necessary. And three: be nice. Come on. If somebody get…

"Sometimes we hackers work too hard to make things more complicated than they need to be." tl;dr: maintaining an online community is anything but simple. I'm not sure exactly what you mean. One possibility is that you're referring to the hackers that build communities online who try to establish some sort of guidelines for behavior. If this is what you meant then I think I disagree. I've tried a very similar experime…

> My entire goal was to recreate that site minus the trolls, and I ruthlessly enforced one simple rule. Do not directly insult other users of the site.

I've pondered this issue a lot, and I've also noticed that, as you indicated, lots of troll messages would be acceptable under your rule, but many responses to those messages would not be.

My favorite example comes from a discussion group about hamsters as pets. Someone -- clearly a troll -- posts a recipe for barbecued hamster. 100 people respond something like, "You're sick!"

In that case, it seemed to me that it was not the trolling that wrecked the discussion, but the response to it. And of course the troll is not violating your rule, but those who replied to him are. So I like your rule.

> And occasionally a good user gets made at something and calls someone a moron. It leaves a bad taste in their mouth if you come down with an iron fist on them.

Hmmm ... but directly asking them not to do it again would probably work well. If they can't even handle that, then you probably don't want them anyway. (And really, is the iron-fist policy so bad? So someone gets a bad taste in their mouth. That someone was wrecking your community.)

Re: Trolls (2008)

#237

Post by billpatrianakos » Thu, Dec 15, 2011, 2:22 AM UTC

mquander wrote: post #144

billpatrianakos wrote: post #95

I like the measures HN has in place to combat trolling. Karma, up/down votes, the downvote threshold, dead links, etc. are all really good and seem to work. The biggest thing though is just making sure everyone understands the kind of unspoken spirit of the site. I'd also argue that we want to keep this place kind of hushed as not to attract too broad of an audience. What I don't like that I have seen a lot of, is wh…

As for downvotes, that button should be reserved for off-topic, vulgar, or otherwise obvious trolling cases and not just because "I didn't like what he said, he's stupid, or whatever." I disagree. Why do you think that? I think that "I didn't like what he said, he's stupid, or whatever" (e.g. I think this comment is foolish, I think this comment is unreasonably rude, I think this comment is uninteresting ) is a very…

I don't think I was very clear. My main concern is that people will move something down because they disagree. There can be a comment I disagree with very much but if it's well reasoned and on topic I can't really punish the author only on the basis of me not sharing the same opinion. And that's what I feel is happening quite often.

It's okay in the cases of foolish and unreasonably rude comments, there's no question about it. But in cases where you simply disagree its uncalled for. In the case of uninteresting comments that don't qualify as rude or foolish I don't think there's a reason to downvote. Instead you up vote the good ones around it and let it just stagnate.

Downvoting is a way you can kind of give others hints of the kind of things that are expected around here. If you downvote on the basis of it not being interesting the person may come to believe they've said something offensive or foolish when really it was just boring. If they see they're getting no up votes then they can kind of tell that what they said was boring without giving them the wrong impression. People who get severely downvoted definitely get the hint if they're being off topic or foolish but when they're downvoted for being boring I don't think they get it and may think something else is up.

Re: Trolls (2008)

#238

Post by billpatrianakos » Thu, Dec 15, 2011, 2:34 AM UTC

JoshTriplett wrote: post #113

billpatrianakos wrote: post #95

I like the measures HN has in place to combat trolling. Karma, up/down votes, the downvote threshold, dead links, etc. are all really good and seem to work. The biggest thing though is just making sure everyone understands the kind of unspoken spirit of the site. I'd also argue that we want to keep this place kind of hushed as not to attract too broad of an audience. What I don't like that I have seen a lot of, is wh…

The downvote button means, literally, "this comment should appear less prominently, and its author should get a very small penalty for having written it". Similarly, upvote means, literally, "this comment should appear more prominently, and its author should get a very small reward for having written it". With that in mind, "perfectly valid" takes on a different light. While sometimes downvoting does get used to rein…

Sure, the examples I remember usually come up whenever there's a discussion over copyright and piracy. What I'll see is a discussion about whether piracy really hurts anyone with people arguing that it's free marketing and people who pirate wouldn't buy anyway. Then someone comes along and the subject moves on to open source vs free software. Someone says piracy is good because all software should be free. Then a bunch of people pile on and agree. Then one guy comes along saying that software companies aren't evil and developers should be able to charge for their work and piracy is bad. He is then downvoted to hell not because he said something off topic but because he held an unpopular opinion.

I actually totally agree with you and the other responder to my comment. Now that you guys have said something I feel like I should rhrase and simply say that sometimes I feel like the up and down vote buttons are sometimes abused. I hate to see group think win the day. I really think the downvote button is a great way to show people that what they're saying isn't okay around here. Downvoted comments get frayed out and are almost unreadable. That's a signal that the comment isn't worth reading at all more so than "it deserves less prominence". So instead if we just up vote the good stuff, ignore mediocre stuff, and downvote bad stuff, then I think we'd be helping to show participants what kind of community this is in a better way. The real trolls get punished. The guys who are boring won't be offended and will be more apt to contribute better stuff next time if you just give them no points at all.

Re: Trolls (2008)

#239

Post by billpatrianakos » Thu, Dec 15, 2011, 2:39 AM UTC

zobzu wrote: post #218

The issue with votes is that they don't fix all that much. People often downvote other people they simply disagree with. In fact, most often do that. So it does not just shut off the "trolls" as in the "assholes". It also shuts off any unpopular opinion. That is sad, because unpopular opinions are generally interesting by nature, and sometimes insightful. That is because popular ones are well-known, thus cannot be "i…

I was trying to say the same thing in my previous comment above. Thank you for being able to put it this way. I think the downvote button should be reserved for off topic/trolling posts. If you downvote out of disagreement or boredom you risk actually turning that person into a troll later on. The newbie who writes a sincere but boring comment and gets downvoted doesn't learn how to better contribute. He just gets alienated. On the other hand, the newbie who writes a few boring comments, gets no up votes and then finally gets an up vote or two for a good contribution learns more about how to be a better contributor than if he had just gotten downvoted for what may seem to him or her, no reason at all.

Re: Trolls (2008)

#240

Post by there » Thu, Dec 15, 2011, 2:48 AM UTC

127 wrote: post #44

figgles wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I hope your bank account isn't stored as just an int(!) But seriously, it is a representation of something physical. Money. Money which can in turn be used for other physical things. Reputation "karma" isn't. It /is/ meaningless in this context, because you can never log into HN again and your life will go on. I don't think the argument was "anything digital is pointless."

Only difference between money and karma is that we can't easily trade karma. Modern money is not physical, it is just a figment of our imaginations. It has only the value we collectively give it.

i wonder how well a site would run if users had to give up karma to upvote a comment or submission.