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New users: Welcome. Please read the site guidelines.

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Re: New users: Welcome. Please read the site guidelines.

#111
post #101
post #100

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, but it once was the case that noise comments were given a single downvote and left alone by everyone else. Negative numbers here are like a slap in the face, and when overused they will be even more corrosive to the community than a flood of juvenile comments would be. More to the point, those scores are not supposed to be used to represent entertainment value, because people are not participating here for pure…

I tend to down vote things that are at +50 karma and up vote stuff that get's really low unless they are extremely good or bad. However, think of it like a threading problem. If 30 people that think like I do see the comment at 10 and all up vote it it's going to hit 40 without updating it's value to those people.

Then maybe enough others like you will take notice a little later on and correct it. Just don't worry about how everyone else votes--they're not the ones you get to decide on.

Re: New users: Welcome. Please read the site guidelines.

#112
post #94

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Unless you have a not-so-secret smirking attitude toward Paul Graham, having publicly ridiculed him in an earlier stage of your career and now being lucky enough to have no need for his money.

I can remember when -23 points would be reserved for something like a string of racial epithets, not merely a lame but inoffensive attempt at humor.

more users -> more mods, whichever way

Re: New users: Welcome. Please read the site guidelines.

#113
post #44

I've also noticed comments modded down to To the new users: If you disagree with a comment, please reply to it, stating why. Don't just blindly downmod it. Just my 2c

On the flip side, I don't understand why someone should get 40 karma points for a two word witty comment, no matter how funny it was. Why isn't karma per comment limited to -1 to 10? Seems like it would limit karma bashing and karma mega-boosting.

I think it's entirely valid to not add karma to a comment you agree because it's reached the karma you feel it deserves.

Similarly as people have pointed out you don't need pile on the down-modding simply because you don't agree with something.

I would almost say that unless something is actually disinformation, spam or trolling you shouldn't down-mod it, even if you disagree. Upvote the comments you agree with or write a persuasive argument instead.

One thing that I like about Stackoverflow.com is the ability to see how much people down/up mod.

Re: New users: Welcome. Please read the site guidelines.

#114
Slashdot used to be (reasonably) well-informed discussion. Digg at the beginning too. And reddit as well. rec.sports.baseball.bos-redsox, too.

All successful forums grow big and become worthless. The Y C kids need to learn this.

Never gonna' give you up Never gonna' let you down. Never gonna run around and desert you.

Re: New users: Welcome. Please read the site guidelines.

#116
post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

One may still benefit greatly from the experience of posting and commenting rather than observing. I was reading hn a while before I got an account, and never really thought about karma, submission titling or type, or comment voting. I have often wondered why the posting, submission, and voting guidelines haven't been more prominent. I appreciate Paul's active role in this community--I think it account's for much of…

Incidentally, having the page detailing the post-formatting capabilities on the Reply page would be handy, so people are aware of italics , code indentation and so on.

Yes, please. It took me a while to figure out how to indent code.

FYI, text surrounded by asterisks (*) will be intended. Begin a new line with two spaces, and you have code indentation.

Re: New users: Welcome. Please read the site guidelines.

#119

Earlier quoted context omitted.

On the flip side, I don't understand why someone should get 40 karma points for a two word witty comment, no matter how funny it was. Why isn't karma per comment limited to -1 to 10? Seems like it would limit karma bashing and karma mega-boosting.

If you limit the karma to 10 then a particularly good comment will eventually sink below comments that are upmodded later because of the way the ordering algorithm works. Similarly, a particularly bad comment will stay visible. I don't see anything wrong with karma mega-boosting. At the end of the day it is just a number on your profile.

And much more likely any good comments that are not put in the first hour will never get the points that they deserve. Someone says something witty and gets 192 points. Two days later someone writes something very informative, but there are very few viewers after that so they get only 5 points. It would be foolish to think that an algorithm could compensate. Slashdot has this very problem years ago and solved it in a very good way. This reddit system of many points only works for when there is very small users, but does not scale.

Re: New users: Welcome. Please read the site guidelines.

#120

I honestly hope that HN news does not degenerate into another reddit or digg-like news sites where comments and content are full of dramatized and useless material. So far, I've found the users of this site intellectual, technical and insightful in their comments and as a result, its been a joy to participate in this community and I hope the crowd which this site attract remain the same - smart and technical people.

Just like when reddit started out. So what does HN do differently that will stop it?
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