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Don't be a jerk

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Re: Don't be a jerk

#121

Post by NAFV_P »

S_A_P wrote: post #47

There always seems to be a touch of nostalgia for the good old days when situations like this come up. People undoubtedly yearn for the time when Hacker News was smaller and more close knit community. Ive been a member here for about 3 and a half years. I suppose that in that time, some of the quality has declined, but I really cant even say for sure that is the case. I think I have learned a lot here, and because of…

> I have noticed that some genuinely funny comments or puns based on the discussion get downvoted, which I disagree with. It may not add to the intellectual value, but I enjoy a good laugh as much as I enjoy learning.

I used to constantly crack jokes to one of my work colleagues, yet she hardly ever laughed at them. One day I uttered a joke which she merely scorned at, a few minutes later another colleague uttered exactly the same joke and she started giggling. At that I moment I realised that she was deeply prejudiced towards me. It would explain why she would often shout at me, insult me and even threaten me with violence.

My humour served a very serious purpose, it exposed someone as being an emotional sadist.

Re: Don't be a jerk

#122

Post by [deleted] »

ascendantlogic wrote: post #61
S_A_P wrote: post #47

There always seems to be a touch of nostalgia for the good old days when situations like this come up. People undoubtedly yearn for the time when Hacker News was smaller and more close knit community. Ive been a member here for about 3 and a half years. I suppose that in that time, some of the quality has declined, but I really cant even say for sure that is the case. I think I have learned a lot here, and because of…

Small communities become insular festivals of group-think. Large communities become whitewashed noise full of trolls. There doesn't seem to be a way to "win".

[deleted]

Re: Don't be a jerk

#123

Post by macguyver »

Totally agreed. I think the biggest issue with the Gen XYZ (I am part of X) is that we as a whole (a big generalization, of course there are exceptions) tend to be too self-centered. We are always concerned with our goals, our aspirations, and we don't think about, care for, or appreciate others nearly enough.

Our parents' generations (baby boomers) had responsibilities that involved caring for siblings, raising children, tending aging parents, and they often put themselves LAST. Not to say that it's better, but after talking to friends my age who have started families, I think it really sheds light into why so many young people are lost, confused, and unfocused. People are wandering around wondering what their purpose is, why they're unhappy, this and that, when they just have to open their eyes to see how blessed they are, how good they have it.

I think at the end, the purpose that Gen XYZ seek is right around them - if they will look up from their smartphone devices - human connection. We need to appreciate more what we have, the help that people give us, and start to give more to others and the world around us.

Re: Don't be a jerk

#124

Post by DanBC »

rokhayakebe wrote: post #102
jedanbik wrote: post #69

I don't think there should be a downvote option. There should be an option for upvoting, and an option for flagging offensive content/content that is against the HN community guidelines. As it stands, there is no visual emphasis on high quality comments. There is a visual emphasis on low quality comments. Why is that? Apologies in advance if I am making an ignorant statement.

J, I cannot express how much I agree with you. The base logic in downvoting is so flawed it baffles me. How can you take away something from someone if you did not give it to them in the first place. Downvoting, especially without commenting, is exactly what the First Amendment was established for.

Jesus fucking christ the first amendment has nothing to do with downvotes on HN.

I would much rather have people downvoting comments they hate than have to read through tiresome boring arguments about stuff hat has been endlessly argued about in the past.

Re: Don't be a jerk

#125

Post by Karunamon »

korzun wrote: post #115
DanBC wrote: post #99

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why do people say things like this? That first line is what's attracting downvotes. It's what people are going to respond to. Someone is gently, politely, pointing out that the line "welcome to the Internet" is going to cause you problems and your response is to bicker?

When I wrote that first line, I knew that somebody will completely ignore the rest of the comment and make a post about it. Adding nothing to the actual discussion. There is absolutely nothing serious about the first line. The rest of the post clearly indicates it. Reminds me of people who will show up to threads featuring proof of concept implementations and comment on how the code lacks unit testing.

A bad attitude ruins an otherwise fine post. Really, you borderline insult people and expect them not to take you to task for it?

Sorry, human beings do not work that way. If you have anything worth saying, you can say it nicely.

Re: Don't be a jerk

#126

Post by maxerickson »

AnimalMuppet wrote: post #98
scott_s wrote: post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Please don't fall back on things like "welcome to the internet." One, it's needlessly snarky. Two, we would like this place to be better .

We'd like that, but... after a long time of people trying to build internet communities, from newsgroups to Slashdot to Reddit to HN, it seems like this may be what the internet is. Or, perhaps, this is what you get when you allow open membership.

It hasn't been all that long in human terms. Especially when you consider that it was only ~ 5 years ago that "almost everyone" in developed countries was finally online.

I think in many senses, HN is a first generation response to how to get a bunch of people who don't really know each other to have a decent conversation in a low context environment.

Re: Don't be a jerk

#127

Post by idlewan »

jack-r-abbit wrote: post #56
bane wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

On certain topics, HN always had a downvote problem for certain contrarian opinions. For example, heaven forbid you didn't think everything Apple produced when Steve Jobs was alive was a gift from heaven. Anything questioning that was always downvoted, even if presented in a non-snarky way. It was so bad that pg even introduced a downvote floor (-5) to keep people from shedding hundreds of points of karma when the do…

> On certain topics, HN always had a downvote problem for certain contrarian opinions. For example, heaven forbid you didn't think everything Apple produced when Steve Jobs was alive was a gift from heaven Also see: Snowden is not a hero, Piracy is not ok & The NSA snooping is not so bad.

Those three opinions are heavily oriented towards an acceptance of totalitarism, and that's probably why most of the HN crowd is not fond of them.

- Snowden is a traitor: all hail secret laws! Burn the dissidents! All hail totalitarism! We should never be able to say to anyone what's wrong when we discover illegal and illegitimate actions!

- Piracy is not okay: leads to "we should stop piracy", which leads to horrible things like either "trusted computing" and willingly or not willingly executing malware on your own machines, or censorship and total global surveillance.

- The NSA snooping is not so bad: you discover that some government agencies have more power than the president of those countries (the intelligence community have the ultimate power to blackmail anyone and their mother), but it's not so bad, they are obviously "good people" so they don't misuse it.

When you are a hacker, you know that anything has flaws (especially humans) and that we don't live in the teletubbies world, so you can't trust an entity that has so much power.

Yeah, no wonder those opinions are shunned on HN.

Re: Don't be a jerk

#128

Post by lotharbot »

danielweber wrote: post #25
bdcravens wrote: post #6

I know I've had times when the answer/response made me look dumb, arrogant, etc, and I've been tempted to delete my comment. In those cases, it wouldn't have been the jerk thing to do, but the cowardly thing to do: if you say, own it, regardless of how it makes you look.

Mistakes are how we learn! Some of my best learning moments have been giving a wrong answer and then other people point out I'm wrong. (NB: it's completely possible for people to be polite when pointing out someone else is wrong.) OTOH, it takes a certain confidence to let your mistakes hang out in public. There is this feeling that everyone on HN is constantly judging all other people so we need to "look smart." Whe…

When my wife was learning piano, her teacher used to tell her "if you're going to make a mistake, make it LOUD so we can hear it and correct it."

Words to live by.

Re: Don't be a jerk

#129

Post by lotharbot »

korzun wrote: post #115
DanBC wrote: post #99

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why do people say things like this? That first line is what's attracting downvotes. It's what people are going to respond to. Someone is gently, politely, pointing out that the line "welcome to the Internet" is going to cause you problems and your response is to bicker?

When I wrote that first line, I knew that somebody will completely ignore the rest of the comment and make a post about it. Adding nothing to the actual discussion. There is absolutely nothing serious about the first line. The rest of the post clearly indicates it. Reminds me of people who will show up to threads featuring proof of concept implementations and comment on how the code lacks unit testing.

> "When I wrote that first line, I knew that somebody will completely ignore the rest of the comment"

Maybe you shouldn't have included that line, then. The comment would not have suffered in any way from being shorter.

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