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An Update on Hacker News

blog.ycombinator.com

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Re: An Update on Hacker News

#51

Post by film42 »

Someone1234 wrote: post #36

Any chance we'll get some better text formatting options? Here's what is currently offered: https://news.ycombinator.com/formatdoc Basically italics and code blocks only. No lists or no bolding.

It would be cool to see markdown support, but I totally understand that any addition to the formatting spec is risky, because any new change means older posts could be awkwardly rendered.

On that historical HN note, it would be great if someone made an app that dug up really awesome older stories from the HN archives. I'd use that a ton!

Re: An Update on Hacker News

#52

Post by colinramsay »

mmwtsn wrote: post #38
shitehawk wrote: post #6

Can anyone comment on the reasoning behind the lack of a mobile style sheet?

Until the redesign goes live, there are a few viable alternatives on mobile. I have been using a mobile-friendly version of Hacker News called HackerWeb on my phone and tablet: http://cheeaun.github.io/hackerweb/ A handful of browser add-ons exist that will update the visual design and generally make the site more pleasurable to use. Here's one for Chrome: http://gabrielecirulli.github.io/hn-special/

Yeah I thought that new HTML was supposed to be coming online a couple of weeks ago?

Re: An Update on Hacker News

#53

Post by waterlesscloud »

Torgo wrote: post #15

What constitutes flag abuse? I only do it for stories which I know will only produce flamewars.

I used to do that, but I had my flagging privilege revoked for a long while. So don't do that, I guess.

It's restored now. I don't think I've flagged many, if any, stories.

I flag any comment I perceive as an attack on a person rather than the ideas of that person. I don't feel that's appropriate. And in particular it's not what I personally want HN to be.

If a comment makes a point in what I feel isn't a good faith manner, I'll merely downvote it.

If I just disagree but it's a fair point, I leave it alone.

Re: An Update on Hacker News

#54

Post by jonnathanson »

readerrrr wrote: post #14

If I understand the rules correctly, downvoting is used for not agreeing with a comment, and flags are used for inappropriate comments. But is fading the comment really the correct behaviour. Isn't the position on the page deciding whether the community agrees with the comment? My suggestion is: remove the fading; let downvoting only move the comments down, since the comment is appropriate yet the community doesn't a…

"If I understand the rules correctly, downvoting is used for not agreeing with a comment, and flags are used for inappropriate comments."

In theory, no, downvoting is not supposed to be used to disagree. It's supposed to be used to move "stupid" comments (inarticulate, illogical, poorly argued, etc.) down towards the bottom of the screen. Flagging, on the other hand, is meant to call out wildly inappropriate, offensive, or completely off-topic comments.

A few hypotheticals:

1) I see a comment that is well articulated and generally inoffensive, but I disagree completely with its premise or its arguments --> I do nothing.

2) I see a comment that is irrational, illogical, poorly constructed, whiny, or off topic --> I downvote.

3) I see a comment that is extremely offensive, completely unrelated to the topic at hand, spammy/astroturfy, or clearly intended to instigate a flame war --> I flag.

That said, many people seem to use downvotes to disagree with a comment, and I'm concerned that lowering the downvote threshold will lead to even more of that behavior.

Maybe the problem is that downvoting and flagging share too close of a hypothetical use case. Downvoting is clearly easier to do, and it's doable in the main thread view. So that could be why people routinely use it to disagree with comments. I have flagged maybe a grand total of one comment in all my time on HN, and I generally regard flagging as an option of last resort. (It could also be that I arrive at various threads after the worst stuff has been flagged and removed, providing me an artificially sunny view of the threads).

Re: An Update on Hacker News

#55

Post by xnxn »

grandalf wrote: post #16

In my opinion the only real annoyance with HN is when story titles are edited. Maybe it will take an updated policy to fix the core issue, which is that while linkbait headlines are annoying, some original works are titled very badly and the poster may actually add useful information by customizing the title (often by highlighting what is most interesting/relevant about the linked article).

I think this aspect of HN has improved immensely in the past several months; dang in particular has done much to increase the transparency around title editing. I find myself less likely to knee-jerk reject a title change when the rationale is right there in the comments.

Re: An Update on Hacker News

#56

Post by waterlesscloud »

grandalf wrote: post #16

In my opinion the only real annoyance with HN is when story titles are edited. Maybe it will take an updated policy to fix the core issue, which is that while linkbait headlines are annoying, some original works are titled very badly and the poster may actually add useful information by customizing the title (often by highlighting what is most interesting/relevant about the linked article).

I've found I can get away with minor changes to a title if they're purely informational. That's nice.

Re: An Update on Hacker News

#57

Post by weaksauce »

BoppreH wrote: post #50
rspeer wrote: post #37

> To prevent abuse, moderators review flagged stories and comments and revoke flagging privileges from users who flag inappropriately. This seems like one of the cases where HN's moderation is both draconian and completely opaque. I can't flag comments, and I have no idea why. I certainly don't think of myself as an abusive user. Maybe I accidentally clicked the "flag" link once. If that gets flagging privileges remo…

Are you sure you are looking at the right place? To flag a comment you must click on "link", and only then the "flag" option appears. TFA mentions the threshold for flagging is only 30 karma. This has been the source of much confusion and I'm not 100% sure on the reason why it was implemented.

There is a karma threshold (iirc, I know there is one for downvotes) to be able to flag and a link threshold that if you don't know where to find it, you won't use it. only the experienced HN people will 1. care enough to use it and 2. have the karma for(old members) it so it's a low pass filter of sorts against poor commenting.

Re: An Update on Hacker News

#58

Post by cs702 »

rspeer wrote: post #37

> To prevent abuse, moderators review flagged stories and comments and revoke flagging privileges from users who flag inappropriately. This seems like one of the cases where HN's moderation is both draconian and completely opaque. I can't flag comments, and I have no idea why. I certainly don't think of myself as an abusive user. Maybe I accidentally clicked the "flag" link once. If that gets flagging privileges remo…

More than once, I've unintentionally downvoted comments I meant to upvote, upvoted comments I meant to downvote, and/or clicked on a button I didn't mean to click (that includes clicking on 'reply' after writing something that doesn't really add any value and almost instantly regretting it).

So I agree, it would be great to have more/better undo options!

Re: An Update on Hacker News

#59

Post by maaaats »

natch wrote: post #31

It seems like early comments on any article generally have a huge advantage in garnering votes. This appropriately rewards engagement, but also pushes down other worthy comments that come slightly later, often to effective near invisibility when replies to the top comment dominate the discussion. I wonder if there is any mechanism that could help counter this.

This has been discussed much on Stack Overflow earlier, by the name of "Fastest Gun in the West Problem". http://meta.stackexchange.com/q/9731/186983

However, I often see new (top level) comments on the top when entering a discussion here on HN, so it seems they at least get some exposure.

Re: An Update on Hacker News

#60

Post by dsugarman »

> First, I want to thank the community for all the work people have done over the past six months to downvote, flag, and comment on content that doesn’t fit the site guidelines

Sam & co, great job on experimenting and improving quality, it shows. I find this statement to be really confusing considering there is no guidelines[1] for downvoting and, in my experience, it is highly used to put opinions you don't personally agree with out of reach for the majority of users to read.

[1] https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

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