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Ask HN: Why downvote? I honestly do not get it.

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Re: Ask HN: Why downvote? I honestly do not get it.

#81

Post by Semiapies »

chrischen wrote: post #79
Semiapies wrote: post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Both can be threatening." I submit that if one is threatened by others disagreeing with or not appreciating one's contribution to a discussion, one needs to find a more harmonious discussion.

When I say threatening I mean with the intent to discourage . so when you down vote someone you disagree with you essentially discourage them from voicing their opinion. Why? Because when I'm downvoted I'm being punished. I don't want to be punished, so I either leave the community and decrease the variation in opinions or refrain from voicing it again. Is that what we want to allow here, or anywhere? We ignore the k…

Discouragement is not punishment.

"We ignore the kkk."

Living in a state that actually occasionally has KKK rallies, "we" sure as Hell don't ignore them. We surround them with counter-protesters whenever they march in their sheets - and outnumber them by many multiples. We look at people ranting on about those dirty, criminal n---s and how America used to be white and pure and call them stupid fucking racists.

No, we don't jail them, we don't attack them, we don't fine them, we don't even raise the price of our groceries when they come in the store.

We downvote them.

Re: Ask HN: Why downvote? I honestly do not get it.

#82

Post by billswift »

marze wrote: post #52

This all brings to mind Churchill's quote (paraphrased): "Democracy is the worst form of government, with the exception of all other forms of government."

You might find Hoppe's book, http://www.amazon.com/Democracy-Economics-Politics-Monarchy-... , interesting. He claims democracy is the worst form of government, period. (The book is not easy reading and is pretty repetitive, but interesting.)

Re: Ask HN: Why downvote? I honestly do not get it.

#83

Post by borism »

dfragnito wrote: post #49
bendotc wrote: post #5

I always find opinions like these to be illuminating whenever people claim that people don't care about karma, as it's obviously just a silly number in some computer running this website. As it turns out, some people find losing just 1 point to be indistinguishable from throwing a rock at the person. For what it's worth, the downvote is for the comment, not the poster. It influences a sorting algorithm that shapes th…

There must be a better way to asses the "value" of content. I agree that the down vote is arguably a good gauge for how the community at large "feels" about the content but not a good indicator for "value". There are two metrics here that I do not believe can be extracted from a voting system. I rarely comment, one of the few time I did I got down voted. I returned 3 days later and tried to defend my position, but it…

Of course comment score doesn't display value objectively or comprehensibly or indefinitely.

Every topic has it's decay period, you may have made a good point, but if the community doesn't feel that way during lifetime of the topic, then that was a lost cause. If it really matters try again, as you just did. If it doesn't - leave it alone.

There are many other things that HN doesn't do and leaves for people to figure out.

Perfect? No. Good enough? I think so.

Re: Ask HN: Why downvote? I honestly do not get it.

#84

Post by borism »

quellhorst wrote: post #47
bendotc wrote: post #5

I always find opinions like these to be illuminating whenever people claim that people don't care about karma, as it's obviously just a silly number in some computer running this website. As it turns out, some people find losing just 1 point to be indistinguishable from throwing a rock at the person. For what it's worth, the downvote is for the comment, not the poster. It influences a sorting algorithm that shapes th…

Your bank account is just a silly number in a computer! The money only has value because other people think it has value.

I'd give you 10 points for that answer. Only if I could :)

Re: Ask HN: Why downvote? I honestly do not get it.

#85

Post by jeremyw »

Semiapies wrote: post #78
jeremyw wrote: post #65

I'm impressed by the shifting voting trends when a new, dissenting (sub)opinion is attached to a comment. A string of upvotes now is halted/reversed. And the polarity change can happen several times. An articulated position unleashes the silent thinker or is this a characteristic of mob rule? (When it happens to me, it's mob rule. :) I'm also terribly sad when someone is downvoted in an opinion-thread (e.g. what is y…

Someone can be off-topic or troll in opinion threads. "What's your favorite X?" is not the place for "Stop using different types of Xs and start using Ys, noobs.", for example.

For such special-purpose threads, I think it's worth seeing those comments fall through upvotes (or flagging) rather than penalize straight opinions. A similar chilling effect to a downvoted opinion could be had by exposing the downvoters. :)

I'm curious if pg has data on this.

Re: Ask HN: Why downvote? I honestly do not get it.

#86

Post by bendotc »

dfragnito wrote: post #49
bendotc wrote: post #5

I always find opinions like these to be illuminating whenever people claim that people don't care about karma, as it's obviously just a silly number in some computer running this website. As it turns out, some people find losing just 1 point to be indistinguishable from throwing a rock at the person. For what it's worth, the downvote is for the comment, not the poster. It influences a sorting algorithm that shapes th…

There must be a better way to asses the "value" of content. I agree that the down vote is arguably a good gauge for how the community at large "feels" about the content but not a good indicator for "value". There are two metrics here that I do not believe can be extracted from a voting system. I rarely comment, one of the few time I did I got down voted. I returned 3 days later and tried to defend my position, but it…

Not seeing the original comment to which you're referring, I can't offer any opinion on it in particular. However, I generally disagree with the statement "if a comment gets down voted but starts a wave of discussion surely it has value." Trolling is, at its heart, the creation of discussion by posts of negative value, usually by eliciting a strong emotional response from readers. Most troll-posts don't have value to those trolled (though there may be exceptions).

Re: Ask HN: Why downvote? I honestly do not get it.

#87

Post by borism »

unalone wrote: post #11
tokenadult wrote: post #2

I cannot see how that is different than someone throwing a stone at another person just because they do not agree with them. You don't think there is any difference between throwing a rock at someone and reducing their overall vote count by one vote in an electronic voting system? If someone downvotes me, I have a reason to look again at what I posted and whether or not it fit the discussion. If someone throws a rock…

Both, however, are instances of expressing disapproval without in turn adding something valuable. It was a ridiculous simile, but I understood his feeling because it's one I have also. When I take time and effort to argue something and get voted down, the message I'm given in liu of an actual counterpoint is that my effort in a community has not been appreciated. It's not as drastic as my being hit by a rock, but it'…

You're taking it too personally.

How do you know the reasons your post got downvoted?

And why do you revenge against community after that?

Community has it's moods too, if it annoys you too much at some particular time you're always free to leave. That's what I do, but I know there's some value in this community so I return. But revenge is simply immature.

Re: Ask HN: Why downvote? I honestly do not get it.

#88

Post by crux »

I downvote because I have been personally offended by something that has been said. Most often I have been offended by the sin of bad taste. This is, granted, a pretty wide area, but when somebody writes something egregiously distasteful—whether it's a terrible sense of humor, or a misinformed righteousness, or craven pandering to the self-important 'social media' upper crust, or indeed the myopic, worthless blather of said upper crust—I am aesthetically offended by that sort of thing. It offends my sense of decency, my sense of wit and interestingness. I suffer in the same way as I do when I witness incredibly stupid people on television, or very bad music, or indeed when I find myself buttonholed into a painfully tedious conversation with someone who is similarly lacking in good taste, be it social, intellectual, aesthetic or otherwise. I suffer and therefore I downvote, in an attempt to exorcise my pain.

Maybe that would be the easiest rule of thumb, then. If you say something which would, if I were chatting with you at a cocktail party, make me fearfully look for some excuse to go refill my drink, I will downvote you.

Re: Ask HN: Why downvote? I honestly do not get it.

#89

Post by chrischen »

Semiapies wrote: post #77
chrischen wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The problem of course is: what is correct / true and how sure are you about it. Exactly. So rather than try to determine "correctness" because sometimes it is subjective, just try to determine what's clearly "better." Up voting better comments will have the side effect of pushing down comments that are not as deserving.

If you can't judge a comment for a degree of "correctness", you can't judge one comment as "better" than another.

Yes you're right. We each have our own definition of "better," as we do have for "correct." But it's less detrimental/errpr to just have you judge "better" than to have you judge both "better" and "worse" which is what happens when we allow judgements of "correct."

Re: Ask HN: Why downvote? I honestly do not get it.

#90

Post by bendotc »

quellhorst wrote: post #47
bendotc wrote: post #5

I always find opinions like these to be illuminating whenever people claim that people don't care about karma, as it's obviously just a silly number in some computer running this website. As it turns out, some people find losing just 1 point to be indistinguishable from throwing a rock at the person. For what it's worth, the downvote is for the comment, not the poster. It influences a sorting algorithm that shapes th…

Your bank account is just a silly number in a computer! The money only has value because other people think it has value.

My point was not to take the position that karma is an unimportant number in a computer somewhere, but that people often claim as much in defense of various scoring systems on sites like this and Reddit and so on that create perverse incentives for the users.

I work on online videogames. You don't need to tell me the value of a number in a computer somewhere that means a whole heck of a lot to someone, and shapes how they act. :-)

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