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I've noticed that if you reply to a mean-spirited comment with a straightforward and dispassionate counter-argument, completely ignoring its rudeness and tone, you get massive upvotes. Transcending meanness also feels really clean; it is neutralized.
By framing the meanness, the site's collegiality is not undermined, but demonstrated.
FWIW, I discovered that people take disagreements personally and will stalk you across threads if you're not careful with their egos. For some reason I am incapable of remembering names and can only identify about 10 - 15 people here other than the ones I have met or know from somewhere else. So the whole thing feels to me like detached, anonymous discussion. I was surprised to be 1) remembered, and 2) "punished" in…
I usually upvote the comments I disagree with because a healthy debate always helps me fill gaps in my knowledge. But when passions and emotions rule, "healthy debate" is simply impossible. Some people seem to be too stuck up with their beliefs.
Come On guys, many times it is good to be _wrong_.
Posts like this are the biggest problem with HN.
pg's quoted comment http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1833255 I've noticed that if you reply to a mean-spirited comment with a straightforward and dispassionate counter-argument, completely ignoring its rudeness and tone, you get massive upvotes. Transcending meanness also feels really clean; it is neutralized. By framing the meanness, the site's collegiality is not undermined, but demonstrated.
I'm not sure if my criticism of blind positivity (boosterism) is intended to be what you're concerned about, or if you're just referring to the popularity of banal and frequently unkind commentary.
I'd really like to know, because if it was my words that raised your concerns, I want to address it.
Of course it's nice to be polite when disagreeing with any article, but I notice myself making more of an effort to be polite when disagreeing with an HN user's own submission, compared to disagreeing with, say, a New York Times article, because the NYT reporter isn't present or going to read my comment. HN's greater volume of user-written content (compared to, say, reddit) makes this something not everyone expects to encounter; it's like ranting about how Daikatana sucks and then realizing that John Romero was standing right next to you, and then you feel bad.
(This doesn't explain mean-spirited comments that are responding to other comments, though.)
No social news site is going to be perfect. If it's people that are writing comments, some comments will be good and some will be bad. Read them and decide for yourself. If a comment hurts your feelings, get over it. If you like a comment, upvote it, and help other people find the best comments. Really, I kind of get tired of reading stuff like this because there is always some subtext to it. "mean-spirited" usually…
Or as the saying goes "Never argue with an idiot. They will drag you down to their level and beat you with experience."
FWIW, I discovered that people take disagreements personally and will stalk you across threads if you're not careful with their egos. For some reason I am incapable of remembering names and can only identify about 10 - 15 people here other than the ones I have met or know from somewhere else. So the whole thing feels to me like detached, anonymous discussion. I was surprised to be 1) remembered, and 2) "punished" in…
You can never prove anything unless you have the logs so there's not much point worrying, just play with and enjoy the furore. The best defence, if there is any, is to have a lot of karma and only engage with these folks if you can bear to lose some of it.
No social news site is going to be perfect. If it's people that are writing comments, some comments will be good and some will be bad. Read them and decide for yourself. If a comment hurts your feelings, get over it. If you like a comment, upvote it, and help other people find the best comments. Really, I kind of get tired of reading stuff like this because there is always some subtext to it. "mean-spirited" usually…
This site is not in a state of nature. There are all kinds of things I do to keep meanness at bay, and the situation would be a lot worse if I didn't. Preventing the site from declining into a swamp of meanness and stupidity (I believe the two are closely related) is something I think about constantly.