But don't votes also give feedback to the commentor? I have used this to learn what works within this community and what doesn't. Now, I only know by approximation to my total karma, or if i am bad, that I turn gray.
Experiment: No Comment Scores
21–30 of 327 posts
Re: Experiment: No Comment Scores
#22I like this already. How long will you let the test run?
Re: Experiment: No Comment Scores
#23Any chance we can see scores when we're looking at our own comments section? Often when I notice a bump in my karma I look at my comment threads to see what was so popular.
I am not alone in the world! And to register this, I clicked the up arrow next to the comment above me, but it redirected me to a blank page. (Chrome, Windows Vista.)
same here (FireFox 3.5.3, Ubuntu Jaunty)
EDIT: Fixed. Wow that was fast!
Re: Experiment: No Comment Scores
#24Earlier quoted context omitted.
I am not alone in the world! And to register this, I clicked the up arrow next to the comment above me, but it redirected me to a blank page. (Chrome, Windows Vista.)
Hmm, will investigate.
Ok, should be fixed now. Sorry, the javascript for modifying displayed scores was breaking now that there weren't any.
Re: Experiment: No Comment Scores
#25Any chance we can see scores when we're looking at our own comments section? Often when I notice a bump in my karma I look at my comment threads to see what was so popular.
I am not alone in the world! And to register this, I clicked the up arrow next to the comment above me, but it redirected me to a blank page. (Chrome, Windows Vista.)
works fine for me. FF on OSX
Re: Experiment: No Comment Scores
#26I can still see the score on the "edit" page, which means I can still edit my post to whine about being downmodded. Since nobody knows the degree that I am being downmodded to (or corrected to), people might upvote more than they should. (I have also noticed that people don't stop upmodding even if the score is visible. I got 80 points yesterday on a one-line comment poking fun at Joel Spolsky. WTF?) Just like when t…
Fixed. I didn't see the comment you mention, but that is exactly the sort of thing I meant about voting starting to have a mob feel.
It was this one: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=840748
Although I don't have any data, I think that if the same comment was posted today, it would end up with more points. If I see a comment with 80 upvotes, I usually let it stay there rather than bumping it to 81.
One other comment; I find it hard to navigate my "threads" page now. I used to focus on highly-voted comments to improve and reply to; now that I don't know what other people like, I have nothing to go on.
I guess spending less time on HN might not be a bad thing, however :)
Edit: one more thing. I still have a reflex-like urge to click the upvote button when the author name says "pg". With no number, it is even harder to suppress the urge.
So far I have managed, but I can't guarantee that I won't change my mind :)
Re: Experiment: No Comment Scores
#27It'd be interesting to see the results of the experiment - level of voting before and after, volatility of the voting before and after, rate of change of comment ordering, before and after. Are you planning on releasing some sort of aggregate data or publishing some sort of analysis?
Re: Experiment: No Comment Scores
#28It looks like pg is still in the middle of changing things. A moment ago I could see other people's comments' scores in the replies on my "threads" page; now I can't.
I have noticed things changing around too. I hear there is this thing called a "dev server"...
I usually do development on my local machine, but for small things like this I use the server's repl.
Re: Experiment: No Comment Scores
#29This will definitely be interesting. While I think not having comment scores will have a somewhat limiting effect on groupthink voting, it will also probably have a counter-effect on pithy/silly one-liner comments by preventing people from noticing that no matter how humorous or witty the comment might have been it has already gathered as many votes as it deserves. The great karnak predicts a lot more early comments at the first level of two of comment threads being short witticisms that attempts to predict the herd and thereby gather a lot of early upvotes.
Re: Experiment: No Comment Scores
#30And here I was, thinking firefox was screwing up the JS. I guess this should improve the quality of discussions a lot, since a lot of people tend to just skim the few comments at the top. Not displaying the comment scores might make them read more.
I don't think this'll stop people from just skimming the top.
But, it will stop them from finding those highly rated comments hidden by a low rated parent comment.