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Adding to this: Replace the down vote icon completely with the flagging icon, as the down vote icon probably encourages aggravated people to use it in the wrong

by ywecur 11y ago

Adding to this: Replace the down vote icon completely with the flagging icon, as the down vote icon probably encourages aggravated people to use it in the wrong way.

striking 11y ago
HN rules don't say anything about the "wrong way" to use the downvote button. If anything, we're encouraged to use it in the way we feel is best.
- lotharbot 11y ago
  in the past, pg has used the analogy that upvotes are not only for civility, so downvotes aren't restricted only to incivility. My own personal guideline: upvote = "I would like more comments like this" and downvote = "I would like less comments like this". My reason for wanting less comments of a particular type can be a lot of things -- incivility, factual incorrectness, being off-topic or distracting, being technically correct but misleading, or even being repetitive in relation to prior comments that already made the same point better.
  - DanBC 11y ago
    PG had a few comments about downvoting. Two were like you said - people use upvote for agree so it makes sense that they downvote to disagree. But he also said that downvote for disagreement was a problem. That's (one of the) reason(s) why comment scores are no longer visible. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=117171 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=117171 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=658683 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=658683 Here's pg trying to address incorrect downvoting: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1057338 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1057338 I think pg is wrong in this next comment, I think people vote to disagree, and I think there's a pile-on effect. But I don't have the data, and he (and dang) did (and do). https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2403716 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2403716 EDIT: Some of those threads talk about the "meanness" of HN. I know I'm sometimes dumb and sometimes mean, so please if you see me doing that downvote me, flag me, send me an email.
    - lotharbot 11y ago
      yeah, it's more nuanced than "downvote for disagree" or "downvote only for flagrant hostility". It's clear that some people are using downvotes aggressively, and that needs managed. I actually had a period of time when every comment I posted (no matter what time of day or what topic) received exactly one downvote between 5 and 6 pm in my time zone, as if I'd offended someone and they were retaliating. But I've also seen people post comments that are purely inflammatory with no worthwhile content (along the lines of "[group] is evil", where [group] is mainstream -- not ISIS or Nazis, but like, Republicans or Muslims) that didn't get downvoted. So the issue is more than "too few downvotes" or "too many downvotes". So I try to be part of HN's corrective mechanism. If I see something blatantly inappropriate, I downvote and flag if appropriate. If I see something reasonable that's grayed out, I upvote. If I see something non-gray that I think is of negative value, I downvote, and I hope that if I misjudged it someone else will come along and cancel out my vote.
  - r00fus 11y ago
    huh - maybe HN should have some sort of Karma modifiers like Slashdot did?
- chimeracoder 11y ago
  Here's what dang, who's currently in charge of HN, had to say about downvoting a while back: > Downvoting for disagreement is not always bad, but it sometimes is. There should be some nuance here. Don't be indiscriminate. When a comment is blatantly false, downvoting is probably ok, especially when there's something else wrong with the comment. But high-quality, polite posts don't deserve penalizing just because you don't share their position. When you see one of those in negative territory, please be a good citizen and upvote it back to par. Users doing that is one of the community's self-correcting mechanisms, and it's more important now that we've made some downvotes more powerful. (Emphasis mine) For what it's worth, I agree that this should be in the site rules. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7606517 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7606517
kirykl 11y ago
Flag opens a drop down for Spam, Me-too, too Far off topic..etc
- eric_h 11y ago
  Much like Slashdot's moderation system.

by ywecur 11y ago

Adding to this: Replace the down vote icon completely with the flagging icon, as the down vote icon probably encourages aggravated people to use it in the wrong way.

striking 11y ago

HN rules don't say anything about the "wrong way" to use the downvote button. If anything, we're encouraged to use it in the way we feel is best.

lotharbot 11y ago
in the past, pg has used the analogy that upvotes are not only for civility, so downvotes aren't restricted only to incivility. My own personal guideline: upvote = "I would like more comments like this" and downvote = "I would like less comments like this". My reason for wanting less comments of a particular type can be a lot of things -- incivility, factual incorrectness, being off-topic or distracting, being technically correct but misleading, or even being repetitive in relation to prior comments that already made the same point better.
- DanBC 11y ago
  PG had a few comments about downvoting. Two were like you said - people use upvote for agree so it makes sense that they downvote to disagree. But he also said that downvote for disagreement was a problem. That's (one of the) reason(s) why comment scores are no longer visible. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=117171 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=117171 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=658683 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=658683 Here's pg trying to address incorrect downvoting: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1057338 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1057338 I think pg is wrong in this next comment, I think people vote to disagree, and I think there's a pile-on effect. But I don't have the data, and he (and dang) did (and do). https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2403716 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2403716 EDIT: Some of those threads talk about the "meanness" of HN. I know I'm sometimes dumb and sometimes mean, so please if you see me doing that downvote me, flag me, send me an email.
  - lotharbot 11y ago
    yeah, it's more nuanced than "downvote for disagree" or "downvote only for flagrant hostility". It's clear that some people are using downvotes aggressively, and that needs managed. I actually had a period of time when every comment I posted (no matter what time of day or what topic) received exactly one downvote between 5 and 6 pm in my time zone, as if I'd offended someone and they were retaliating. But I've also seen people post comments that are purely inflammatory with no worthwhile content (along the lines of "[group] is evil", where [group] is mainstream -- not ISIS or Nazis, but like, Republicans or Muslims) that didn't get downvoted. So the issue is more than "too few downvotes" or "too many downvotes". So I try to be part of HN's corrective mechanism. If I see something blatantly inappropriate, I downvote and flag if appropriate. If I see something reasonable that's grayed out, I upvote. If I see something non-gray that I think is of negative value, I downvote, and I hope that if I misjudged it someone else will come along and cancel out my vote.
- r00fus 11y ago
  huh - maybe HN should have some sort of Karma modifiers like Slashdot did?
chimeracoder 11y ago
Here's what dang, who's currently in charge of HN, had to say about downvoting a while back: > Downvoting for disagreement is not always bad, but it sometimes is. There should be some nuance here. Don't be indiscriminate. When a comment is blatantly false, downvoting is probably ok, especially when there's something else wrong with the comment. But high-quality, polite posts don't deserve penalizing just because you don't share their position. When you see one of those in negative territory, please be a good citizen and upvote it back to par. Users doing that is one of the community's self-correcting mechanisms, and it's more important now that we've made some downvotes more powerful. (Emphasis mine) For what it's worth, I agree that this should be in the site rules. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7606517 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7606517

kirykl 11y ago

Flag opens a drop down for Spam, Me-too, too Far off topic..etc

eric_h 11y ago
Much like Slashdot's moderation system.