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I have the top comment on the runoff thread, and I was against Pinboard (due to doubts about whether Pinboard would do YCF in good faith - similar to what dang

I have the top comment on the runoff thread, and I was against Pinboard (due to doubts about whether Pinboard would do YCF in good faith - similar to what dang is saying here). So while I did notice a lot of people were in favor, it can hardly be called overwhelming.

tptacek 11y ago
What's the score on that comment?
hkmurakami 11y ago
I voted for Pinboard but did not downvote your post (it would be wrong for me to have done so). While the upvotes are an indication of support for your position, it wouldn't have accurately captured the number of people who disagreed with you (and thus supported Pinboard), since disagreement is not grounds for downvoting.
- argonaut 11y ago
  According to Paul Graham, it's acceptable to downvote for disagreement. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=117171 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=117171
  - nickpsecurity 11y ago
    It's true but I'm in same boat as parent: I only downvote on spam, hate comments, etc. Downvoting can make comments disappear and sort of censor aspects of a discussion. Even bad claims are often misconceptions worth addressing with comments and evidence instead of downvoting for other readers' benefit. So, I almost never downvote. I'm sure there's others given I know specific people's position on comments I made that they could've downvoted. So, parent's claim stands but we can't know how much. Maybe worth considering modifying downvote concept to deal with this somehow in another forum as an experiment.
    - argonaut 11y ago
      My view is that there is a ton of noise of HN, and HN has this problem where threads devolve into tangents/pedantry/really nitpicky arguments where people start arguing over little logical details. And rather than just go down the rabbit hole of this morass of noise, I'd rather just downvote.
      - nickpsecurity 11y ago
        Sounds reasonable. A third option you don't mention is simply ignoring the noise to upvote the quality submissions. You apparently had to look at the noise anyway to downvote it. So, is there another reason you're taking that effort?
        argonaut 10y ago
        I have to at least skim it to determine whether it's noise or not in the first place.

tptacek 11y ago

What's the score on that comment?

hkmurakami 11y ago

I voted for Pinboard but did not downvote your post (it would be wrong for me to have done so). While the upvotes are an indication of support for your position, it wouldn't have accurately captured the number of people who disagreed with you (and thus supported Pinboard), since disagreement is not grounds for downvoting.

argonaut 11y ago
According to Paul Graham, it's acceptable to downvote for disagreement. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=117171 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=117171
- nickpsecurity 11y ago
  It's true but I'm in same boat as parent: I only downvote on spam, hate comments, etc. Downvoting can make comments disappear and sort of censor aspects of a discussion. Even bad claims are often misconceptions worth addressing with comments and evidence instead of downvoting for other readers' benefit. So, I almost never downvote. I'm sure there's others given I know specific people's position on comments I made that they could've downvoted. So, parent's claim stands but we can't know how much. Maybe worth considering modifying downvote concept to deal with this somehow in another forum as an experiment.
  - argonaut 11y ago
    My view is that there is a ton of noise of HN, and HN has this problem where threads devolve into tangents/pedantry/really nitpicky arguments where people start arguing over little logical details. And rather than just go down the rabbit hole of this morass of noise, I'd rather just downvote.
    - nickpsecurity 11y ago
      Sounds reasonable. A third option you don't mention is simply ignoring the noise to upvote the quality submissions. You apparently had to look at the noise anyway to downvote it. So, is there another reason you're taking that effort?
      - argonaut 10y ago
        I have to at least skim it to determine whether it's noise or not in the first place.