Slashdot -- as always the trailblazer in terms of comment self-moderation -- had that feature 10 years ago. You could mark users as friends or foes; their post

Slashdot -- as always the trailblazer in terms of comment self-moderation -- had that feature 10 years ago. You could mark users as friends or foes; their posts would be highlighted and get a (customisable) karma modifier. I don't like the terminology, but I think I like the feature. While having inter-personal vendettas is probably bad for forum culture, it at least facilitates some kind of inter-personal relationships. It's nice to judge each comment on its own merits, but it's also fun and interesting to recognise someone as a peer whose comments you liked -- or disliked! -- before. It's also orthogonal to the karma system. I already have a personal (if completely one sided) relationship to a few prominent hacker news users. But outside of that circle of maybe 5 to 10 people, posts might as well be anonymous. Annotating other users makes it easier to expand this sphere beyond hacker news royalty.