42 ms·
> I would have totally flagged that story if I had seen it for the same reasons I flagged this one: I don't live in the US, I don't care about politics Why fla
by joshmanders 9y ago
> I would have totally flagged that story if I had seen it for the same reasons I flagged this one: I don't live in the US, I don't care about politics
Why flag though? Is it because parent threads don't have downvotes so people opt to flagging?
Politics and rumors aside, I'm confused by why people flag something that they just don't care to read, instead of going onto the next story. If a post makes the front page, it's probably a good case that it's a subject people want to talk about. By flagging it because you don't care for it, makes no sense to me.
- dang 9y ago> I'm confused by why people flag something that they just don't care to read, instead of going onto the next story. It's because the front page space is so limited. Each story there takes a place that could go to many other interesting things.
- joshmanders 9y agoBut "other interesting things" is subjective... I don't know how many flags it takes for it to be taken down but if it makes it to the front page, does the number of upvotes change how many flags it takes?
- dang 9y agoIt's subjective in the sense that people disagree about specific cases and that there's interpretation involved—that's true. But HN's notion of 'interesting' as described at https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html and https://news.ycombinator.com/newswelcome.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newswelcome.html is narrower than you might think. For example, it is not the same thing as 'like'—not even close. Of course people use upvotes to signal 'like' all the time. That's inevitable, and one reason why both flags and moderation are necessary as counterweights.
- joshmanders 9y agoAh, makes sense. Thanks for clarifying, dang.