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Ask HN: Why not link AND text? xor vs. or [meta]
It is becoming quite a common thing (specially with the Show HN) that when you submit a link you'd also submit a comment explaining more about what you made, relevance to HN, specific questions, etc. So my question is simple:
When you submit a story you can choose "url" or "text", but why not both? What are the disadvantages of just setting them as optional? (and requiring at least one)
Meta: I'd suggest changing the "or" to "xor" to display this mutual exclusivity. Or just leave it as "or" and allow both
- CM30 9y agoHave to be honest, I've wondered why Reddit doesn't do this. Seems like a simple change that'd open up a lot of possibilities for aggregators. Especially given how many popular posts have a top rated comment by the author which does nothing more than explain stuff that could have been explained in the post itself (had the service given them room to do so).
- skylark 9y agoWhen links and text are available together, many of the top level comments will be direct responses to the original poster's text rather than discussion about the link itself. By forcing the original poster to follow the same commenting rules, it greatly cleans up the top level discussion by confining direct responses to the poster in their own tree. This is one of the reasons why the AskReddit subreddit moved to the headline-only model: It encourages people to share their own stories at the top level rather than respond to the poster, whose comment also needs to be able to stand on its own merits rather than get a default high visibility position.
- throwawaynnn 9y agoTotally makes sense. Where can I learn more about things like that?