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Obviously, it CAN. But down voting for "any reason" (for example, should I down vote your comment because I think you are wrong?) is unlikely to foster a colleg
by bjourne 9y ago
Obviously, it CAN. But down voting for "any reason" (for example, should I down vote your comment because I think you are wrong?) is unlikely to foster a collegial environment.
For example, many Ask HN posts are questions asking for opinions. So you help the poster out and write your opinion. Then some dofus comes around who is to lazy to write an opinion of his or her own but wants to express disagreement by down voting your post. These dofuses' downvotes are annoying and results in people not bothering to reply to Ask HN posts anymore.
- krapp 9y agoDownvoting for disagreement is probably the most common reason for downvoting, after accidentally not upvoting because the arrows are too small. Letting people downvote for any reason frees up space that would otherwise be taken by petty or banal comments. If a downvoter had something to say worth reading, I would rather they commented, but if they can't put in the effort, then the board is better off with just their vote. Better still with their complete silence, but people get emotionally involved and feel they have to contribute something. Also, I've found that most obviously pointless downvotes either get corrected or stay at -1. I haven't seen many comments voted down further than that which didn't have some obvious issues. People shouldn't be discouraged - these are meaningless internet brownie points we're talking about.