8 ms·
HN Ignore downvotes CSS
- yup123 9y agobe nice if the downvote button would be removed entirely, I believe more HNers would speak their mind.
- smt88 9y agoPeople already do speak their minds, and heavy downvoting is often limited to comments that are unsubstantive. You may dislike the downvote, but I'd stop using this site if it were removed.
- onion2k 9y agoThe chilling effect is a bad thing for any individual who has a point they want to make, but it also makes people less reactionary and more thoughtful which is better for the community. Overall I think downvotes are a net positive.
- acct1771 9y agoIsn't it only freezing those who care about their points, and/or the community?
- onion2k 9y agoI don't think so. Back when I was running my startup I would occasionally refrain from posting on some of the more divisive topics where my opinions aren't inline with the concensus here. Investors, customers, and peers read HN, so maintaining a clean history can seem moderately important.
- treve 9y agoI only really see really misguided/unresearched/unhelpful comments downvoted. Rarely ever comments that are just contrarian. I'm curious if you think there's a problem, and why. Maybe I'm just inside the bubble.
- dragonwriter 9y ago> I only really see really misguided/unresearched/unhelpful comments downvoted. On controversial topics, I see lots of better comments downvoted for a while when they are new, but they tend to recover within a few hours.
- nocman 9y agoWell, those kind of comments do get downvoted, but people on HN do also downvote comments simply because they disagree with them (often regardless of whether the comments are perfectly civil, and just express a point of view that the downvoter doesn't share). Of course, many of those downvoting these comments would be quick to label them as "misguided" or "unhelpful", at which point there is usually little reason to argue about it. It's an imperfect system, but I'd guess it is a net positive at least most of the time. It does help to filter out when people are just being total jerks.
- yorwba 9y agoMaybe, but I don't think that would improve the quality of discussion. When I get downvoted, it's usually because I'm a) factually wrong b) didn't explain the reasoning behind a counterintuitive statement or c) disagreed with someone on an emotionally charged topic. At least in cases a) and b), downvotes help me improve my writing.
- lowpro 9y agoDefinitely agree. I find when I'm downvoted it was due to being an impulsive post rather than a well thought out post. With the amount you see people say 'I'll get downvoted for this but...' then go on to be the top post, I think the downvoted helps more than hurts. There's groupthink of course, but I feel the HN community is more responsible with it, and that comes from someone who often disagrees with the majority (personally, rarely expressed).
- scarface74 9y agoMost of my downvotes were when I was being snarky. A few were caused by me going against some HN orthodoxy but they usually get upvoted later.
- blackflame7000 9y agoI suggest an amendment to the downvote such that if your total lifetime positive (excluding downvotes) reaches say 1000 or 1500, you should also get the ability to downvote. It’s much easier to lose points than gain them on the site.
- SyneRyder 9y agoI don't think it's easier to lose points here. Gaining points is easy if your comments are constructive and actionable. Opinions and anything argumentative generally isn't very useful. One thing you can try is looking through your comment history and see which of your comments got the most upvotes. One of my highest upvotes was in a thread about whether software engineers should waste time doing telephone customer support, and I linked to a story of when William from Microsoft took a customer support call: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15813387 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15813387 Another was a comment about where I got my first customers: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14192711 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14192711 Or linking to a strategy for finding product ideas: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14040708 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14040708 Checking your most upvoted comments can also be a way to find topics that you should turn into a blog post. If the HN community found it interesting and suddenly gave you 10x the upvotes you usually get, then it's probably also useful to the wider world. When I've been downvoted, it's usually because I've poorly researched something & provided incorrect information.
- blackflame7000 9y agoWhile I agree with you that arguments are not constructive, a healthy disagreement of differing opinions should not have the implicit correctness go to the person with the ability to downvote his adversary. Furthermore, there is a psychological aspect to voting positively for a negatively voted comment unless its something you absolutely agree with. I might lack tact, (which is hard to convey in text), but that doesn't make answers I've submitted that were backed by cited facts only to be downvoted on trivial meta issues weren't 100% correct. I personally think the downvoting feature is fine, just really overused by people with much more karma that it makes the website less enjoyable to visit, especially for new people. And sure, one of the things I love about this site is that there are legitimate gurus on here, but a lot of people take their ability to downvote to classic Dunning Kruger syndrome. Perhaps a quarter point penalty for downvoting to stop spamming and for people to consider the worthiness of a downvote or ignore. After all, Karma is how you treat others, and constantly negging them with no explanation isn't very kind at all especially for the majority of the people on this site that just want to learn.
- swang 9y agodo you really think losing a bunch of internet points will reduce people's ability to speak their mind?
- dingaling 9y agoOr if downvoting cost the downvoter one karma point. So they'd have to make the choice between contributing a comment to contest the issue or lazily pushing the down arrow and losing karma. I generally try to upvote only. It really annoys me to see some comment down voted to grey oblivion with no follow-up comments explaining why. Particularly when looking back at older topics; was the post wrong, or just unpopular?
- dmichulke 9y agoTitle suggestion: HN Show Downvoted Comments as Normal CSS Yes: it's a step against the filter bubble
- amingilani 9y agoTo see everything on HN, go to your settings and enable Show Dead. You'll also get to see comments that were killed off.
- quickthrower2 9y agoNot for the faint at heart! Be prepared for some very offensive comments, although a lot of dead stuff is just new accounts and reasonable comments.
- acct1771 9y agoExamples? I've yet to read anything dead that I'd describe using your verbiage.
- amingilani 9y agoTempleOS routinely uses the n-word and other colorful phrases
- Annatar 9y agoWhat is the “n-word”? n-gate.com?
- amingilani 9y agoI think you're being funny, but if not, see this poll[1]. I think he deleted his account though. [1]:https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7818823 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7818823
- Annatar 9y agoNo, I genuinely do not know what the “n-word” is supposed to be. None of that made much sense to me.
- fnayr 9y agoI'm still working my way towards earning the downvote! I have been on the site for over 6 years and browse more than I contribute, but I still am shy a little of the 500 karma required. I wonder if there are users with even older accounts than mine that are still active and don't have the karma yet either.
- cjhveal 9y agoFor what it's worth, my account is older by ~7 months and I'm not yet halfway there.
- fnayr 9y agoOkay interesting, I thought I was alone. Guess there's a lot of us "noncontributors" on here haha.
- 5555624 9y agoOr "occasional" contributors. My biggest problem is I am often reading the comments a couple of days later and the discussion is no longer active.
- BrandoElFollito 9y agoThis is a real problem. I noticed that all my (infinitesimal) karma was received on comments which were a few hours old. The brilliant comments which are 1+ day old all went to a blackhole nirvana.
- ojkelly 9y ago7 years without the downvote here. Still got a long way to go.
- babaganoosh89 9y agoHope my upvote gets you a little closer :)
- deleted 9y ago
- superasn 9y agoI wish the downvote button was two step (while upvote as is) where a user had to select from things like off topic, spam, etc. Maybe a decoy disagree too for letting the new user downvote but not counting it.
- qume 9y agoDefinitely. Some of the most valuable posts are downvoted. Thats what makes them so valuable - sometimes the conventional wisdom is so wrong that when someone with specialist knowledge chimes in people reject it. Try posting here about anything related to nutrition and the health risks of eating meat...
- nickbarnwell 9y agoSlashdot meta-moderation was fantastic for this. I'm curious why it never made an appearance elsewhere - it really was a great idea.
- fnordsensei 9y agoCould you elaborate on how it works/worked? Or is it as suggested above: a downvote + a reason?
- snowwrestler 9y agoWell there are actually two ideas in the parent comment. On Slashdot, upvotes and downvotes each came with a label. So upvote wasn't just an up-arrow, it was more like "+1, Helpful" or "+1, Funny". And downvotes weren't just a down arrow, the options were like "-1, Off Topic" or "-1, Abusive". Don't hold me to the actual labels, but you get the idea. There was also a cap; each post could only go so far down (can't remember) or up (pretty sure that was 5). Overall, this system was called moderation. There was also meta-moderation, where people had to review someone else's votes up or down, and verify them. This way, people who were making bad votes could get caught by the community. The ability to moderate or meta-moderate was hooked into the karma score, but I can't remember exactly how. Meta-moderation was like a chore you had to do sometimes to maintain the right to moderate, as I recall. I'm sure there is a write-up somewhere that could do a better job than my off-teh-cuff remembering.
- gnicholas 9y agoInteresting concept. I am the creator of the BeeLine Reader browser plugin, which applies a color gradient to make text blocks easier/faster to read. I go back and forth on whether this functionality is a net benefit on sites like HN, where our text coloring obfuscates the underlying color (and the downvoting that it communicates). Sometimes I will disable it on HN if I'm engaging in a lot of discussions where I'd like to be able to see if other comments have been downvoted. If anyone else here uses this plugin, I'd be very interested to know if you've disabled it on HN or if you find the functionality to be helpful. We can make it default on/off on certain sites, so feedback is appreciated.
- Jerry2 9y agoDownvotes (and flaggings) on comments are HN's biggest flaw. It has turned this site into a giant echo chamber and has completely killed any chance of having diversity of opinions. If you do not conform, you will be downvoted into oblivion. So people censor themselves as a result.
- dragonwriter 9y ago> If you do not conform, you will be downvoted into oblivion. So people censor themselves as a result. I see radically divergent opinions on many threads which are not "downvoted into oblivion". The things I do see downvoted into oblivion are usually unsubstantive and/or uncivil, and themselves come from all directions, often from a similar apparent ideology to comments that are not downvoted. But if people who would otherwise post in a similar manner to the posts downvoted into oblivion are censoring themselves, I think the functionality is working as intended.
- jochung 9y agoYou'll still see those opinions if you have the link, but there is a very obvious pattern of removing threads about contentious issues from the front page once they reach a certain amount of wrong think. Either the admins are turning a blind eye, or they're not paying attention. At this point my money is on the former. The supreme irony of course is that lately the most recurring instances are about the memo that was titled "Google's ideological echo chamber". It's an open secret which cliques have a septic response to disagreement, and who simply wants to be heard but is treated as malicious. Empathy for me, not for thee, and feelings of safety are more important than actual safety. The content of people's skin is more important than their character.
- dragonwriter 9y ago> You'll still see those opinions if you have the link, but there is a very obvious pattern of removing threads about contentious issues from the front page once they reach a certain amount of wrong think. There's an obvious pattern of removing threads about contentious issues from the front page due to an overt automated moderation feature referred to as the "flamewar detector" designed to demote posts than generate more heat than light, judged by comments vs. upvotes on the post. This is reinforced by the fact that posts that are likely to turn into flamewars are also likely to get flagged by users who are tired of the recurring flamewars. Of course, removing such posts from the front page is a completely different issue (independent of methodology) from bias in downvotes.