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Reddit wouldn't be so toxic if the vote counts were hidden, but echo chamber validation is the ultimate badge of honor there. There is so much in this document

Reddit wouldn't be so toxic if the vote counts were hidden, but echo chamber validation is the ultimate badge of honor there. There is so much in this document that applies to all things Reddit (please note that I wrote it inspired by my time on Reddit): https://github.com/prettydiff/wisdom/blob/master/Avoiding_Trolls.md https://github.com/prettydiff/wisdom/blob/master/Avoiding_Tr...

Reedx 9y ago
There are some subreddits where they are hidden for a period of time (not sure how long, but it's quite a while). I wonder if anyone has analyzed those?
- minimaxir 9y ago
  A formal statistical experiment was done in /r/politics about the impact of hiding vote counts temporarily but it did not find statistical evidence that it made an impact on discourse: https://htmlpreview.github.io/?https://github.com/mitmedialab/CivilServant-Analysis/blob/master/reports/stylesheet_experiment_results.11.2017.html https://htmlpreview.github.io/?https://github.com/mitmediala...
  - thaumaturgy 9y ago
    Low-effort comment, but: I really appreciate your content, both here and on Reddit. It's refreshing to see anyone doing any of this sort of analysis, and it takes a lot of effort to do it, and you do it really well and at a rate that's mind-boggling.
    - minimaxir 9y ago
      Thanks! I do have other cool things planned with the Reddit data pipeline too, so stay tuned! ;) (for clarification, the linked statistical analysis isn't mine)
  - cookiecaper 9y ago
    /r/politics is aggressively left-wing, so much so that I'd doubt anyone interested in real discourse is trying anymore. I'd think an experiment like that would need to be done on a clean subreddit that isn't bringing in any baggage, or a pre-existing ideology-based ban list, to test its validity.
  - sli 9y ago
    Was /r/politics given a vote-hiding feature that other subreddits didn't have? Votes and downvote buttons are typically hidden with custom CSS that users can disable, which would completely invalidate these results. Votes can be hidden for real for a short time, but cannot be disabled completely.
- Lionsion 9y ago
  > There are some subreddits where they are hidden for a period of time (not sure how long, but it's quite a while) I think there's a subreddit-level setting for that, but the max is only something like a couple of days.
  - linker3000 9y ago
    0-1440 mins Just checked - Reddit mod /r/askelectronics
- stochastic_monk 9y ago
  r/politics said it didn’t make much difference, but they left it that way anyhow. The feedback based ranking implicitly supports echo chambering, but there’s not much of a way around that.
  - dspillett 9y ago
    > but they left it that way anyhow If it makes little difference either way, perhaps they left it on to quiet those who would keep suggesting they try it even though they already have.
  - paulmd 9y ago
    > The feedback based ranking implicitly supports echo chambering, but there’s not much of a way around that. Traditional topic-based forums are better, because you can't suppress unpopular-but-correct opinions by downvoting. Even if you don't care about Fake Internet Points (and the reason they exist is because we do, gamification works), if you state something that goes against the prevailing hivemind your opinion will literally be hidden unless users go out of their way to find them. (and yes, I browse HN with showdead=yes for the same reason)
    - bhandziuk 9y ago
      what does showdead do?
      - paulmd 9y ago
        Shows posts that have been flagged from mods, users, or shadowbanning and hidden from the normal display.
    - CompanionCuuube 9y ago
      Same here. I read all of the gray comments, because it means the comment was something unpopular enough to downvote.
wvenable 9y ago
Reddit would also be better if karma wasn't known.
- jdironman 9y ago
  Just goes to show that whenever there is money involved there has to be some 'incentive' or motivation for users / creators.
- Gargoyle 9y ago
  Both reddit and hacker news would be much better off with no voting at all. Strong moderators are the only thing I've ever seen keep online forums at a high quality level. Voting is the weakest kind of moderation.
  - remir 9y ago
    The problem with the upvote/downvote system is that it's too simplistic. If you have an opinion that goes against the status quo, a lot of people will downvote your comment simply because they disagree with what you said on some emotional level. Of course, past a certain number of downvotes, you post will be buried, so you have basically an echo chamber.
    - posterboy 9y ago
      That might have it's use, too. Echochamber sounds bad, resonant frequency response sounds neutral, and it's needed for harmony. The real problem then is kakophonie, noise, and choosing the instrument to play on with a nice timbre, noise floor, etc. The internet is large and finding the right venue and audience is difficult. There is value in being told to have hit the wrong tone. This is why shorter messages and twitter are important, it allows a finer grained ... censorship? (Zensur in German also means grade, shool mark). That's why many people, I at least, discuss online, looking for light conversation, so emotional feedback should be welcome as ''the basic unit of exchange in communication''.
      - remir 9y ago
Bartweiss 9y ago
I'm not sure hiding vote counts is sufficient, since comments are still displayed based on them. The 'Theory of Reddit' sub did some pretty compelling analyses showing that the first 3-5 votes almost completely predict eventual vote direction, and that the top comments in a thread will consistently be the first handful of upvoted comments. Which also explains complaints of the shape "Reddit hates X one day, but loves X the next!" Whoever shows up first with an idea people don't hate ends up becoming the dominant voice of that specific conversation.
- SimbaOnSteroids 9y ago
  A subreddit solely dedicated to auditing the quality of moderation on various subs would go a long way to give reddit the tools to remove problematic moderators. Ultimately the quality of the mod makes the quality of sub.
  - kbrosnan 9y ago
    The problem is that the reddit culture is that upvotes/downvotes solve all and that moderators should be invisible.
    - masklinn 9y ago
      It's a difficult statement to agree with when the subreddits usually considered best-in-class are very heavily moderated. Though of course some of the worst shit-shows are also heavily moderated. At the end of the day, heavy moderation is not unlike absolute monarchy, it's a high-risk high-reward management system.
  - Karunamon 9y ago
    This exists, but in a really basic and incomplete-looking form. http://reddit.com/r/dsmr/wiki http://reddit.com/r/dsmr/wiki http://reddit.com/r/blueribbon/wiki http://reddit.com/r/blueribbon/wiki
- WhompingWindows 9y ago
  I read about one strategy on my favorite subreddit. A user admitted to posting memes and cheap content there, then going into /new and downvoting every other post and upvoting his own with a couple alternate accounts.
SeanLuke 9y ago
Fundamentally the problem, I think is anonymity. On the Internet no one knows you're a dog. I have both pseudonymous handles on reddit and also I go by my own name. On Hacker News I only go by my own name. And I have found that it made me a much, MUCH better person when posting. So now I post on reddit about 95% of the time under my own name as well. When you have no skin in the game -- such as your reputation to uphold, no superego to hold yourself in check -- a person's id reveals itself. And it's not pretty.
- cup-of-tea 9y ago
  I disagree. Anonymity allows you to express unpopular views that you wouldn't be able to in real life. But the existence of downvoting basically defeats that, except in unpopular echo chambers, of course.
  - alex_young 9y ago
    What if your unpopular view you wouldn't express in real life is something abusive towards others? i.e. trolling.
    - projektir 9y ago
      You get banned.
      - ninkendo 9y ago
        Then you just make a new account?
    - cup-of-tea 9y ago
      Who decides what is "trolling"? I think there should be moderators but that it's possible to see what moderators have done and impossible for them to actually delete posts. That way each person can decide if they are happy with the moderation being done.
  - SeanLuke 9y ago
abritinthebay 9y ago
Vote counts on HN are hidden - doesn't stop a lot of toxic behavior on here. The problem is down votes are not a good comment tool. Especially combined with hiding and such. Upvote only systems are much more resilient to the kind of gaming mechanics you see here and on reddit.
- jessaustin 9y ago
  What is meant by "gaming mechanics you see here"? Could you be more specific? Of course, voting does affect what gets posted, but that's the point. If your authentic voice doesn't appeal to HN voters, then develop another voice that does appeal to us!
  - ryandrake 9y ago
    Isn’t that how you get a popularity-driven echo chamber? If only certain points of view will get upvoted or avoid downvotes, only those points of view will be posted or get discussed.
    - jessaustin 9y ago
      Yes it does encourage some posts and discourage others. At times it might seem that is based on "points of view", but more often it's about form, logic, salience, or substance. Preferences probably vary on those measures, but keeping the discussion within tighter bounds in these senses is just a part of HN.
  - abritinthebay 9y ago
    That’s completely compatible with an upvote only system. So I don’t see your objection?
    - jessaustin 9y ago
      I post here a lot and my posts get downvoted and upvoted a lot. I don't see any "gaming mechanics", whatever that is. If you have a reason to believe that stuff is happening, please share that with the rest of us. Also, you overstate this "compatibility". For humans, loss hurts more than gain feels good. Voting with negative as well as positive reinforcement is simply more effective at changing comment styles.
SamUK96 9y ago
That blob is (ironically) extremely ideological/generalising. Doesn't mean I don't disagree with it though, maybe just the approach/tone. I believe you may be grouping strong (and maybe not always right) opinions with flat out chaotic evil trolls (whom there are actually extremely few). It's been intruiging to grow up witnessing the appearance of the term "troll", initially designated to IRC and other net spammers, to it's present and increasingly meaningless, nebulous definition of "mean people on the internet". It's a big difference, which your linked blob quite interestingly evidences :D

Reedx 9y ago

There are some subreddits where they are hidden for a period of time (not sure how long, but it's quite a while). I wonder if anyone has analyzed those?

minimaxir 9y ago
A formal statistical experiment was done in /r/politics about the impact of hiding vote counts temporarily but it did not find statistical evidence that it made an impact on discourse: https://htmlpreview.github.io/?https://github.com/mitmedialab/CivilServant-Analysis/blob/master/reports/stylesheet_experiment_results.11.2017.html https://htmlpreview.github.io/?https://github.com/mitmediala...
- thaumaturgy 9y ago
  Low-effort comment, but: I really appreciate your content, both here and on Reddit. It's refreshing to see anyone doing any of this sort of analysis, and it takes a lot of effort to do it, and you do it really well and at a rate that's mind-boggling.
  - minimaxir 9y ago
    Thanks! I do have other cool things planned with the Reddit data pipeline too, so stay tuned! ;) (for clarification, the linked statistical analysis isn't mine)
- cookiecaper 9y ago
  /r/politics is aggressively left-wing, so much so that I'd doubt anyone interested in real discourse is trying anymore. I'd think an experiment like that would need to be done on a clean subreddit that isn't bringing in any baggage, or a pre-existing ideology-based ban list, to test its validity.
- sli 9y ago
  Was /r/politics given a vote-hiding feature that other subreddits didn't have? Votes and downvote buttons are typically hidden with custom CSS that users can disable, which would completely invalidate these results. Votes can be hidden for real for a short time, but cannot be disabled completely.
Lionsion 9y ago
> There are some subreddits where they are hidden for a period of time (not sure how long, but it's quite a while) I think there's a subreddit-level setting for that, but the max is only something like a couple of days.
- linker3000 9y ago
  0-1440 mins Just checked - Reddit mod /r/askelectronics
stochastic_monk 9y ago
r/politics said it didn’t make much difference, but they left it that way anyhow. The feedback based ranking implicitly supports echo chambering, but there’s not much of a way around that.
- dspillett 9y ago
  > but they left it that way anyhow If it makes little difference either way, perhaps they left it on to quiet those who would keep suggesting they try it even though they already have.
- paulmd 9y ago
  > The feedback based ranking implicitly supports echo chambering, but there’s not much of a way around that. Traditional topic-based forums are better, because you can't suppress unpopular-but-correct opinions by downvoting. Even if you don't care about Fake Internet Points (and the reason they exist is because we do, gamification works), if you state something that goes against the prevailing hivemind your opinion will literally be hidden unless users go out of their way to find them. (and yes, I browse HN with showdead=yes for the same reason)
  - bhandziuk 9y ago
    what does showdead do?
    - paulmd 9y ago
      Shows posts that have been flagged from mods, users, or shadowbanning and hidden from the normal display.
  - CompanionCuuube 9y ago
    Same here. I read all of the gray comments, because it means the comment was something unpopular enough to downvote.

wvenable 9y ago

Reddit would also be better if karma wasn't known.

jdironman 9y ago
Just goes to show that whenever there is money involved there has to be some 'incentive' or motivation for users / creators.
Gargoyle 9y ago
Both reddit and hacker news would be much better off with no voting at all. Strong moderators are the only thing I've ever seen keep online forums at a high quality level. Voting is the weakest kind of moderation.
- remir 9y ago
  The problem with the upvote/downvote system is that it's too simplistic. If you have an opinion that goes against the status quo, a lot of people will downvote your comment simply because they disagree with what you said on some emotional level. Of course, past a certain number of downvotes, you post will be buried, so you have basically an echo chamber.
  - posterboy 9y ago
    That might have it's use, too. Echochamber sounds bad, resonant frequency response sounds neutral, and it's needed for harmony. The real problem then is kakophonie, noise, and choosing the instrument to play on with a nice timbre, noise floor, etc. The internet is large and finding the right venue and audience is difficult. There is value in being told to have hit the wrong tone. This is why shorter messages and twitter are important, it allows a finer grained ... censorship? (Zensur in German also means grade, shool mark). That's why many people, I at least, discuss online, looking for light conversation, so emotional feedback should be welcome as ''the basic unit of exchange in communication''.
    - remir 9y ago

Bartweiss 9y ago

I'm not sure hiding vote counts is sufficient, since comments are still displayed based on them. The 'Theory of Reddit' sub did some pretty compelling analyses showing that the first 3-5 votes almost completely predict eventual vote direction, and that the top comments in a thread will consistently be the first handful of upvoted comments. Which also explains complaints of the shape "Reddit hates X one day, but loves X the next!" Whoever shows up first with an idea people don't hate ends up becoming the dominant voice of that specific conversation.

SimbaOnSteroids 9y ago
A subreddit solely dedicated to auditing the quality of moderation on various subs would go a long way to give reddit the tools to remove problematic moderators. Ultimately the quality of the mod makes the quality of sub.
- kbrosnan 9y ago
  The problem is that the reddit culture is that upvotes/downvotes solve all and that moderators should be invisible.
  - masklinn 9y ago
    It's a difficult statement to agree with when the subreddits usually considered best-in-class are very heavily moderated. Though of course some of the worst shit-shows are also heavily moderated. At the end of the day, heavy moderation is not unlike absolute monarchy, it's a high-risk high-reward management system.
- Karunamon 9y ago
  This exists, but in a really basic and incomplete-looking form. http://reddit.com/r/dsmr/wiki http://reddit.com/r/dsmr/wiki http://reddit.com/r/blueribbon/wiki http://reddit.com/r/blueribbon/wiki
WhompingWindows 9y ago
I read about one strategy on my favorite subreddit. A user admitted to posting memes and cheap content there, then going into /new and downvoting every other post and upvoting his own with a couple alternate accounts.

SeanLuke 9y ago

Fundamentally the problem, I think is anonymity. On the Internet no one knows you're a dog. I have both pseudonymous handles on reddit and also I go by my own name. On Hacker News I only go by my own name. And I have found that it made me a much, MUCH better person when posting. So now I post on reddit about 95% of the time under my own name as well. When you have no skin in the game -- such as your reputation to uphold, no superego to hold yourself in check -- a person's id reveals itself. And it's not pretty.

cup-of-tea 9y ago
I disagree. Anonymity allows you to express unpopular views that you wouldn't be able to in real life. But the existence of downvoting basically defeats that, except in unpopular echo chambers, of course.
- alex_young 9y ago
  What if your unpopular view you wouldn't express in real life is something abusive towards others? i.e. trolling.
  - projektir 9y ago
    You get banned.
    - ninkendo 9y ago
      Then you just make a new account?
  - cup-of-tea 9y ago
    Who decides what is "trolling"? I think there should be moderators but that it's possible to see what moderators have done and impossible for them to actually delete posts. That way each person can decide if they are happy with the moderation being done.
- SeanLuke 9y ago

abritinthebay 9y ago

Vote counts on HN are hidden - doesn't stop a lot of toxic behavior on here. The problem is down votes are not a good comment tool. Especially combined with hiding and such. Upvote only systems are much more resilient to the kind of gaming mechanics you see here and on reddit.

jessaustin 9y ago
What is meant by "gaming mechanics you see here"? Could you be more specific? Of course, voting does affect what gets posted, but that's the point. If your authentic voice doesn't appeal to HN voters, then develop another voice that does appeal to us!
- ryandrake 9y ago
  Isn’t that how you get a popularity-driven echo chamber? If only certain points of view will get upvoted or avoid downvotes, only those points of view will be posted or get discussed.
  - jessaustin 9y ago
    Yes it does encourage some posts and discourage others. At times it might seem that is based on "points of view", but more often it's about form, logic, salience, or substance. Preferences probably vary on those measures, but keeping the discussion within tighter bounds in these senses is just a part of HN.
- abritinthebay 9y ago
  That’s completely compatible with an upvote only system. So I don’t see your objection?
  - jessaustin 9y ago
    I post here a lot and my posts get downvoted and upvoted a lot. I don't see any "gaming mechanics", whatever that is. If you have a reason to believe that stuff is happening, please share that with the rest of us. Also, you overstate this "compatibility". For humans, loss hurts more than gain feels good. Voting with negative as well as positive reinforcement is simply more effective at changing comment styles.

SamUK96 9y ago

That blob is (ironically) extremely ideological/generalising. Doesn't mean I don't disagree with it though, maybe just the approach/tone. I believe you may be grouping strong (and maybe not always right) opinions with flat out chaotic evil trolls (whom there are actually extremely few). It's been intruiging to grow up witnessing the appearance of the term "troll", initially designated to IRC and other net spammers, to it's present and increasingly meaningless, nebulous definition of "mean people on the internet". It's a big difference, which your linked blob quite interestingly evidences :D