A post with a few comments ranks much higher for me than one with just upvotes. The main reason I upvote something is because I want it to have more exposure so

A post with a few comments ranks much higher for me than one with just upvotes. The main reason I upvote something is because I want it to have more exposure so more people will comment on it. Having an expert in the field or the author of the paper etc just pop in and start answering questions is my favorite thing about HN. Unsurprisingly, I check the comments first, unless it specifically piques my interest (which isn't hard), and then I leave the comments open as a parent tab to check later because if I'm interested in a topic I'm interested in opinions of it. These are more likely for me to click through to: * Databases and programming languages: theory, standards, etc. * Specific languages I like reading about: rust, go, .net * A little bit of general world news * Psycology * Security * Anything really technical. I like picking up on new modes of thought even if I don't understand the topic. * Anything that stays on the homepage for a while I'm likely to check out