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Ask HN: Why do Hacker News, Reddit, not show the users that voted?

5 points by suliamansaleh 16y ago

i was wondering why we are not allowed to see the people are voting on posts, is this like a technical issue, or a political one(conflict), i dont get it thanks

makecheck 16y ago
Occasionally, a single comment can get over 100 points. The site may not want to keep track of that many links to a single post. (Not that I know why it works the way it does, but this seems like a good technical reason for it.)
- ygd 16y ago
  Sites like reddit can garner thousands of votes on a certain comment. Keeping track of these would further decrease reddit's already slow response time.
- mzl 16y ago
  It still needs to keep track of it for purposes of stopping double voting.
ashitvora 16y ago
May be they want to keep things simple. You anyways don't know other users unlike facebook where most of the people liking and commenting on your status are your fiends. More features they have, more complex it is for users and developers have to maintain it.
brudgers 16y ago
Anonymous voting reduces quid pro quo, vendettas and other sorts of unproductive behaviour.
- suliamansaleh 16y ago
  "quid pro quo" i didnt know what it means, but it sounded pretty kool, just checked it on wiki, it sounds so british, im a londoner myself, fantasttic use of words @brudgers
  - brudgers 16y ago
    If only I could program in Latin.
  - mzl 16y ago
    You could also use google translate from latin, although this particular phrase is somewhat special :)
- ntoshev 16y ago
  Quora shows who voted up an answer among the people you follow (presumably you value their opinion). Makes a lot of sense in that context.
pg 16y ago
It's a social choice. It wouldn't be difficult technically. Historically the origin of the custom may be slashdot.
- malandrew 16y ago
  Complementing pg's answer here about "social choice". It places the focus squarely on the news content and not on the users involved. There's no following and there's no cronyism this way. In many services, such as twitter and quora, I've noticed that there is some degree of reciprocity that occurs even if it is neither expressed or implied that you should reciprocate. In fact, in most cases there is nothing written or unwritten culturally that says you should reciprocate, yet people do anyways. By eliminating this you eliminate this falsely perceived social expectation of reciprocity, thus placing 100% of voting motivation on content. This is the right approach if you want stories and comments to make it to the front page based on quality of content alone.
bmm6o 16y ago
It would seem like the default option to me. Why would it show you who voted up and down? What would you do with that information?

5 points by suliamansaleh 16y ago

i was wondering why we are not allowed to see the people are voting on posts, is this like a technical issue, or a political one(conflict), i dont get it thanks

makecheck 16y ago

Occasionally, a single comment can get over 100 points. The site may not want to keep track of that many links to a single post. (Not that I know why it works the way it does, but this seems like a good technical reason for it.)

ygd 16y ago
Sites like reddit can garner thousands of votes on a certain comment. Keeping track of these would further decrease reddit's already slow response time.
mzl 16y ago
It still needs to keep track of it for purposes of stopping double voting.

ashitvora 16y ago

May be they want to keep things simple. You anyways don't know other users unlike facebook where most of the people liking and commenting on your status are your fiends. More features they have, more complex it is for users and developers have to maintain it.

brudgers 16y ago

Anonymous voting reduces quid pro quo, vendettas and other sorts of unproductive behaviour.

suliamansaleh 16y ago
"quid pro quo" i didnt know what it means, but it sounded pretty kool, just checked it on wiki, it sounds so british, im a londoner myself, fantasttic use of words @brudgers
- brudgers 16y ago
  If only I could program in Latin.
- mzl 16y ago
  You could also use google translate from latin, although this particular phrase is somewhat special :)
ntoshev 16y ago
Quora shows who voted up an answer among the people you follow (presumably you value their opinion). Makes a lot of sense in that context.

pg 16y ago

It's a social choice. It wouldn't be difficult technically. Historically the origin of the custom may be slashdot.

malandrew 16y ago
Complementing pg's answer here about "social choice". It places the focus squarely on the news content and not on the users involved. There's no following and there's no cronyism this way. In many services, such as twitter and quora, I've noticed that there is some degree of reciprocity that occurs even if it is neither expressed or implied that you should reciprocate. In fact, in most cases there is nothing written or unwritten culturally that says you should reciprocate, yet people do anyways. By eliminating this you eliminate this falsely perceived social expectation of reciprocity, thus placing 100% of voting motivation on content. This is the right approach if you want stories and comments to make it to the front page based on quality of content alone.

bmm6o 16y ago

It would seem like the default option to me. Why would it show you who voted up and down? What would you do with that information?