5 ms·

Or you could not just worry about your karma score, or your average and just post when you think you've got something to say and say it. I don't get the obsessi

by smiler 16y ago

Or you could not just worry about your karma score, or your average and just post when you think you've got something to say and say it. I don't get the obsession with karma and people getting annoyed when they get down voted. Be yourself and if people disagree so be it

raganwald 16y ago
I think we're in violent agreement. I just want to note that 'worrying about it when deciding what/whether to post' is not the same thing as 'finding a discussion about it interesting.' At this point in software history, all software is social software. Therefore, discussions about social behaviour and how it is affected by mechanisms and features is extremely relevant to the business of making software. So I'm fascinated by the subject of karma even if I don't try very hard to accumulate any.
mkr-hn 16y ago
HN is based on karma--you only get access to certain features at given thresholds. It's something you have to care about if you ever want to be able to make full use of the site. I think a time-based system might go along with karma well. If you stay above a certain level for long enough, you get access to the next feature level. You still have to work your way up the karma tree, but you're not doing it for the features.
- grandalf 16y ago
  wait, what are these levels? I don't know if I have ever been aware of this other than just the downvote privilege based on average comment score.
  - mkr-hn 16y ago
    I don't know of any others aside from the poll privilege, but it works whether there's one or 100 levels.
  - Retric 16y ago
    There is also a threshold to change the color of the bar at the top.
- bootload 16y ago
  "... HN is based on karma ..." HN is based on the quality of your ideas.
  - mkr-hn 16y ago
    I'm talking about the software behind HN, not the community.
dasil003 16y ago
The point is shaping aggregate community behavior. The attitude you are advocating is an internet-age-old drumbeat since Slashdot introduced moderators, and we are better for it, but the fact is that karma does affect people's behavior is undeniable and statistically immutable; therefore your point doesn't really address raganwald's concern.
jamesteow 16y ago
Without a high karma score, how are you supposed to downvote comments? You can't have certain features unlocked by karma and then tell people not to care about their score.

by smiler 16y ago

raganwald 16y ago

I think we're in violent agreement. I just want to note that 'worrying about it when deciding what/whether to post' is not the same thing as 'finding a discussion about it interesting.' At this point in software history, all software is social software. Therefore, discussions about social behaviour and how it is affected by mechanisms and features is extremely relevant to the business of making software. So I'm fascinated by the subject of karma even if I don't try very hard to accumulate any.

mkr-hn 16y ago

HN is based on karma--you only get access to certain features at given thresholds. It's something you have to care about if you ever want to be able to make full use of the site. I think a time-based system might go along with karma well. If you stay above a certain level for long enough, you get access to the next feature level. You still have to work your way up the karma tree, but you're not doing it for the features.

grandalf 16y ago
wait, what are these levels? I don't know if I have ever been aware of this other than just the downvote privilege based on average comment score.
- mkr-hn 16y ago
  I don't know of any others aside from the poll privilege, but it works whether there's one or 100 levels.
- Retric 16y ago
  There is also a threshold to change the color of the bar at the top.
bootload 16y ago
"... HN is based on karma ..." HN is based on the quality of your ideas.
- mkr-hn 16y ago
  I'm talking about the software behind HN, not the community.

dasil003 16y ago

The point is shaping aggregate community behavior. The attitude you are advocating is an internet-age-old drumbeat since Slashdot introduced moderators, and we are better for it, but the fact is that karma does affect people's behavior is undeniable and statistically immutable; therefore your point doesn't really address raganwald's concern.

jamesteow 16y ago

Without a high karma score, how are you supposed to downvote comments? You can't have certain features unlocked by karma and then tell people not to care about their score.