3 ms·

I don't see why you couldn't flag! Are you sure? If we speak of biases that way, then I'm not sure there's anything outside of bias. This site has a bias towar

by sctb 8y ago

I don't see why you couldn't flag! Are you sure? If we speak of biases that way, then I'm not sure there's anything outside of bias. This site has a bias towards a particular kind of discourse. It's not that Twitter doesn't have discourse, but it's a different style. Topics like this one can be quite controversial and flamewar-style, and Hacker News readers have a bias against flamewars. It's not that flamewars aren't discourse, but it's not our preference here. Yes, it's only one venue, and it does reflect its users (and its history and its conventions and its table-based layout, etc.). How could it be any other way? Something that's a detriment to thoughtfulness and civility is when we project our own opinions onto the canvas of “bias” constituting the mechanisms of discussion which are invariably present. It's never what we think, and always a projection. This is supported by the fact that everyone perceives moderation, flagging, etc. to be in support of the opposite side. Has anyone ever complained, “Boy, this really confirms my existing view without adequately representing what I disagree with. How biased!”. Sorry for the rant! I'm of course generalizing and addressing more than you've actually said.

angry_octet 8y ago
I can flag articles, but not comments. I'm not sure if this is just me of course, but given comments appeared marked as [flagged] it seems so. Inflation in kerma required for flagging? The rules are rather opaque. I'm fine with bias, it is as you point out, expected and unavoidable. It is more obvious who likes/dislikes what on twitter, though they keep making that harder to determine analytically. I guess the problem boils down to there being no sense of who is voting one way or the other, and would you respect those people? Like, I'm not going to care if Jacob Wohl downvotes something, or if a bunch of Wohlites (or Chomskyists for that matter) are angry, but how can you tell? As to articles specifically related to gender and women, I would say HN has a problem. It is up to HN owners to decide whether to damp down the jerk responses, the flagging, etc. I prefer HN posts because they don't have to be absurdley short, and there are no memes. How I hate memes. Though the lack of respect for humour and wit really diminishes discourse.

by sctb 8y ago

angry_octet 8y ago

I can flag articles, but not comments. I'm not sure if this is just me of course, but given comments appeared marked as [flagged] it seems so. Inflation in kerma required for flagging? The rules are rather opaque. I'm fine with bias, it is as you point out, expected and unavoidable. It is more obvious who likes/dislikes what on twitter, though they keep making that harder to determine analytically. I guess the problem boils down to there being no sense of who is voting one way or the other, and would you respect those people? Like, I'm not going to care if Jacob Wohl downvotes something, or if a bunch of Wohlites (or Chomskyists for that matter) are angry, but how can you tell? As to articles specifically related to gender and women, I would say HN has a problem. It is up to HN owners to decide whether to damp down the jerk responses, the flagging, etc. I prefer HN posts because they don't have to be absurdley short, and there are no memes. How I hate memes. Though the lack of respect for humour and wit really diminishes discourse.