3 ms·

Personally, the lack of images is a plus for me. It's one of the things I love about HN. That lack of emotional feel towards posters is what keeps postings focu

by Hates_ 18y ago

Personally, the lack of images is a plus for me. It's one of the things I love about HN. That lack of emotional feel towards posters is what keeps postings focused. Take Digg for instance, I think that it's that sense of community that leads to 99% of the comments being of no real benefit at all, because everyone is trying to crack a joke.

epi0Bauqu 18y ago
Digg comments aren't bad because they have pictures. They are bad because they are from that set of commenters. If you supposed the set of Hacker News commenters didn't change, I think pictures would clearly be a win. What you seem to be suggesting is that by adding pictures, we would attract bad commenters. I just don't think that is true.
- Alex3917 18y ago
  "Digg comments aren't bad because they have pictures. They are bad because they are from that set of commenters." I think it's as much the social norms as the user base. For example, we have kind of an unspoken humor armistice here. Normally humor is used to demonstrate intelligence. However, it's mutually understood that everyone here is intelligent enough to make the appropriate joke, but that we should refrain because it doesn't really add anything to the conversation or make anyone else any better off.
  - epi0Bauqu 18y ago
    Agreed. Sorry to all Digg users. This just makes the point further, in my opinion. Once we have these "social norms" established, we should be able to do things with the UI to increase community without degrading the adherence to the social norms.
  - ArcticCelt 18y ago
    I agree, I constantly refrain from cracking jokes because I don't want to see this turn into what Reddit has become lately. I think it should be told somewhere what are the goals of the community and explain that we aim for efficiency, knowledge and insightful conversations more than entertainment. Not because we don't like entertainment but because that's not why we are here.

by Hates_ 18y ago

epi0Bauqu 18y ago

Digg comments aren't bad because they have pictures. They are bad because they are from that set of commenters. If you supposed the set of Hacker News commenters didn't change, I think pictures would clearly be a win. What you seem to be suggesting is that by adding pictures, we would attract bad commenters. I just don't think that is true.

Alex3917 18y ago
"Digg comments aren't bad because they have pictures. They are bad because they are from that set of commenters." I think it's as much the social norms as the user base. For example, we have kind of an unspoken humor armistice here. Normally humor is used to demonstrate intelligence. However, it's mutually understood that everyone here is intelligent enough to make the appropriate joke, but that we should refrain because it doesn't really add anything to the conversation or make anyone else any better off.
- epi0Bauqu 18y ago
  Agreed. Sorry to all Digg users. This just makes the point further, in my opinion. Once we have these "social norms" established, we should be able to do things with the UI to increase community without degrading the adherence to the social norms.
- ArcticCelt 18y ago
  I agree, I constantly refrain from cracking jokes because I don't want to see this turn into what Reddit has become lately. I think it should be told somewhere what are the goals of the community and explain that we aim for efficiency, knowledge and insightful conversations more than entertainment. Not because we don't like entertainment but because that's not why we are here.