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Have you considered adding a slight cost for submitting articles? (perhaps 2-5 points of karma?) There's a reward for submitting anything first that other peopl

Have you considered adding a slight cost for submitting articles? (perhaps 2-5 points of karma?) There's a reward for submitting anything first that other people are likely to submit, but no cost, so the new page is often clogged with industry buzz that drowns out more substantial submissions. Many excellent article fall off within an hour, and then they can't get reposted. Having more articles on the front page that aren't based on a scramble for duplicate-submission karma would probably improve the overall discussion threads, too; those posts tend to draw a lot of shallow comments. It would also help with spam. Win win win. I also wonder what percentage of upvotes for submissions comes just from duplicate submissions - maybe those should be counted differently (or not at all)? If the front page is already full of threads about some news about Apple (or whatever), being first to submit a redundant (but distinct) post is disproportionately rewarded, yet reduces the signal/noise ratio even further.

bfe 16y ago
There's a reverse problem too with complaining about karma farming eroding the SNR. I care about learning interesting things and couldn't care less about my karma on a website. I've only ever submitted two articles, and those were only after I read something that I found profoundly interesting that had just been posted (I read them right after getting an email alert that they were posted). For both, I also took the time to search HN to make sure they hadn't been submitted yet, before I hit the button. But the second one still drew complaints of being a duplicate based on prior submissions of a related previous Techchrunch post that hadn't shown up in my search and that I'd never noticed despite hitting HN several times a day, because they hadn't been upvoted at all and had quickly plummeted off the first few pages. I hope a solution can be found that cuts down on both redundant submissions and occupying comment space with annoying complaints about redundant submissions (and that obviates the need for annoying complaints about the annoying complaints). I'd suggest trying just eliminating awarding karma to users, at least for submissions - just use the submissions' points for the ordering on the page. It takes way more effort to write a valuable comment than to hit submit for a link, so let comments become the sole determinant of users' karma. I think users would still submit pages they find particularly interesting for HN out of desire to share interesting things.
- silentbicycle 16y ago
  I don't care about karma either, but it's an arbitrary metric that steers community behavior somehow. May as well utilize that.
DarkShikari 16y ago
The problem with this is it makes every submission into a karma game. If submitting costs karma, it will cause more people to think "will this earn enough points?" before submitting links. ... but that's not what you want people to think. You want them to think "is this interesting and on-topic for HN?" They're not the same question, as much as the former tries to approximate the latter. If people focus too much on points, you're likely to get more groupthink and more industry buzz (since that stuff always gets a gazillion upvotes) instead of interesting articles. Certainly, people think about link karma already, but I think this would make it worse. Creating a cost will cause even people who don't think about karma to think about it, even for just a moment -- which is probably not what you want.
- silentbicycle 16y ago
  I wonder about that, too, but think it'd be worth experimenting. The cost should probably be small. I find myself wondering, "if I submit this now, will enough people be awake/etc. to notice it before it spills off the page?" That has deterred me from submitting more interesting content than costing 2 or 3 points ever would. Also, a lot of those upvotes come from duplicate submissions. I don't have detailed info, but probably a significant percent, likely enough to lift them out of the new feed and onto the front page. Or, maybe duplicate submissions shouldn't give the original an automatic upvote? I don't know.
  - kenjackson 16y ago
    Or, maybe duplicate submissions shouldn't give the original an automatic upvote? Why shouldn't they? The fact that someone else indepedently thought the article was good to submit seems to be at least as strong a sign of interest as a click of an arror.
    - silentbicycle 16y ago
      The problem here is that it doesn't distinguish between these two cases: 1. Multiple people independently submitted a content they found, because they found it interesting. This is (generally) good. Maybe it's not the community's cup of tea, and gradually fades away, but that's fine. 2. Somebody notices some fresh, overtly linkbait-ish article. They post it ASAP, hoping that fifty other people will be slower on the draw, netting them fifty upvotes. (Those people may be doing it for the same reason.) Either way: fluff gets submitted. Maybe it has fifty upvotes, maybe there are fifty others that just crowded out something really fascinating. This sets up a feedback loop that rewards posting things because they're linkbait, not thought-provoking. I suspect that rewarding duplicate submissions too much tips the scales towards rewarding submitting linkbait. Looking at the new page basically ever backs this up. I don't know if adding a cost to submissions, reducing duplicate-submission karma, penalizing everybody involved for flagged->deleted articles, or what will help, but that seems like the root of the problem, so let's talk about it!
deleted 16y ago
[deleted]
chipsy 16y ago
Hmm. We might take this concept further and make it a "wager" of karma with a minimum bet, and you get gains at some rate proportionate to the size of the bet. But extending it in this way, it would probably also have to have some effect on the front page algorithm for a large bet to ever make sense. Which in turn could lead to a stagnation where elite posters are constantly sinking thousands of karma points into "sure things" and nobody else can compete. Something to think about, in any case.
- silentbicycle 16y ago
  No, I think at most it should add just the right amount of friction. Rewarding first submits is the real problem, IMHO. It's like, "first post!", except it also drowns out good submissions.
huntero 16y ago
I think this would exacerbate the "comment quality" problem by encouraging people to make lots of sub-par comments so they can gain enough karma to submit their latest blog post.
3dFlatLander 16y ago
Would it really help with spam though? The rewards for a spammer to make it to the first, second, or even third page are probably worth the risk of negative karma. As for duplicate articles, I'm not even really sure what the problem is. Is it duplicate articles (same url, slightly different) that clog up the system? Or is it the same subject being covered from many different sources? There have also been a few times within the last month where two stories about the same topic will be right next to each other on the front page--amazon/apple/other big industry announcements like to do this.
- alanh 16y ago
  Right, I have to imagine if I were a spammer, I would churn through new accounts fairly regularly anyway. (Not to imply new accounts are always unwanted of spammy — we were all new once…)
- nightpool 16y ago
  I think most of the problem has to do with the fact that you are spreading upvotes and comments over two pages, rather then having them on one.
- silentbicycle 16y ago
  I expected that new accounts wouldn't be able to submit anything until they have a couple points of karma (from upvoted comments). The problem is that the main page of the new feed frequently has a max age under an hour (44 min., currently) - if something doesn't get any upvotes by then, it falls off the page and becomes drastically less likely to get any further upvotes. It also can't be resubmitted for several months. Slowing this down would almost certainly be good - quite a few interesting posts get submitted at the wrong time and never get noticed.

bfe 16y ago

There's a reverse problem too with complaining about karma farming eroding the SNR. I care about learning interesting things and couldn't care less about my karma on a website. I've only ever submitted two articles, and those were only after I read something that I found profoundly interesting that had just been posted (I read them right after getting an email alert that they were posted). For both, I also took the time to search HN to make sure they hadn't been submitted yet, before I hit the button. But the second one still drew complaints of being a duplicate based on prior submissions of a related previous Techchrunch post that hadn't shown up in my search and that I'd never noticed despite hitting HN several times a day, because they hadn't been upvoted at all and had quickly plummeted off the first few pages. I hope a solution can be found that cuts down on both redundant submissions and occupying comment space with annoying complaints about redundant submissions (and that obviates the need for annoying complaints about the annoying complaints). I'd suggest trying just eliminating awarding karma to users, at least for submissions - just use the submissions' points for the ordering on the page. It takes way more effort to write a valuable comment than to hit submit for a link, so let comments become the sole determinant of users' karma. I think users would still submit pages they find particularly interesting for HN out of desire to share interesting things.

silentbicycle 16y ago
I don't care about karma either, but it's an arbitrary metric that steers community behavior somehow. May as well utilize that.

DarkShikari 16y ago

The problem with this is it makes every submission into a karma game. If submitting costs karma, it will cause more people to think "will this earn enough points?" before submitting links. ... but that's not what you want people to think. You want them to think "is this interesting and on-topic for HN?" They're not the same question, as much as the former tries to approximate the latter. If people focus too much on points, you're likely to get more groupthink and more industry buzz (since that stuff always gets a gazillion upvotes) instead of interesting articles. Certainly, people think about link karma already, but I think this would make it worse. Creating a cost will cause even people who don't think about karma to think about it, even for just a moment -- which is probably not what you want.

silentbicycle 16y ago
I wonder about that, too, but think it'd be worth experimenting. The cost should probably be small. I find myself wondering, "if I submit this now, will enough people be awake/etc. to notice it before it spills off the page?" That has deterred me from submitting more interesting content than costing 2 or 3 points ever would. Also, a lot of those upvotes come from duplicate submissions. I don't have detailed info, but probably a significant percent, likely enough to lift them out of the new feed and onto the front page. Or, maybe duplicate submissions shouldn't give the original an automatic upvote? I don't know.
- kenjackson 16y ago
  Or, maybe duplicate submissions shouldn't give the original an automatic upvote? Why shouldn't they? The fact that someone else indepedently thought the article was good to submit seems to be at least as strong a sign of interest as a click of an arror.
  - silentbicycle 16y ago
    The problem here is that it doesn't distinguish between these two cases: 1. Multiple people independently submitted a content they found, because they found it interesting. This is (generally) good. Maybe it's not the community's cup of tea, and gradually fades away, but that's fine. 2. Somebody notices some fresh, overtly linkbait-ish article. They post it ASAP, hoping that fifty other people will be slower on the draw, netting them fifty upvotes. (Those people may be doing it for the same reason.) Either way: fluff gets submitted. Maybe it has fifty upvotes, maybe there are fifty others that just crowded out something really fascinating. This sets up a feedback loop that rewards posting things because they're linkbait, not thought-provoking. I suspect that rewarding duplicate submissions too much tips the scales towards rewarding submitting linkbait. Looking at the new page basically ever backs this up. I don't know if adding a cost to submissions, reducing duplicate-submission karma, penalizing everybody involved for flagged->deleted articles, or what will help, but that seems like the root of the problem, so let's talk about it!

deleted 16y ago

[deleted]

chipsy 16y ago

Hmm. We might take this concept further and make it a "wager" of karma with a minimum bet, and you get gains at some rate proportionate to the size of the bet. But extending it in this way, it would probably also have to have some effect on the front page algorithm for a large bet to ever make sense. Which in turn could lead to a stagnation where elite posters are constantly sinking thousands of karma points into "sure things" and nobody else can compete. Something to think about, in any case.

silentbicycle 16y ago
No, I think at most it should add just the right amount of friction. Rewarding first submits is the real problem, IMHO. It's like, "first post!", except it also drowns out good submissions.

huntero 16y ago

I think this would exacerbate the "comment quality" problem by encouraging people to make lots of sub-par comments so they can gain enough karma to submit their latest blog post.

3dFlatLander 16y ago

Would it really help with spam though? The rewards for a spammer to make it to the first, second, or even third page are probably worth the risk of negative karma. As for duplicate articles, I'm not even really sure what the problem is. Is it duplicate articles (same url, slightly different) that clog up the system? Or is it the same subject being covered from many different sources? There have also been a few times within the last month where two stories about the same topic will be right next to each other on the front page--amazon/apple/other big industry announcements like to do this.

alanh 16y ago
Right, I have to imagine if I were a spammer, I would churn through new accounts fairly regularly anyway. (Not to imply new accounts are always unwanted of spammy — we were all new once…)
nightpool 16y ago
I think most of the problem has to do with the fact that you are spreading upvotes and comments over two pages, rather then having them on one.
silentbicycle 16y ago
I expected that new accounts wouldn't be able to submit anything until they have a couple points of karma (from upvoted comments). The problem is that the main page of the new feed frequently has a max age under an hour (44 min., currently) - if something doesn't get any upvotes by then, it falls off the page and becomes drastically less likely to get any further upvotes. It also can't be resubmitted for several months. Slowing this down would almost certainly be good - quite a few interesting posts get submitted at the wrong time and never get noticed.