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This phenomenon is why HN shopped showing comment vote counts publicly some years ago. It used to be you would see HN_Favorite_Person with a +X,XXX comment foll
by spiffytech 6y ago
This phenomenon is why HN shopped showing comment vote counts publicly some years ago. It used to be you would see HN_Favorite_Person with a +X,XXX comment followed by Someone_Disagrees with +32, and that set the tone for what the whole site thought, or thought it should think.
There are times I miss public vote counts. While it's nice to assess someone's position just on its merit, it's also useful to factor in how much popular support that opinion has. If I disagree with a position that looks well-endorsed by the community, maybe I should take a second look at the topic and whether my minority position is really correct.
Anecdotally, it also feels like HN has much more prolific hard-line extreme sentiments in the years since hiding comment vote counts. People arguing from a position of ideology rather than constructive pursuit of goals. There could be any number of reasons for that, but I'd bet at least a little of it is that now it's harder to look at an extreme opinion and a moderate one and gauge which (if either) represents broader community sentiment.
The HN community has seemed to broadly support the removal of vote counts; whatever drawbacks the decision has, consensus appears to be that it's a good move.
- hyder_m29 6y ago> There are times I miss public vote counts. While it's nice to assess someone's position just on its merit, it's also useful to factor in how much popular support that opinion has. If I disagree with a position that looks well-endorsed by the community, maybe I should take a second look at the topic and whether my minority position is really correct. It also has the negative impact of discouraging people from voicing their opinion. What I really like about HN is that I could be reading opinions from leaders in the topic field, or someone who is just a hobbyist in the field, without really knowing it. And I get to make my voting decision based on the quality of the content alone.
- scott_s 6y agoI have wondered something similar, even though I also think that eliminating vote counts was a good thing. A possible feature is, per-thread, giving commenters the option of viewing karma for posts, but doing so prevents them from being able to participate in the discussion. I'm not sure how much I like this idea, and it's likely too fiddly for HN's style.
- spiffytech 6y agoI've wondered about the viability of showing a comments score only on that comment's permalink page. Then the info would be available if someone wanted it, but it wouldn't be "in your face" when voting and commenting. There are probably big ways than could break down, but it's interesting to think about.