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I think the inescapable problem is that this is someone else's heavily moderated (automatically and manually) forum, not a blog or a bulletin board. A thorough
by chaganated 6y ago
I think the inescapable problem is that this is someone else's heavily moderated (automatically and manually) forum, not a blog or a bulletin board.
A thorough well-sourced reply is just as likely to get downvoted/flagged/grayed-out over a disagreement as a low-effort one. With those dynamics, most people aren't going to bother with an effortpost.
Personally, I miss the old bulletin boards. The upvote/downvote approach has become a groupthink amplifier, and this is even more pernicious when unpopular-yet-civil opinions are disappeared.
- jollofricepeas 6y agoThis is a good point. Two ideas. 1. What if comments containing a link to “evidence” were more heavily weighted? The evidence could be inaccurate or biased but that would lead to better conversations than anecdotal information, no? 2. What if the upvote/downvote were categorized? Examples: - “-1 Commenter appears to not have read post, irrelevant”. - “-1 Commenter did not provide link to evidence or source material”. - “+1 Commenter provided link to research/evidence”. There could be a second layer where people could vote on what they perceive as the quality of the evidence. From this perspective, HN could maybe let more controversial and even inflammatory comments stay while letting commenters discuss the merits of the evidence that backs/refutes them. Just an idea but the current lack of innovation in HN moderation feels lazy and half-baked.
- chaganated 6y agoI think the hiding is the worst part. If a post just floats to the bottom, at least it's still there.