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In fact it seems like a no brainer decision. Why should a day 1 account be able to downvote content?

by Graffur 6y ago

paxys 6y ago
Why should a day 1 account be able to upvote content? They both ultimately have the same impact.
- Dumblydorr 6y ago
  Well, you can use a bunch of troll accounts to downvote people who disagree with you. Meanwhile, troll accounts up voting a bad post would put it neutral or slightly positive, I'd guess.
- stevenhuang 6y ago
  I imagine it promotes discourse by encouraging discussion instead of shallow dismissals by downvoting.
- bitshiftfaced 6y ago
  I think people tend to downvote out of negative emotion but more likely upvote out of genuine interest. All it takes is one bad actor to downvote a comment early and it may never again gain enough visibility to get the position it actually deserves. On the other hand, the absence of upvoting keeps the comment at a neutral level. Its speed of losing visibility can't be unfairly accelerated, and so it has a chance at competing with comments of the same level.
- busymom0 6y ago
  If a new account can neither upvote nor downvote, then wouldn't it be a catch 22 where no one ever gains any karma? Also as someone else pointed out, people often downvote for political purposes whereas the only reason I can think of someone abusing upvotes would be for spam which gets handled by HN's filters pretty well.
r00fus 6y ago
There's a lot more. You shouldn't be able to downvote replies to your post. Rate limits. Metamoderation. Hell/shadowbanning. Most good forums rely on an active superadmin moderation a lot - when that goes away or is unreliable the site dies.
- CaptainZapp 6y ago
  > There's a lot more. You shouldn't be able to downvote replies to your post. You're not allowed to do that anyway. You can only upvote direct replies to a comment of yours.
pwr33 6y ago
Because someone who created an account yesterday is no better or worse than anyone else. I've been here for well over 10 years and this place has always been filled with complete buffoons and parasites.

In fact it seems like a no brainer decision. Why should a day 1 account be able to downvote content?

paxys 6y ago

Why should a day 1 account be able to upvote content? They both ultimately have the same impact.

Dumblydorr 6y ago
Well, you can use a bunch of troll accounts to downvote people who disagree with you. Meanwhile, troll accounts up voting a bad post would put it neutral or slightly positive, I'd guess.
stevenhuang 6y ago
I imagine it promotes discourse by encouraging discussion instead of shallow dismissals by downvoting.
bitshiftfaced 6y ago
I think people tend to downvote out of negative emotion but more likely upvote out of genuine interest. All it takes is one bad actor to downvote a comment early and it may never again gain enough visibility to get the position it actually deserves. On the other hand, the absence of upvoting keeps the comment at a neutral level. Its speed of losing visibility can't be unfairly accelerated, and so it has a chance at competing with comments of the same level.
busymom0 6y ago
If a new account can neither upvote nor downvote, then wouldn't it be a catch 22 where no one ever gains any karma? Also as someone else pointed out, people often downvote for political purposes whereas the only reason I can think of someone abusing upvotes would be for spam which gets handled by HN's filters pretty well.

r00fus 6y ago

There's a lot more. You shouldn't be able to downvote replies to your post. Rate limits. Metamoderation. Hell/shadowbanning. Most good forums rely on an active superadmin moderation a lot - when that goes away or is unreliable the site dies.

CaptainZapp 6y ago
> There's a lot more. You shouldn't be able to downvote replies to your post. You're not allowed to do that anyway. You can only upvote direct replies to a comment of yours.

pwr33 6y ago

Because someone who created an account yesterday is no better or worse than anyone else. I've been here for well over 10 years and this place has always been filled with complete buffoons and parasites.