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No, it is better to get comments, even emotional and not well written. Because with comments I might understand where I was wrong, or at least know where exactl

No, it is better to get comments, even emotional and not well written. Because with comments I might understand where I was wrong, or at least know where exactly my opponent disagrees with me, because it I could have written a wall of text, not every sentence of it is wrong. Even a comment like "fuck you you are dumb bastard hateful shit" tells me much more than a downvote. With comment like that I know that the opponent is not interested in productive conversation, so I move on. And if people downvotes because they are emotional, this is not the place where I'd like to participate in discussions. I'm interested in the grown up respectful dispute and the extending each other world view. A place where everyone agrees with each other is boring and a waste of time.

dec0dedab0de 5y ago
A place where everyone agrees with each other is boring and a waste of time. If everyone agreed there would be no need for voting, or even for comments. Very rarely do people gang up and down vote someone to oblivion, usually controversial opinions are up and down throughout the day. Plus there is a max amount of karma you can lose from down voting anyway, I think it's 5. It basically only affects new users who are out of line, or are trying to be provocative. I think it's the main thing that keeps HN the best forum on the internet. Well, third best thing behind dang, and sctb. edit: also, HN is generally geared towards less comments of a higher quality. The biggest example is that if comments exceed votes by a certain amount, the story is automatically dropped from the front page.
- asteroidbelt 5y ago
  > Very rarely do people gang up and down vote someone to oblivion, usually controversial opinions are up and down throughout the day. No, they don't gang up, but they share beliefs, and they downvote independently. > there is a max amount of karma you can lose from down voting anyway Even if it is true, it is per comment. And if it is a long thread, like 10 messages, 3 people routinely scrolling down the thread and downvoting all comments without reading the arguments, decrease karma by 30. > It basically only affects new users who are out of line, or are trying to be provocative. I'm getting downvoted each time I say something controversial, like Amazon is good for the world, lower taxes for rich people is good, or it was only 19 people unarmed black people killed by police in the last year, or Rust project has these problems: 1, 2, 3. You may consider it provocative though, as any opinion outside of what is accepted by majority might be considered controversial. And this is the problem. HN (and generally systems with downvoting) promote groupthink and narrow set of allowed opinions. Edit: I saw the same effect on the other side. There was a thread, where each of my opponent comment was downvoted (by someone else). Obviously I didn't agree with the commenter, the comments were mostly wrong in my opinion, but I enjoyed the conversation, arguments were well presented, and that downvoting was not helpful. Just someone decided the commenter must be punished for holding their opinion. > I think it's the main thing that keeps HN the best forum on the internet. No it's not. The best thing it is geek-friendly, only text without bells and whistles, so it deters common internet folks.
giantrobot 5y ago
> Because with comments I might understand where I was wrong Someone can disagree with you without you being wrong. If you think they are wrong in their response...what good is being done? If you both have intractable positions then more discussion on the topic is just lengthening scroll bars. Additionally if I disagree with you or just think you're wrong I don't owe you any explanation of that. You don't have a right to my time because we disagree. It's not my job to convince you. I may choose to reply to you (as I obviously just have) but it's my choice entirely. You may reply back to me and I may never ever read it, I don't have any requirement to do so.
- asteroidbelt 5y ago
  > You don't have a right to my time because we disagree. It's not my job to convince you. Yes, but it is in HN (and HN community) best interest to incentivize you to reply. That's why downvotes are harmful.

dec0dedab0de 5y ago

A place where everyone agrees with each other is boring and a waste of time. If everyone agreed there would be no need for voting, or even for comments. Very rarely do people gang up and down vote someone to oblivion, usually controversial opinions are up and down throughout the day. Plus there is a max amount of karma you can lose from down voting anyway, I think it's 5. It basically only affects new users who are out of line, or are trying to be provocative. I think it's the main thing that keeps HN the best forum on the internet. Well, third best thing behind dang, and sctb. edit: also, HN is generally geared towards less comments of a higher quality. The biggest example is that if comments exceed votes by a certain amount, the story is automatically dropped from the front page.

asteroidbelt 5y ago
> Very rarely do people gang up and down vote someone to oblivion, usually controversial opinions are up and down throughout the day. No, they don't gang up, but they share beliefs, and they downvote independently. > there is a max amount of karma you can lose from down voting anyway Even if it is true, it is per comment. And if it is a long thread, like 10 messages, 3 people routinely scrolling down the thread and downvoting all comments without reading the arguments, decrease karma by 30. > It basically only affects new users who are out of line, or are trying to be provocative. I'm getting downvoted each time I say something controversial, like Amazon is good for the world, lower taxes for rich people is good, or it was only 19 people unarmed black people killed by police in the last year, or Rust project has these problems: 1, 2, 3. You may consider it provocative though, as any opinion outside of what is accepted by majority might be considered controversial. And this is the problem. HN (and generally systems with downvoting) promote groupthink and narrow set of allowed opinions. Edit: I saw the same effect on the other side. There was a thread, where each of my opponent comment was downvoted (by someone else). Obviously I didn't agree with the commenter, the comments were mostly wrong in my opinion, but I enjoyed the conversation, arguments were well presented, and that downvoting was not helpful. Just someone decided the commenter must be punished for holding their opinion. > I think it's the main thing that keeps HN the best forum on the internet. No it's not. The best thing it is geek-friendly, only text without bells and whistles, so it deters common internet folks.

giantrobot 5y ago

> Because with comments I might understand where I was wrong Someone can disagree with you without you being wrong. If you think they are wrong in their response...what good is being done? If you both have intractable positions then more discussion on the topic is just lengthening scroll bars. Additionally if I disagree with you or just think you're wrong I don't owe you any explanation of that. You don't have a right to my time because we disagree. It's not my job to convince you. I may choose to reply to you (as I obviously just have) but it's my choice entirely. You may reply back to me and I may never ever read it, I don't have any requirement to do so.

asteroidbelt 5y ago
> You don't have a right to my time because we disagree. It's not my job to convince you. Yes, but it is in HN (and HN community) best interest to incentivize you to reply. That's why downvotes are harmful.