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i dont know why people downvote the shit out of me whatever i post. it seems like HN has become a cesspit of idiots... anyway i was very interested to see my co

i dont know why people downvote the shit out of me whatever i post. it seems like HN has become a cesspit of idiots... anyway i was very interested to see my comment validated by this guy https://old.reddit.com/r/robotics/comments/p7t14o/tesla_reveals_its_new_irobot_style_robotic_servant/h9pofm5/ https://old.reddit.com/r/robotics/comments/p7t14o/tesla_reve...

fuzzfactor 5y ago
I don't know about cesspits & idiots, but a little smell can develop that does tend to bring the intellectual level toward the below-average rather than above. For those that want to push downward, the present system highly leverages their ability to do so simply through the process or habit of frequent downvoting. If there is any perception that there was a time when there was very little detectable smell by comparison, it would be good to assess the average downvote-per-user rate then, and compare it to today's figure. Then measure each user along this scale, perhaps including a time component, or relative to activity in some way. Allowing for a reasonable standard deviation, it might be better if frequent downvoters past a certain range had the weight of each downvote normalized and see what happens. This could possibly also be tuned to achieve a target level of discourse relative to a previously-considered-desirable data point in time. Alternatively, users alone appear theoretically able to overcome the issue if there was a widespread concerted or random effort to frequently upvote the comments or postings seen descending, whether fully deserved or not, keeping them at least neutral without having a negative effect on the commenter's rating. Mathematically a small uptick in "compensatory upvoting" habits among average users could bring the target way up as long as the overly-frequent downvoters are in the vast minority. Then when there is true downward consensus it will still always drop through, but those who participate mainly to downvote will have less negative impact. The only thing worse than the "nattering nabobs of negativity" are the non-nattering nabobs of even worse negativity.

fuzzfactor 5y ago

I don't know about cesspits & idiots, but a little smell can develop that does tend to bring the intellectual level toward the below-average rather than above. For those that want to push downward, the present system highly leverages their ability to do so simply through the process or habit of frequent downvoting. If there is any perception that there was a time when there was very little detectable smell by comparison, it would be good to assess the average downvote-per-user rate then, and compare it to today's figure. Then measure each user along this scale, perhaps including a time component, or relative to activity in some way. Allowing for a reasonable standard deviation, it might be better if frequent downvoters past a certain range had the weight of each downvote normalized and see what happens. This could possibly also be tuned to achieve a target level of discourse relative to a previously-considered-desirable data point in time. Alternatively, users alone appear theoretically able to overcome the issue if there was a widespread concerted or random effort to frequently upvote the comments or postings seen descending, whether fully deserved or not, keeping them at least neutral without having a negative effect on the commenter's rating. Mathematically a small uptick in "compensatory upvoting" habits among average users could bring the target way up as long as the overly-frequent downvoters are in the vast minority. Then when there is true downward consensus it will still always drop through, but those who participate mainly to downvote will have less negative impact. The only thing worse than the "nattering nabobs of negativity" are the non-nattering nabobs of even worse negativity.