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I really like your reasoning. The only problem I see is that if everyone did what you propose, we wouldn't have Hacker News at all (upvotes, in the end, must co

I really like your reasoning. The only problem I see is that if everyone did what you propose, we wouldn't have Hacker News at all (upvotes, in the end, must come from somewhere). So from a Kantian ethical point of view, it doesn't really work. There ought to be a better solution. But on a personal level, I wholeheartedly agree

carrotcarrot 4y ago
The majority of users don't comment anyways.
- jerlam 4y ago
  Sometimes it is shocking how few upvotes you need to get to the HN frontpage.
  - carrotcarrot 4y ago
    It's shocking on many platforms. I can't find a citation but I swear I read a study (or small experiment, more likely) which showed the first two votes determine the fate of most posts on reddit. You can use bots on twitter to similarly guide "the hivemind", I receny learned the intelligence term for this practice is "consensus cracking". There's even guides on the internet: https://edith.reisen/computers/security/forum_shills.html https://edith.reisen/computers/security/forum_shills.html
    - largepeepee 4y ago
      Depends on how active is the subreddit and heavily botted it is. Using wsb as an example, you used to see quality posts with 20 upvotes then the 2020s roll around, bots and scrawlers started inflating the needed numbers and even with thousand of upvotes, some posts were blatant ads after wsb proved it had alot of wealthy eyes. The main pages of reddit have the same problems full of bots that flood into selected posts almost immediately after it gets posted, this is especially obvious during election years, where billions are burned to "let us discover what the popular concensus is".
MattyRad 4y ago
I take your point. But note that I'm here upvoting and commenting still! I saw the link to this article in my RSS feed, and I took the time to open a browser, find the link, and comment because RSS adoption is something that I genuinely want to have a conversation about. Which means that with RSS, you can still be a part of the community, you just won't reflexively upvote or spend time in the comments section.
- 6510 4y ago
  Comment sections should have their own feed. Just like sub forums, users and search queries. Each comment could have its own feed of replies. Sometimes an uninteresting website has a very interesting article. This is specially great for supper niche stuff. An empty feed should not draw much attention in a reader. The single comment posted years later could be really useful. There is also <comment> https://validator.w3.org/feed/docs/rss2.html#ltcommentsgtSubelementOfLtitemgt https://validator.w3.org/feed/docs/rss2.html#ltcommentsgtSub...
toxicFork 4y ago
"if everyone did X" should automatically evaluate to "false".

carrotcarrot 4y ago

The majority of users don't comment anyways.

jerlam 4y ago
Sometimes it is shocking how few upvotes you need to get to the HN frontpage.
- carrotcarrot 4y ago
  It's shocking on many platforms. I can't find a citation but I swear I read a study (or small experiment, more likely) which showed the first two votes determine the fate of most posts on reddit. You can use bots on twitter to similarly guide "the hivemind", I receny learned the intelligence term for this practice is "consensus cracking". There's even guides on the internet: https://edith.reisen/computers/security/forum_shills.html https://edith.reisen/computers/security/forum_shills.html
  - largepeepee 4y ago
    Depends on how active is the subreddit and heavily botted it is. Using wsb as an example, you used to see quality posts with 20 upvotes then the 2020s roll around, bots and scrawlers started inflating the needed numbers and even with thousand of upvotes, some posts were blatant ads after wsb proved it had alot of wealthy eyes. The main pages of reddit have the same problems full of bots that flood into selected posts almost immediately after it gets posted, this is especially obvious during election years, where billions are burned to "let us discover what the popular concensus is".

MattyRad 4y ago

I take your point. But note that I'm here upvoting and commenting still! I saw the link to this article in my RSS feed, and I took the time to open a browser, find the link, and comment because RSS adoption is something that I genuinely want to have a conversation about. Which means that with RSS, you can still be a part of the community, you just won't reflexively upvote or spend time in the comments section.

6510 4y ago
Comment sections should have their own feed. Just like sub forums, users and search queries. Each comment could have its own feed of replies. Sometimes an uninteresting website has a very interesting article. This is specially great for supper niche stuff. An empty feed should not draw much attention in a reader. The single comment posted years later could be really useful. There is also <comment> https://validator.w3.org/feed/docs/rss2.html#ltcommentsgtSubelementOfLtitemgt https://validator.w3.org/feed/docs/rss2.html#ltcommentsgtSub...

toxicFork 4y ago

"if everyone did X" should automatically evaluate to "false".