It may seem negative to you, and in a particular light I can see that perspective, but you should ask whether those comments truly provide any meaningful contri

It may seem negative to you, and in a particular light I can see that perspective, but you should ask whether those comments truly provide any meaningful contribution to the discussion. I have been seeing everything from "+1" or similar to "Wow that's great", and while positive, they are ultimately useless comments. They don't contribute in any meaningful way to the discussion. I will always downvote anything that doesn't add meaning. We are worried about trolls, but all too often we forget about the happy Flickr effect. This means that if you put up a photo on Flickr, almost 99.9% of the commentary you will get on it will be positive. "That's a great photo, good job, +1, WOW, etc". When all of the feedback on your content is purely negative or purely positive, its effectively meaningless. Our jobs as users of HN is to maintain the traditional high level of discourse as much as possible. That doesn't mean to be assholes or ever-loving angels, but to be in the middle. If you read through my comment history, its a combination of positive and negative. I even recognize that sometimes I forget my own advice and think I come across as too critical or too approving.