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Things that are false, mean, or devoid of content (things like: "thanks!", "I agree", or "haha"). Only exception is things already at -1 or below. If a comment
by Xichekolas 18y ago
Things that are false, mean, or devoid of content (things like: "thanks!", "I agree", or "haha"). Only exception is things already at -1 or below.
If a comment is none of those things and below one, I'll mod it up because I don't believe in burying someone you disagree with.
As for things that are blatantly trollish (linkspam, racist, stream of curse words, etc), I'll gladly pile on until they are too faint to read... and usually flag them as well.
- queensnake 18y agoI think meanness in service to a larger cause, ie a site's quality, as opposed to just an arguing tactic, is a good thing. I used to hang out at K5 (when it had traffic) where one finds that meanness to dummies is quite effective at shutting them up. Shutting up dummies is the #1 thing to preserve a site's quality. High quality comments is a fragile thing, imo too rare to ruin with squeamishness about people's feelings. There's a threshold of tolerating bad comments past which you can't do anything anymore (eg, Reddit).
- russell 18y agoI disagree for the most part. HN is a pretty polite place and I prefer it remain so. There are very few trolls that need piling on. Some dummies just need elightenment. http://xkcd.com/386/ http://xkcd.com/386/ guides me.
- Xichekolas 18y agoI'm not against meanness in defense of people's feelings, I'm against it because the only outcome is starting a feud or feeding a troll. Being mean directly degrades a site's quality... in no way does it preserve it. When you say something mean, even to a troll, you become part of the problem.
- queensnake 18y agoIn the short term. In the long term, a witty or angry putdown is quicker, conveys more information and gets its point across more deeply than politeness and downmodding. imo.