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This place turned more pedantic than I remembered 5 years ago. The benefit is that sometimes the tangential discussions bring about something interesting but mo

This place turned more pedantic than I remembered 5 years ago. The benefit is that sometimes the tangential discussions bring about something interesting but most times the pedantry is a negative as it just gets people riled up and nitpicking to death. It's also more hostile than I remembered, but oddly people use politeness as some weird passive-aggressive pulpit to combat each other. Replies and comments get seen as personal attacks and others quickly get dismissed as trolls. And when the simplest solution to dealing with anonymous people on the internet vying for fake internet points is just to leave well alone, some -- especially nicks I've seen around from five years ago -- have decided the best way to react is to respond. And poorly at that. It's very much the same catty atmosphere I've encountered when hanging out with my art school friends and their cliques that they endure for their art. But then again, it's the same eternal september problem that was discussed back then, regurgitated every year, and now we're here. That said, there are good signals here and I keep seeing the same advice that people give: ignore the noise. But the challenge is two folds: what is noise and should you really be ignoring it? The first is relative, you decide you own level of involvement but I do have opinions on the second question. I don't think it's right to ignore the negative comments. You can't improve your craft living on good vibes and hugs. So understanding that this place, relative to the rest of the world, is different place, it's both a sanctuary and a padded room. So take the inputs, review them, filter them, and prioritize them. Never internalize the hate but at the same time don't be naive. PS: 17 is young but it's not that young. When I was in the Marine Corps we gave 17 year olds guns and entrusted them to be men and women that can get a job done when need be.

ignostic 14y ago
Why do you think the pedantic comments have become so common? There was one post recently about a breakthrough in cancer research. There was an oncologist in the thread who gave more detail and talked about how exciting the research was, but no one was paying attention to him. All anyone could talk about was whether the headline was or was not misleading. I found myself nodding in agreement at the author's lines: "...most of them just criticized for the sake of criticizing." "They simply hold on to one point and stretch it out, overlooking the fact that the point that they want to make is tangential to the discussion at hand." I couldn't agree more. I have never seen a community where this is so true, nor have I ever understood why.
- Semaphor 14y ago
  The comments on HN are still better than most on Reddit. There have been discussion over discussions how to prevent the quality decay with a larger number of users (I remember the time before I had an account here when people were saying (paraphrased) "Don't link to HN, the riff raff will come"). As far as I know no one found a solution yet.
  - graeham 14y ago
    One option would be non-alias usernames. Youtube seems to think this is the answer to poor-quality comments there, although I can see benefit for some HN posts being anonymous. The world is a tough place and life is too short to get worn down by a few jerks on the internet hiding behind their keyboards. It can be tough to take criticism on work you spend hours writing, and someone writes a nasty comment having spent only minutes or seconds reading it. And even with dozens of good comments, one bad one can make you feel crumby. It is a shame because it discourages people from submitting good content, but I think its best to just ignore bad comments.
    - DanBC 14y ago
      > One option would be non-alias usernames. Youtube seems to think this is the answer to poor-quality comments there YouTube also provides an excellent example of the total failure of the "real names improve comments". I strongly agree with the rest of your comment. Some people are jerks. One technique that it useful to ignore jerks is to take just a few moments to help control the thoughts caused. You sit with the unpleasant thoughts for a few moments. You work out what the "hot thought" is; you work out what the emotion is. You then work out what the evidence is for those, and how strongly you feel it. Then you think about the person making the comment, about why they might have made those comments (are they attacking you for a realistic reason, or are they just attacking a block of text on a screen, etc), you think about the good comments, and then you assess how strongly you still feel your hot thought and emotion. This process should be enough to interrupt the negative thoughts, which can sometimes churn and stay with people.
    - Semaphor 14y ago
nirvana 14y ago
Personally, I've been astounded at the frequency of personal attacks and snotty responses. The signal to noise on HN is something like 1:100. It's sad. I don't comment here anymore simply because there is no point when you never get comments from people who even bothered to read what you wrote or will honestly disagree. Worse there are people who go out on personal vendettas, engage in nothing more than harassment and a form of stalking, and those people are not punished, but dare to post scientific information that disagrees with global warming and you get hellbanned. That's the cause- the moderation is done by unaccountable people who moderate for political correctness at least as much for politeness. Certainly people who cant' muster anything more than personal attacks are allowed to get away with it, while those being attacked are often censored. The people who are the cause of the problem like the situation because their egos are getting stroked, so they see no need to change it. I've solved it for myself-- I just never bother to read the comments these days (for many months at a time.) If there's nothing intelligent said on hacker news comments, why bother with them?
- chris_wot 14y ago
  There's plenty of comments that are enlightening... Is it possible that some of your own comments were a little too blunt or were taken the wrong way because of how they were phrased? I'm disappointed though, I found myself disagreeing with you more than I agree, but you do have an interesting perspective on things. I'd just ignore those who are trolling you.
  - _Simon 14y ago
    Long time reader, second time poster here. I'd agree that that the previous poster is quite blunt, however his biggest crime seems to be being pro Apple, with a negative view of Google, which is no good reason to lambast the chap. To be honest, a lot of the pettiness here is as a result of percieved allegiances to a brand or an ideology. Some of the faux moral outrage exhibited here is amusing and distressing in equal measure.
  - DanBC 14y ago
    nirvana has some opinions around Apple which are seen by some as pure trolling. (Not saying they actually are trolling or should be downvoted or anything else.) nirvana mentions global warming. While it'd be nice if HN could have calm discussions about science it's obvious that HN cannot have calm discussions about a variety of hot-button topics. This is even mentioned in the guidelines which urge against topics which are shallowly but intensely interesting. These are topics where people have already decided their position and they're not going to go into the discussion with an open mind. They're also topics where people tend to want to teach others the "Truth" that is being suppressed. This unfortunate combination means that nirvana gets heavily downvoted on some comments. It is a shame - dissenting opinions (if correctly formed) can be very useful.

ignostic 14y ago

Why do you think the pedantic comments have become so common? There was one post recently about a breakthrough in cancer research. There was an oncologist in the thread who gave more detail and talked about how exciting the research was, but no one was paying attention to him. All anyone could talk about was whether the headline was or was not misleading. I found myself nodding in agreement at the author's lines: "...most of them just criticized for the sake of criticizing." "They simply hold on to one point and stretch it out, overlooking the fact that the point that they want to make is tangential to the discussion at hand." I couldn't agree more. I have never seen a community where this is so true, nor have I ever understood why.

Semaphor 14y ago
The comments on HN are still better than most on Reddit. There have been discussion over discussions how to prevent the quality decay with a larger number of users (I remember the time before I had an account here when people were saying (paraphrased) "Don't link to HN, the riff raff will come"). As far as I know no one found a solution yet.
- graeham 14y ago
  One option would be non-alias usernames. Youtube seems to think this is the answer to poor-quality comments there, although I can see benefit for some HN posts being anonymous. The world is a tough place and life is too short to get worn down by a few jerks on the internet hiding behind their keyboards. It can be tough to take criticism on work you spend hours writing, and someone writes a nasty comment having spent only minutes or seconds reading it. And even with dozens of good comments, one bad one can make you feel crumby. It is a shame because it discourages people from submitting good content, but I think its best to just ignore bad comments.
  - DanBC 14y ago
    > One option would be non-alias usernames. Youtube seems to think this is the answer to poor-quality comments there YouTube also provides an excellent example of the total failure of the "real names improve comments". I strongly agree with the rest of your comment. Some people are jerks. One technique that it useful to ignore jerks is to take just a few moments to help control the thoughts caused. You sit with the unpleasant thoughts for a few moments. You work out what the "hot thought" is; you work out what the emotion is. You then work out what the evidence is for those, and how strongly you feel it. Then you think about the person making the comment, about why they might have made those comments (are they attacking you for a realistic reason, or are they just attacking a block of text on a screen, etc), you think about the good comments, and then you assess how strongly you still feel your hot thought and emotion. This process should be enough to interrupt the negative thoughts, which can sometimes churn and stay with people.
  - Semaphor 14y ago

nirvana 14y ago

Personally, I've been astounded at the frequency of personal attacks and snotty responses. The signal to noise on HN is something like 1:100. It's sad. I don't comment here anymore simply because there is no point when you never get comments from people who even bothered to read what you wrote or will honestly disagree. Worse there are people who go out on personal vendettas, engage in nothing more than harassment and a form of stalking, and those people are not punished, but dare to post scientific information that disagrees with global warming and you get hellbanned. That's the cause- the moderation is done by unaccountable people who moderate for political correctness at least as much for politeness. Certainly people who cant' muster anything more than personal attacks are allowed to get away with it, while those being attacked are often censored. The people who are the cause of the problem like the situation because their egos are getting stroked, so they see no need to change it. I've solved it for myself-- I just never bother to read the comments these days (for many months at a time.) If there's nothing intelligent said on hacker news comments, why bother with them?

chris_wot 14y ago
There's plenty of comments that are enlightening... Is it possible that some of your own comments were a little too blunt or were taken the wrong way because of how they were phrased? I'm disappointed though, I found myself disagreeing with you more than I agree, but you do have an interesting perspective on things. I'd just ignore those who are trolling you.
- _Simon 14y ago
  Long time reader, second time poster here. I'd agree that that the previous poster is quite blunt, however his biggest crime seems to be being pro Apple, with a negative view of Google, which is no good reason to lambast the chap. To be honest, a lot of the pettiness here is as a result of percieved allegiances to a brand or an ideology. Some of the faux moral outrage exhibited here is amusing and distressing in equal measure.
- DanBC 14y ago
  nirvana has some opinions around Apple which are seen by some as pure trolling. (Not saying they actually are trolling or should be downvoted or anything else.) nirvana mentions global warming. While it'd be nice if HN could have calm discussions about science it's obvious that HN cannot have calm discussions about a variety of hot-button topics. This is even mentioned in the guidelines which urge against topics which are shallowly but intensely interesting. These are topics where people have already decided their position and they're not going to go into the discussion with an open mind. They're also topics where people tend to want to teach others the "Truth" that is being suppressed. This unfortunate combination means that nirvana gets heavily downvoted on some comments. It is a shame - dissenting opinions (if correctly formed) can be very useful.