As someone with a comment history that could be called combative I (unsurprisingly?) disagree. I'm mostly a lurker. I check HN maybe once a day to see what peo

As someone with a comment history that could be called combative I (unsurprisingly?) disagree. I'm mostly a lurker. I check HN maybe once a day to see what people are thinking about in web tech / entrepreneurship circles. I comment maybe once a month, which is to say I have to think someone's really missing something important, or feel really strongly that something needs to be considered. The emergent behavior of this is polarized: either strong arguments or technical corrections. Imagine you're having a loud discussion at a conference, with a stream of developers walking by. Who's going to stop and talk to you? I think it'll mostly be: 1. Someone who hears a rare misconception they've figured out the answer to 2. Someone who hears you're talking about a fringe technology they are also passionate about 3. Someone who wants to sell you something (depending on who you are: 4. someone who recognizes you, and is excited to meet you in person) If you're commenting on every article, I can maybe see how it would feel like it's "a few bad apples"... but I encourage you to count the number of people you consider "bad apples" -- they probably outnumber the regular commenters 10:1 or more. I think the "bad apples" are just people who don't usually comment, deciding their perspective on whatever is sufficiently valuable to the community that it's worth their time. ("feels important" is of course != "important" -- #include stories about airbnb screwing up) Which is to say, when you put something on the HN homepage you're going to learn about: a ton of rare misconceptions you accidentally relied on, and a bunch of fringe technologies you should have been using / should have known exist. I think I can see why that might feel like being under Sauron's gaze... I just don't think it's malicious, and don't think those commenters are doing it wrong.