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While the idea sounds good, care should be taken that it doesn't mean HN turns into an echo chamber. Sometimes having your idea shot down is the best thing that

by RyanZAG 13y ago

While the idea sounds good, care should be taken that it doesn't mean HN turns into an echo chamber. Sometimes having your idea shot down is the best thing that can happen. Doing a "Show HN" and getting only positive feedback can convince someone to quit their job and work on this new idea full time to disastrous consequences if the idea wasn't that great. "That idea is terrible. X is bad, Y doesn't work. We already have Z." While hostile, it's sometimes the best and most useful advice someone can receive. People who believe their idea is awesome and end up with positive reinforcement, even a simple "looks good, just work on Y a little" can become a major life changing event if that is the most hostile feedback they receive while living in a dream world. In short, I see no reason to force sugar coating on HN. I'd rather have a 'flag' button on individual comments for getting people banned who are being insulting to a person rather than an idea. As it stands, a genuinely useful but 'harsh' comment may never get seen even when it should be.

mindcrime 13y ago
In short, I see no reason to force sugar coating on HN. I'd rather have a 'flag' button on individual comments for getting people banned who are being insulting to a person rather than an idea. As it stands, a genuinely useful but 'harsh' comment may never get seen even when it should be. I have never understood, and probably will never understand, why so many people on HN seem to think "critical" == "insulting" == "harsh". It's possible to criticize someone or their idea without being a dick, but too many people seem to think that "being a dick" is somehow necessary to give "critical feedback". I don't think it is. Rational, reasonable people can disagree and debate, even disagree vehemently, without anyone needing to resort to the kind of comments that often get attacked (the ones where the criticizer is just being a dick). I don't think anyone on HN wants to eliminate constructive feedback or even "negative" comments. The goal is to get the constructive feedback and the criticism while remaining civil. We don't need sugar-coating, we just need people to practice basic manners and remember the Golden Rule. Walk a mile in the other guy's shoes, etc. Have some compassion and empathy. "That idea is terrible." Taken by itself, that's a terrible comment - even if it's true! It's terrible because it lacks any explanation or exposition on why the idea is terrible and, as such, amounts to just an opinion (even if it is, coincidentally, accurate). Why not say instead: "I don't think this idea is going to work, because XXXX" where XXX might be "there are already 374 competitors doing exactly the same thing", or "it takes very specific industry connections to break into that domain", or "it violates the second law of thermodynamics" or whatever?
- __--__ 13y ago
  > I have never understood, and probably will never understand, why so many people on HN seem to think "critical" == "insulting" == "harsh". I think that's the influence of California culture on the startup community. I'm a New Yorker, so harsh for me is telling me if my brother were still alive my app would give him cancer all over again. In California, I've been told I'm being overly critical and harsh for saying I think using node.js wouldn't work for the application and we should try nginx. Some managers I've had even thought I was mad at them because I didn't smile at them enough during the day. For better or worse, people on the west coast are more sensitive to negativity than people from the northeast. Maybe it has something to do with the winters (or lack thereof). :) The point being, the dividing line between destructive and constructive criticism can vary greatly depending on the person and the culture they're from. I guess that's where the voting from pending to live comes into play. It'll be interesting to see where that dividing line lands for the community as a whole.
  - mindcrime 13y ago
    Good point. I'm an East Coast guy myself, and not real in-tune with California culture. Maybe that is a big part of it. Hard to say...
bilbo0s 13y ago
I have to agree with PG here. I guess I just see criticism and incivility as two different things. I think what you are describing is criticism, which is fine, if civil. It's incivility that should be eschewed. I would actually be more inclined to vote civil arguments up if I knew such a system was in place. I also think your hypothetical would-be founder is more likely to get criticism of a higher quality under the circumstances that PG is proposing. "X is bad"... I'd imagine might give way to something more like... "X is requiring three clicks to get done, and at the end, it does Y instead. You guys should look at that funnel." Which is much more helpful. "Y doesn't work"... I could see morphing over time to something more like "Y doesn't work on my Vaio with 8GB RAM running Firefox 23 on Windows 8." There's a bit more information there, and it's still a civil comment. I'm interested to see how it plays out. I could see it being ESPECIALLY good for things like feedback.
6ren 13y ago
It's possible to be critical without being harsh or uncivil. e.g. your example can be shortened to "X is bad, Y doesn't work. We already have Z." And the opinion "bad" could be replaced with its factual/reasoned basis. Of course, praise is sweet and criticism bitter. Let's not sugar-coat it - but let us not poison it either.
jfoster 13y ago
On the other hand, Mark Zuckerberg might've been told "we already have tonnes of social networks; MySpace, Friendster, Orkut, etc." In my experience, people in a dream world usually are not very deterred by what other people tell them, anyway. It seems that they need to go through a series of realizations for themselves.

by RyanZAG 13y ago

mindcrime 13y ago

In short, I see no reason to force sugar coating on HN. I'd rather have a 'flag' button on individual comments for getting people banned who are being insulting to a person rather than an idea. As it stands, a genuinely useful but 'harsh' comment may never get seen even when it should be. I have never understood, and probably will never understand, why so many people on HN seem to think "critical" == "insulting" == "harsh". It's possible to criticize someone or their idea without being a dick, but too many people seem to think that "being a dick" is somehow necessary to give "critical feedback". I don't think it is. Rational, reasonable people can disagree and debate, even disagree vehemently, without anyone needing to resort to the kind of comments that often get attacked (the ones where the criticizer is just being a dick). I don't think anyone on HN wants to eliminate constructive feedback or even "negative" comments. The goal is to get the constructive feedback and the criticism while remaining civil. We don't need sugar-coating, we just need people to practice basic manners and remember the Golden Rule. Walk a mile in the other guy's shoes, etc. Have some compassion and empathy. "That idea is terrible." Taken by itself, that's a terrible comment - even if it's true! It's terrible because it lacks any explanation or exposition on why the idea is terrible and, as such, amounts to just an opinion (even if it is, coincidentally, accurate). Why not say instead: "I don't think this idea is going to work, because XXXX" where XXX might be "there are already 374 competitors doing exactly the same thing", or "it takes very specific industry connections to break into that domain", or "it violates the second law of thermodynamics" or whatever?

__--__ 13y ago
> I have never understood, and probably will never understand, why so many people on HN seem to think "critical" == "insulting" == "harsh". I think that's the influence of California culture on the startup community. I'm a New Yorker, so harsh for me is telling me if my brother were still alive my app would give him cancer all over again. In California, I've been told I'm being overly critical and harsh for saying I think using node.js wouldn't work for the application and we should try nginx. Some managers I've had even thought I was mad at them because I didn't smile at them enough during the day. For better or worse, people on the west coast are more sensitive to negativity than people from the northeast. Maybe it has something to do with the winters (or lack thereof). :) The point being, the dividing line between destructive and constructive criticism can vary greatly depending on the person and the culture they're from. I guess that's where the voting from pending to live comes into play. It'll be interesting to see where that dividing line lands for the community as a whole.
- mindcrime 13y ago
  Good point. I'm an East Coast guy myself, and not real in-tune with California culture. Maybe that is a big part of it. Hard to say...

bilbo0s 13y ago

I have to agree with PG here. I guess I just see criticism and incivility as two different things. I think what you are describing is criticism, which is fine, if civil. It's incivility that should be eschewed. I would actually be more inclined to vote civil arguments up if I knew such a system was in place. I also think your hypothetical would-be founder is more likely to get criticism of a higher quality under the circumstances that PG is proposing. "X is bad"... I'd imagine might give way to something more like... "X is requiring three clicks to get done, and at the end, it does Y instead. You guys should look at that funnel." Which is much more helpful. "Y doesn't work"... I could see morphing over time to something more like "Y doesn't work on my Vaio with 8GB RAM running Firefox 23 on Windows 8." There's a bit more information there, and it's still a civil comment. I'm interested to see how it plays out. I could see it being ESPECIALLY good for things like feedback.

6ren 13y ago

It's possible to be critical without being harsh or uncivil. e.g. your example can be shortened to "X is bad, Y doesn't work. We already have Z." And the opinion "bad" could be replaced with its factual/reasoned basis. Of course, praise is sweet and criticism bitter. Let's not sugar-coat it - but let us not poison it either.

jfoster 13y ago

On the other hand, Mark Zuckerberg might've been told "we already have tonnes of social networks; MySpace, Friendster, Orkut, etc." In my experience, people in a dream world usually are not very deterred by what other people tell them, anyway. It seems that they need to go through a series of realizations for themselves.