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> I get it. Anonymous people on the internet are assholes. What I don't get is how letting anonymous assholes typing things you've seen hundreds of times keep y

by EC1 13y ago

> I get it. Anonymous people on the internet are assholes. What I don't get is how letting anonymous assholes typing things you've seen hundreds of times keep you from finding some signal in the noise is a good idea. There are some great insights to be found out there. The way I see it, is anonymity itself is the problem. I don't bother reading comments anywhere, because the chance of me being "enlightened" is slim to none. I have no idea who is posting, or if what they are posting is true, or who they are. I'm more likely to get quality reading out of books on specific topics I want to learn. Comments are just a waste of time. I think HN is the one place left which still has decent comments.

eitland 13y ago
I guess which sites you visit influences the quality of the comments a whole lot more than anonymity or not. At least my experience is that some of the most thoughtless and intolerant people are the same who will happily post using Facebook login, full name etc.
- eitland 13y ago
  I possibly might answer my own question. It seems we have a non-sandbox discourse installation linked to the article. Which makes me happy.
cgriswald 13y ago
You are effectively anonymous to me. (Granted: It is really pseudonymity.) I know nothing about you. I could check out your comment history to get a little better idea of you as a person, but doing that for every single person whose comments interest me would be time consuming and probably would not provide much benefit. And yet, you've offered ideas here that I may not have considered on my own. I find value in that regardless of whether I ultimately agree, disagree, or choose not to consider it further. HN has a variety of comments, some excellent, some mindless, but most effectively anonymous. So I don't think I can agree that anonymity is the problem. Perhaps the problem is accountability. HN (and really, any comments section that is still worthwhile) has methods for punishing bad behavior and rewarding good behavior. Or maybe we are simply lucky enough to be small enough to not be that interesting to trolls.
- EC1 13y ago
  Actually yeah, I just gave this some thought and you're right. It's accountability. No sites ban users anymore for anything. Except HN.

by EC1 13y ago

eitland 13y ago

I guess which sites you visit influences the quality of the comments a whole lot more than anonymity or not. At least my experience is that some of the most thoughtless and intolerant people are the same who will happily post using Facebook login, full name etc.

eitland 13y ago
I possibly might answer my own question. It seems we have a non-sandbox discourse installation linked to the article. Which makes me happy.

cgriswald 13y ago

You are effectively anonymous to me. (Granted: It is really pseudonymity.) I know nothing about you. I could check out your comment history to get a little better idea of you as a person, but doing that for every single person whose comments interest me would be time consuming and probably would not provide much benefit. And yet, you've offered ideas here that I may not have considered on my own. I find value in that regardless of whether I ultimately agree, disagree, or choose not to consider it further. HN has a variety of comments, some excellent, some mindless, but most effectively anonymous. So I don't think I can agree that anonymity is the problem. Perhaps the problem is accountability. HN (and really, any comments section that is still worthwhile) has methods for punishing bad behavior and rewarding good behavior. Or maybe we are simply lucky enough to be small enough to not be that interesting to trolls.

EC1 13y ago
Actually yeah, I just gave this some thought and you're right. It's accountability. No sites ban users anymore for anything. Except HN.