As I mentioned in the article, it's like saying "please read the Wikipedia citations". You can get plenty of benefit from the main Wikipedia article itself, but

As I mentioned in the article, it's like saying "please read the Wikipedia citations". You can get plenty of benefit from the main Wikipedia article itself, but it's nice when the comments are sane and contain signal, as they can help you drill down into the claims of the article and evaluate them. It is definitely optional, comments are like annotations to the article. Counterpoint: sometimes I skip to the HN comments before reading the linked URL to see if there are any major problems / concerns / flaws in the article. Kind of conceptually the same way people use Amazon user reviews when determining if they want to buy a product or not. Crowdsourcing credibility.. The manufacturer (writer) tells one story, the consumers (readers) may tell another. If you want the bigger picture, it is nice to consider both. But you're right that a well written article should stand on its own, the comments shouldn't be necessary to complete the article.