Certainly runs of the risk of removing dissenting opinion from the mix, which is unfortunate. For example, if language X has had a new release with a bunch of

Certainly runs of the risk of removing dissenting opinion from the mix, which is unfortunate. For example, if language X has had a new release with a bunch of features and someone posts the announcement to HN, language X users will typically form the majority of the comment pool. Now, when someone comes along that feels differently about language X and the direction it's going in, foundation, etc., naturally the dissenting opinion will be suppressed as pro language X users will be incentivized to not promote the comment, no matter how constructive the comment is, and the dissenter will therefore need to rely on members of the minority (dissenters) to come to the rescue, so to speak, in order for the comment to go live. I prefer to see the _whole_ picture, if something comes up on HN it's important to see the pros and cons, not just the pros of the pro-X-posting crowd (i.e. clique affect). Gut reaction is thumbs down, comment quality on HN is generally quite good, but PG must have seen a need (or had an itch) to implement pending comments. We'll see how it plays out p.s. seems a little heavy handed for the under 1000 karma crowd, which must quite large...