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The problem with linking karma to up/down votes is that it prevents people from posting anything that is contrary to popular opinion and therefore downvoted, ev
by _mulder_ 12y ago
The problem with linking karma to up/down votes is that it prevents people from posting anything that is contrary to popular opinion and therefore downvoted, even if it may be well thought out or, shock horror, factually accurate too!!
The end result is an ever increasing alignment of 'group-think' where popular opinions are boosted and differing opinions are hidden.
Up/down voters just need to take a second and consider what they're voting for. If it's just because they agree, then don't. If they agree and they've learned something new, then do. If they disagree and but they think the arguments are well presented or they've learned something new, upvote.
Down voting should be reserved only for inappropriate comments, not disagreement.
- normloman 12y agoI don't even see the point of karma. It's like fake internet points that mean noting. I have a karma of 583 on HN. What does that mean exactly? What can I do with 583 that I couldn't do before? To me, it's just a pointless scoreboard for how popular my opinions are. It gives me incentive to post a karma-baiting comment once in a while, so I get a burst of dopamine whenever the number jumps by 10 or more. But back to my main point: When everything is majority rules, with no checks and balances, society collapses into mob rule. Why would it be any different with upvote/downvote? We're not going to solve this by asking users to think before they click downvote. We should consider removing the upvote/downvote altogether.