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They are long, but not uncivilized. That's the point - HN goes to significant effort to avoid long threads, and in my view a lot of our best information is cont
by yummyfajitas 12y ago
They are long, but not uncivilized. That's the point - HN goes to significant effort to avoid long threads, and in my view a lot of our best information is contained in long threads.
If lack of civility is what we want to avoid, maybe we should target that directly.
- tptacek 12y agoNo, HN doesn't avoid long threads. Incivility is what's being targeted.
- yummyfajitas 12y agoThe post I originally responded to was discussing various ways HN discourages long threads, at least relative to reddit. HN also explicitly penalizes stories with comments >> upvotes, and makes it difficult to reply to longer discussions via exponential backoff procedures (I know you can work around it by clicking the "link").
- scott_s 12y agoThe reply-timer is not aimed at long discussions per-se, but to avoid quick-fire, heated back-and-forths between parties. The idea is that such exchanges are correlated with noise.
- rntz 12y agoIt's not relevant what it's intended to do, but what it does. If it makes long conversations hard, that's a con. (OTOH, if it avoids heated exchange, that's a pro. I don't really have a strong position one way or the other.)