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It's not much, but when I see posts that are downvoted for no discernable reason (assuming good faith on the poster), I'll usually throw them an upvote to bring

It's not much, but when I see posts that are downvoted for no discernable reason (assuming good faith on the poster), I'll usually throw them an upvote to bring them a bit out of grey. It's not much, but if I'm having a crap day and something I say it getting downvoted, I feel a little better when it ticks up a notch, knowing at least one person isn't trying to just bomb my post. It's basically the tiniest little gift I like to give to people, heh. I also think that, if enough people put that upvote in, the community could shift how it reacts to things. Just my two cents

rootlocus 11y ago
> It's not much, but if I'm having a crap day and something I say it getting downvoted, I feel a little better when it ticks up a notch, knowing at least one person isn't trying to just bomb my post. It's basically the tiniest little gift I like to give to people, heh. I think you're too concerned about what strangers think and do around the internet. Most people will "bomb" your subjective side of the argument (the snarky, mean, remarks), and not the underlying idea. I've found out that conveying your arguments while avoiding personal, subjective, attacks is a much better way of getting your point across, since people are more receptive if they don't get the impression they need to be defensive.
- deleted 11y ago
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- doorhammer 11y ago
  Yeah. Part of "good faith" for me is that the person isn't being discernibly or overtly aggressive, mean, or sarcastic. Basically, if you're being an asshole, I don't feel a need to save you from yourself. There aren't many (if any) formal guidelines for comment voting on HN, so this is me driving at what I want out of the community. I don't speak for everyone. For my part, I want civility, and to encourage people to contribute their opinions, popular or not. The polite responses to misinformed ideas are often some of the most educational, at least for me, and so I'd like an environment where anxiety about the chance of being wrong is low for everyone. I also don't want any of this to sound like an indictment of hacker news. I keep coming back here because I think the community is really top notch, and the signal to noise ratio is high. Commenting systems and forums have had these problems for ages, and they're hard problems. I just wanted to add my voice to the crowd.
jorgearturo 11y ago
>> assuming good faith on the poster haha I get it. And that's also very kind of you. I do it too sometimes, trying not to lose perspective of the true purpose of the conversation taking place of course; a single upvote in a bombarded comment won't cause detriment to the conversation but it will provide some motivation for the participant to keep trying to participate (assuming good faith on the poster, as well). For example in StackOverflow, if I notice a -1 post but the post has some value, I'll upvote it even if it wasn't particularly useful for my issue, in order to give it a chance to be reevaluated without a negative bias of that -1 I find it a bit funny/curios on why we do such things. I've always known I'm not the only one doing that, it's one of those unsaid things that happen on the net, part of its culture.

rootlocus 11y ago

> It's not much, but if I'm having a crap day and something I say it getting downvoted, I feel a little better when it ticks up a notch, knowing at least one person isn't trying to just bomb my post. It's basically the tiniest little gift I like to give to people, heh. I think you're too concerned about what strangers think and do around the internet. Most people will "bomb" your subjective side of the argument (the snarky, mean, remarks), and not the underlying idea. I've found out that conveying your arguments while avoiding personal, subjective, attacks is a much better way of getting your point across, since people are more receptive if they don't get the impression they need to be defensive.

deleted 11y ago
[deleted]
doorhammer 11y ago
Yeah. Part of "good faith" for me is that the person isn't being discernibly or overtly aggressive, mean, or sarcastic. Basically, if you're being an asshole, I don't feel a need to save you from yourself. There aren't many (if any) formal guidelines for comment voting on HN, so this is me driving at what I want out of the community. I don't speak for everyone. For my part, I want civility, and to encourage people to contribute their opinions, popular or not. The polite responses to misinformed ideas are often some of the most educational, at least for me, and so I'd like an environment where anxiety about the chance of being wrong is low for everyone. I also don't want any of this to sound like an indictment of hacker news. I keep coming back here because I think the community is really top notch, and the signal to noise ratio is high. Commenting systems and forums have had these problems for ages, and they're hard problems. I just wanted to add my voice to the crowd.

jorgearturo 11y ago

>> assuming good faith on the poster haha I get it. And that's also very kind of you. I do it too sometimes, trying not to lose perspective of the true purpose of the conversation taking place of course; a single upvote in a bombarded comment won't cause detriment to the conversation but it will provide some motivation for the participant to keep trying to participate (assuming good faith on the poster, as well). For example in StackOverflow, if I notice a -1 post but the post has some value, I'll upvote it even if it wasn't particularly useful for my issue, in order to give it a chance to be reevaluated without a negative bias of that -1 I find it a bit funny/curios on why we do such things. I've always known I'm not the only one doing that, it's one of those unsaid things that happen on the net, part of its culture.