[kwhitefoot]

Hacker news would be greatly improved, in my opinion, if downvotes were accompanied by an explanation. I seem to be seeing a lot more irritating grey text lately and a lot of it seems to be quite unobjectionable so why does it get downvoted.

[PostOnce]

Downvotes aren't supposed to mean "I disagree", they are supposed to mean "this doesn't contribute anything useful or insightful or discussion-furthering to the thread"

Saying "I'm doing this this weekend!" doesn't contribute anything, there's no information of value to be gained from it, nothing to learn, nothing to think about. It was a waste of time to post. So it gets downvoted so the rest of us don't have to spend a second reading a useless comment.

All those useless seconds add up. The downvotes make us all better off in the long run.