[p333347]

I wonder how you deal with remarks made by known people in real life where there isn't this obscuring mechanism. If you have a plan to deal with that, the same can be applied here.

Personally, having a "blue tick" like thing for distinguished posters is helpful psychologically as it reassures me that I am not reading comments by newly minted young adult or a 20+ years experienced person doing mostly rote work. Now, there is nothing inherently bad about comments made by such posters, just that it would be far more reassuring to know that a poster is, hopefully, bringing in his publicly acknowledged experience into what he is saying, especially on topics in which that person is known for. To make it clear, they could even be a 20 something distinguished person! The point is not about age but about accomplishment.

[khedoros1]

> it reassures me that I am not reading comments by newly minted young adult or a 20+ years experienced person doing mostly rote work.

What does that matter, if the comment is good? Nothing is inherently bad about those comments, just like nothing is inherently good about others.

Rather than a blue tick in the comment thread, it might be useful to have something like that inside their user profile. For example, animats has "John Nagle" in his "about" field. Having the information available but not initially visible might be valuable to help support claims like "As one of the early workers on network congestion" without coloring the interpretation of statements outside of his area of expertise (basically, avoiding attaching an "argument to authority" fallacy to every celebrity-posted comment).

edit: Bah, just saw your later comment where you suggested a similar mechanism. Sorry.

[p333347]

You quoted me "it reassures me that I am not reading comments by newly minted young adult or a 20+ years experienced person doing mostly rote work." and said "What does that matter, if the comment is good? Nothing is inherently bad about those comments, just like nothing is inherently good about others."

I can't believe you were so eager to respond to me that you didn't continue reading my post. I answer your query like in the very next sentence.

[khedoros1]

I read the whole post several times before responding, and re-read over parts of it while responding. I just don't think that you provided a well-justified reason. Why is reassurance a good thing? That seems like it'd imply that you're relaxing your guard when considering their opinion.

[p333347]

> I just don't think that you provided a well-justified reason

I was implying something like why reading something from a textbook is better than a random answer on reddit or yahoo answers. Mind you, I am talking about posters talking about specific things, not giving opinions on a variety of things, which is why I mentioned "topics in which they are known for".

> Why is reassurance a good thing?

I prefaced my post with "personally" specifically to avoid this line of discussion. It is a personal perception, and as I said elsewhere it is futile to argue about perceptions. The answer is, it just is.

> That seems like it'd imply that you're relaxing your guard when considering their opinion.

That's reaching.

[Klathmon]

If it's important to the conversation, the commenter can point out their own past experience (which Animats did by saying "As one of the early workers on network congestion").

Just because it's difficult to remove the "person" from the "message" in face-to-face conversation doesn't mean we can't strive for something better online.

I have a very relevant example! A few days ago I was reading a comment here about someone that drinks tap water and how (anecdotally) they are fine, and they didn't understand the craze with bottled water. Being completely honest, I made a "mental picture" of him as a mid 20's "hipster" silicon-valley type. And I agreed with his overall message. But halfway through his comment, he had a link to his "beverage container of choice" that he drinks water from. I read the whole comment before opening that link. I had assumed that it would point to a glass and leather "artisan" water bottle... The link pointed to something similar to this:

http://assets.suredone.com/1766/media-photos/sd009014-vintag...

After opening the link, my whole view changed. Suddenly that "mental image" changed into a mid 40's overweight sysadmin, and (as much as I'm ashamed to say it), I suddenly "trusted" their message less...

I realized what had just happened, and I realized that just thinking I knew who this person was affected my thinking. If I had known that person's age, size, gender, profession, etc... Would I have given their message a second thought? Honestly I don't think I would have. And that makes me feel like shit. I have prejudisms (is that a word?) that I don't consciously know I have, and if possible I'd like to not apply them. Reading HN comments as faceless-nameless comments helps me read the message with none of that "baggage". And if I later read about the person behind the comment (and learn that it's not what I expected), it can go a long way toward reducing the prejudice that I may have that I don't even know I have.

[p333347]

It seems we have quite different ways of looking at things, so it would be futile, and honestly unnecessary, to debate on that.

> If it's important to the conversation, the commenter can point out their own past experience (which Animats did by saying "As one of the early workers on network congestion").

This is basically what I was trying to convey. By making it known via some mechanism, HN would help posters from repeatedly posting their credentials before saying something deep and insightful or unpopular. A mechanism that isn't obvious, as in a button that makes something else visible that shows something about a distinguished poster, would benefit both parties I think.

[khedoros1]

> prejudisms

Are you looking for "prejudices"?