[willbw]

Is it just me or is this style of comment, where you replicate someone else's comment and change some words to make them appear foolish, tremendously irritating and not conducive to good discussion?

Imagine having a conversation in person where someone parrots back your phrases changing a few nouns. Would you do that?

It is also such a derivative style of commenting, I've seen it many times on HN and I wish people would not recycle it any further.

[BeetleB]

>Is it just me or is this style of comment, where you replicate someone else's comment and change some words to make them appear foolish, tremendously irritating and not conducive to good discussion?

It is useful in some contexts, but pointless in this one. Where I think it is useful is where the original person is stringing together a set of statements which (s)he then claims leads to a conclusion (when it doesn't). So you then construct a similar set of statements, string them together, and make the opposite conclusion. Or string together the opposite statements and make the same conclusion. Presumably the original person will not agree with the conclusion, and the hope is that it becomes apparent that as a result, his original set of statements do not lead to his claimed conclusion. It's hard for that person to debunk your statement without pointing out the flaws in his own logic.

In this case, the original commenter wasn't trying to make a point - just expressing his opinion. It makes no sense to use the tactic here.

[protomyth]

It is a fairly common way to show the opposite (or near opposite) opinion has a weight of its own. It works best when the the original comment is extreme and definitive. It is also not a half bad way to do a self critique of what you are writing to see if you are pushing (although, I must admit when I'm pushing I'm probably not in the mood for self critique :( )

[chrisbennet]

I don’t thunk it makes the OP appear foolish. The replace-the-word technique facilitated seeing the argument from a different perspective.

[ironjunkie]

When done right, it is quite enlightening.

[endgame]

The not-snarky version is "should you reverse any advice you hear?" http://slatestarcodex.com/2014/03/24/should-you-reverse-any-...

[matte_black]

You need to use the right commenting style for the right situations.

This particular style of comment is best used when you want to emphasize that what a person just said is only one perspective and that there exists an equally valid opposing perspective. It works even better if the original post was written with a tone of superiority, though it’s not required. It wouldn’t be surprising to find it commonly used on HN.

[willbw]

You could also just write a regular comment arguing that point. Your approach risks coming across as condescending, and depends upon the reader having the patience to read essentially the exact same comment twice, keeping an eye out for whatever clever substitutions were made.

edit: that being said, I'm more than happy to move on. To each their own

[blunte]

It is quite possible that one may judge a statement as being superior when in fact it was not written as such. In that case, the reader could perhaps have some other emotion (inferiority?) coloring their perception.

Who is to say how the echo style of reply is generally seen, but I find it snarky. It seems less like saying, "I have a quite alternate point of view" and more like saying, "the originally presented view is backwards - here let me show you".

But this is all meta, and HN isn't a forum for us to be debating communication skills. Doing so is more futile amongst a group often known for lacking in communication skills in inverse proportion to their intellectual skills.

[mercutio2]

Complete tangent:

Most studies I’m familiar with find that intellectual skills and communications skills are very correlated (highly g-loaded) in the general population.

Your phrasing using “lacking” and “inverse proportion” could actually be interpreted as agreeing with that in a circuitous fashion, but the rest of the tone makes me think your “lacking” was an editing mistake, you meant the two skills are inversely correlated (apologies if I misunderstood your intent).

But you may be right that HN appeals to the outliers whose communication skills/maturity/desire for internet points don’t match the general population.

[BeetleB]

>But this is all meta, and HN isn't a forum for us to be debating communication skills.

It's as important as any in society, as well as the workplace. You're generally not going to get very far with technical brilliance alone.

>Doing so is more futile amongst a group often known for lacking in communication skills in inverse proportion to their intellectual skills.

Given the number of submissions on the topic in the last month or two, I think the HN crowd would disagree with you.

[qop]

Not if it's got substance to it.

If it's sarcastic and rude, then yeah, but this wasn't that.

The other side of a coin is always bound to be the same size as the first side. A counter point to a point is necessarily similar, rhetorically, to the original point it's refuting.

Also, if you're wishing Internet conversations were more real, perhaps looking somewhere besides the Internet may benefit you Makerspaces have hackers, as do hackathon meetups, conventions, hell, sometimes libraries have resources for computer scientists or enthusiasts.

I like the hn format because of the density and accessibility. If I want to talk to another hacker in meat space I gotta go out, make an appointment with them, inevitably buy them coffee, survive the subway, it's inevitably late, so now this guy thinks I'm a jackass, and I have a urge in the back of my head to check my phone for hn while we are small talking before we can appropriately arrive at the twenty minute chat about whatever before doing the entire routine in reverse.

Or I can just read hn.