[pdonis]

> HN is kinda dying as a community

I've been here almost 10 years now, and I don't think so. I think the overall quality has remained about the same.

> Being able to downvote replies without any refutation, to me, seems like a massive mistake

If downvoting is going to be used just to express disagreement, I agree it's too easy to do. (A number of commenters have posted links to comments by pg where he has said that's what downvoting is for, but I still think it's too broad.)

If downvoting is going to be used only for posts that are seen as adding no value to the discussion or the site, that's a much narrower category, and it doesn't really lend itself to "refutation".

> it just teaches people not to say anything interesting

The way around that is to build up enough karma that you don't care if you get downvoted. Of course, then you have to police yourself by not saying unpopular things just to be difficult, but only if you genuinely think they need to be said and are adding something to the discussion and the site. But people who have built up enough karma are going to have learned to do that anyway.

[microcolonel]

> Of course, then you have to police yourself by not saying unpopular things just to be difficult, but only if you genuinely think they need to be said and are adding something to the discussion and the site.

It seems like you're impugning their motives here.

Do you honestly think that most people whose thoughtful comments are downvoted are engaging in bad faith, “saying unpopular things just to be difficult”?

[pdonis]

> Do you honestly think that most people whose thoughtful comments are downvoted are engaging in bad faith, “saying unpopular things just to be difficult”?

No. Remember that I was talking about a particular subset of users: the ones who have enough karma that they don't care if they get downvoted. In order to get that much karma, such a user will have already made a lot of thoughtful comments that were made in good faith. I was just observing that, once a user has enough karma not to care if they get downvoted, the feedback mechanism that regulated their behavior up to that point--karma--no longer has much impact. When put in that kind of position, it has been known to happen that a person might change their behavior. But I would hope and expect that a change for the worse under those circumstances would be rare.

[microcolonel]

I guess I just disagree that the behaviour required to gain a karma cushion is "good", or "better" than the behaviour that stagnates or moderately shrinks karma.

I personally think that playing in to the echo chamber is a subtler form of abuse; making the people in the community progressively more unhealthy by carefully avoiding anything that looks or feels challenging.

I don't think a healthy community is one which encourages people to fat eachother up on sweet nothings and uncontroversial shower thoughts.

It seems to me that the most popular replies are often the ones which present an obvious, widely-held opinion as though it's controversial outside the group; which enables holders of the majority opinion to think of themselves as underdogs and free thinkers.

I think a lot of harm is done by rewarding people for defending the majority opinion as though it's controversial.

[pdonis]

> I guess I just disagree that the behaviour required to gain a karma cushion is "good", or "better" than the behaviour that stagnates or moderately shrinks karma.

It seems like you think that upvotes are not being used to identify posts that add value, but simply as a signal of agreement with groupthink. Am I reading that right?

Also, do you think that downvotes are similarly misused? (I.e., to slap down controversial but value-add posts?)

My own experience is that the posts of mine that have gotten lots of upvotes have been thoughtful ones, not simple "party line" ones, and the posts of mine that have gotten downvotes have been thoughtful ones as well--just thoughtful ones that the majority disagreed with but didn't have any good refutations of. But my experience might not be typical. It is certainly more plausible on its face that both upvotes and downvotes would be misused, than that downvotes would be misused but upvotes would not.

[microcolonel]

> It seems like you think that upvotes are not being used to identify posts that add value, but simply as a signal of agreement with groupthink. Am I reading that right?

Put simply, no.

[pdonis]

Then I'm afraid I don't understand what point you're trying to make.

[kevin_thibedeau]

I made a generic, non-specific comment about people using religion to manipulate and swindle a few weeks ago. As expected it got -4 because it had too many trigger words for the snowflakes. Then it was flagged into oblivion. I don't mind harsh downvote even when unmerited. What shouldn't be allowed is groupthink as an excuse for completely erasing non-incendiary discourse.