[version_five]

I find HN has a better SNR than any other user discussion I've read on the internet. Arguing against points addressed in the article seems like a good thing to me (maybe I misunderstand though and you mean people are missing objective facts). My biggest criticism of the discussions is that there usually isnt much diversity of opinion for controversial topics and most outside a narrow range get downvoted. I think diversity would get worse if there were more barriers to commenting.

[jgwil2]

I think the complaint is that people routinely rehash points that were already addressed in the article, because they didn't bother reading it in the first place.