[terrapinbear]

How come others get to downvote my comments but I don't like-wise? This is what's hurting HN. Black box phenomenon like this. No information about the commenting process. Maybe reddit is on to something after all. The designer of this site is one arrogant sob.

[jat850]

At the risk of further degenerating into meta discussion, I'll answer your question: Downvoting privileges are opened up at a certain karma threshold. The number has changed a number of times in the past and I believe it's currently at around a floor of 500-600 karma.

There are guidelines surrounding commenting/submissions here: http://ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

[Natsu]

Also, note that you cannot downvote anyone who replies to you.

[alanh]

Or posts older than a day or two, I believe.

[calinet6]

This just in: "Pointless Arguments Over What's Hurting Hacker News are Hurting Hacker News."

Just knock it off and get back to posting interesting discussion. If you're not doing that, you're contributing to the "hurting of HN." And I'm well within my understanding of hypocrisy and irony to be aware of the fact that I'm committing this exact fault, so thanks for pointing that out, you're so intelligent.

[drivebyacct2]

What does Paul Graham have to do with people downvoting you. It's a policy to help with people reflexively downvoting and it encourages people to become positive contributors before they can moderate others. It's a public policy. It's no conspiracy.