[mbreese]

This goes back a lot farther with Ars. They done this for years because their comments section is driven by forum software. The main conversations happen in the forums. They are then reformatted for a the comment view.

So, their main goal wasn’t to hide the comments, but push people to forums where there is a better format for conversation.

At least that’s how it used to work.

[bombcar]

The Ars forums used to be incredibly useful sources of information - many of their best authors "grew" from forum posters; and the comments sections on articles were quite informative and had serious comments from actual experts - and discussion!

Then the Soap Box took over the entire site and all that's left is standard Internet garbage.