It would be really awesome if when you downvoted a person, only the down arrow vanished. If you then upvote them, it cancels the downvote and both arrows are there. Likewise, if you upvote someone, only the up arrow vanished and a subsequent downvote would cancel the upvote. Doing either one again would finalize the action and both arrows vanish. This would give you one "oopsie" per comment and not allow people to just mess with the system by repeatedly clicking up/down/up/down.
"Someone said something that actively works against improving the direction of the conversation."
This includes what I assume the "mean/racist/sexist" choice refers to -- obnoxiousness that raises the level of antagonism with no corresponding up-side. It also includes not only the useless comments (thanks, cool story bro), but also the kind of silly joke comments that invariably turn into threads where the participants are primarily showcasing their cleverness and entertaining themselves, rather than shedding light on the subject. Everyone is generally better off letting reddit be the designated location for that sort of thing.
I agree with this. When someone posts something blatantly false in a matter of fact way I feel downvoting is a public service in the sense you are averting eyeballs from it.
I'd also say that if at that point no one else has corrected the person, you should.
Some comments are wrong but interesting, it's a common error or an error on a strange case. I try to vote a correction reply or write a comment explaining the error.
Some comments are extremely wrong, as "If you plant a fried potato, you get a fried potato tree." I downvote this kind of comments.
I was under the impression that I can downvote whatever I want to for whatever reason I see fit. Reading the HN guidelines, there are no rules dictating what criteria should be met for me to be allowed to downvote (or upvote) a post. What it does say is:
> Resist complaining about being downmodded. It never does any good, and it makes boring reading.
The current method of downvoting appears to work just fine. I can't recall the last time that I saw a truly valuable, substantive argument downvoted into oblivion at the bottom of the page.
I downvote comments that I think do not add anything relevant to that particular discussion.
For example, any time there is an article about email marketing, there are always people on HN who post how they hate getting commercial email, all commercial email is spam, all email newsletters are spam, etc.
I often downvote these because they add nothing of substance to a discussion of the article itself; they're just people staking their claim to a particular opinion.
It's fine to have opinions (we all do), but if the thread is about a particular technique or technology to improve email marketing, then a bald "I hate it all" statement doesn't add anything.
Whatever the results here, I want to use this opportunity to strongly object to all of the meta-scoring-discussion that I see more and more of ...
Editing your comment, or adding additional comments with things like "why the downvotes ... ?" or "not sure why I am being downvoted because ..." or "you can downvote all you want, but ..."
By all means edit posts and post followups and continue the discussion, but please, please let's stop injecting literal references to the scoring system into the conversation itself. It's distracting at best, and really narcissistic at worst.
I would greatly appreciate it if downvoters also added their explanation if it merits it.
OTOH, I've been downvoted a few times for things that, viewed from the outside, can be seen as flamebait-ish or useless discussion.
I've also had the opposite, people that, instead of downvoting, ask "did you answer the wrong post?" (has happened) or if I misunderstood the comment I was replying to (has also happened), and I greatly appreciate that.
edit:
example of a comment where I was downvoted, and it was probably flamebait-ish
I'm sort of amazed that "B" has only 12 points at this moment. I am downvoted allthetime based on B. Otherwise, I'd love someone to go through my comments and find how many that fall under A or G (as I'd very much want to learn to never fall under either of these categories). Unless you think, "zzzeek posted facts that are incorrect (sure), misunderstood the person he was responding to (arguable IMHO but i often make this impression), told person-I-like they are wrong (lots), used a little too heavy on the sarcasm (I think I've improved a lot in this regard but I continue to work on this) therefore the comment is MEAN! -> downvote".
My clearly annoyed comment a couple of days ago https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8135515 started out underwater a bit, flowed up to 7 and then back down to 5, which means someone's clicking downmod. I think these downmods are fine because I wasn't entirely careful in writing that post (whiskey will do that).
I tend to think of downmods just like the catcalls you hear in the House of Commons from the opposition party. It's chaotic and rude sure but that's just human nature.
I'm only okay with someone posted a useless (thanks, cool story bro...) option if it's actually encouraging a better community. I suspect this sort of reasoning is why communities often tank - assholes. Assholes who are tempted by the idea of casting judgement. In that sense, it's a disservice because it encourages an emotional behaviour over a rational one.
Why downvote if it doesn't detract from the conversation?
My rule of thumb is to upvote if the comment is insightful or has information I find useful. Downvote if it seems blatantly incorrect, mean, overly negative or is actively trying to make the conversation worse. Otherwise I just ignore it.
Why do you feel that something that is incorrect (even blatantly) isn't useful? I have often observed a thread where somebody ignorantly spouts something and is taught appropriately. I've learned stuff from those and left with a net positive. The original poster might never admit to being wrong, or changing his world-view, but I certainly have many times.
In this case "blatantly incorrect" meant lies with a likely ulterior motive. Off the top of my head I can't think of any case where this has been an issue on HN, but I have seen it on other forums where marketers try to spin problems with their products.
I draw a distinction between a person saying something I disagree with, ("I think variable foo should be 35%, not 34%") and a person being outrageously, astonishingly wrong. ("Solar roadways are a good idea." "Instagram is worth one billion dollars.")
>> outrageously, astonishingly wrong. ("Solar roadways are a good idea." "Instagram is worth one billion dollars.")
I don't think I'd downvote your two examples, they just sound like opinions I'd politely disagree with. To me, outrageously, astonishingly wrong would be something like "the Holocaust didn't happen", "the moon landing was faked" or "Obama wasn't born in Hawaii".
I was trying to find opinions that weren't political, but were badly wrong. Your three examples fall mostly under the heading of Big Lies. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Big_lie)
Your third example should go under the distinction of statements you disagree with.
There are plenty of reasons why Instagram may be worth $1 billion that are not outrageously, astonishingly wrong. Not least of which is because that's what Facebook paid for it two years ago. Instagram has grown significantly since then, as has FB's valuation. I'd speculate Instagram could go public today at a low multi-billion valuation.
A big problem with this poll is that the lines between option A and B have become largely blurred in today's society.
For example: "I disagree with the President of the United States and feel his policies are harming America."
Response: "You are a racist."
Of course, the reason for disagreeing with the President has nothing to do with race, yet it's an easy way to attack and silence points with which some do not agree.
As one commenter noted, "there are no rules." Really, it comes down to rational, thinking human beings being open to an alternative point of view rather than finding every way possible to attack people on the other end of the table—whether by downvoting or crying "racism."
Also with "You are a sexist." Disagreeing with a person might have nothing to do with their sex/gender but is also an easy way to shut them down. People will be hesitant to agree with a person that was just labeled racist/sexist.
A community feels hostile when everyone down-votes the unpopular opinions and I think we should at least refrain from down-voting when we just don't agree.
Think about a democracy. You can't down-vote, you always vote for something. People get "down-voted" (getting trialed and fined) when they act against the rules.
What I humbly recommend is sometimes actually up-voting a controversial comment that you disagree with as long as it is in-line with the conversation. That makes it more visible and it becomes more likely that there'll be a discussion under it it. I usually reply and up-vote when I disagree, just up-vote otherwise.
I think I can speak from experience as someone who frequently gets downvoted (and upvoted). I think a lot of people do downvote for something that they disagree with, although I would imagine most would say they did it due to the post being useless. Also using humour here is a likely downvote.
I would have to imagine that the liberal downvoting for 'useless comments' actually detracts from the value of HN. Good thread here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8031898
I have no idea. I just spent a few minutes brainstorming for reasons why someone would use the down arrow. In general I have learned that if I can come up with something (even if it disgusts me), then there are at least a few people out there who will do it.
I also had at least one option that I considered adding to the list but didn't because I didn't want to suggest it as a possibility.
Of course they do. Or if two people are disagreeing through multiple comments, you can tell as each person comes along as every one of your comments will get a downvote (and, I'm sure, the person you're arguing with is probably earning an upvote). So you learn that if your opinion isn't popular, do no reply multiple times or you'll "pay the price" multiple times.
Even if your comments are long transparent, people need to "exert their opinion" and penalize you in aggregate.
There's a conversation where, in response to someone hailing an app developer for linking to competitors, I observed the benefits that such an action brings. I had responded to a couple of replies, and could tell as each person came through because they didn't just skip that no longer relevant, transparent conversation. No, they had to read it and then gang downvote. Which...what's the point?
A) cultures are different and such subjective argument is not enough to use down-vote. If you are some smart ass who want something without emotions, go and chat with your PC, but if you are reading public opinions, do not be surprised that they are written by humans (probably containing some emotions).
F) when someone makes something good and publishes it to be accessible by society it is normal to receive thanks, especially if it is open source project or non-commercial project aimed to make the world better. But suddenly some smart asses appears from nowhere with zero contribution, but with privilege to make other achievements invisible.
In my belief down-voting system is unfair. Especially if you are advised to shut-up when you are down-voted because it makes conversation boring... As HN does not stimulate responsible conversation, but only something like "say and shut-up if we do not like you", there are no reason for me to keep track of conversation and provide more arguments to prove that I am right.
I think "someone posted a useless (thanks, cool story bro...) comment" is applied too liberally. Downvoting can definitely discourage participation. For that reason it should be targeted towards stuff in (A). Except in the most egregious instances of (E), when people downvote they come across as being immature or petty.
I am sure I missed some perfectly reasonable answers, so please let me know. I have only ever used the downvote button a few times, mostly for reason A, but there is also at least one out there that I would take back if that were an option.
I have also been downvoted myself, and I know that especially for someone with low karma it can be a real blow.
If a comment really is factually incorrect then a downvote is appropriate, but some comments that at first glance appear to be factually incorrect are really just opinions.
I'm continually downvoted on HN because I disagree with most on here on things related to copyright.
It is becoming pretty annoying, mainly because HN is becoming more like /r/politics (NSA, government, big business are all evil), rather than talking about cool hacker tech.
Since I tend to highlight text with a mouse as a I read, there are a number of threads that I have accidentally voted on. I would really appreciate the ability to change my up/down vote on HN (even if it's only available for a limited time).
The missing options greatly lessen the validity of the poll, as you implicitly assume down-voting has its place.
H) Never.
I) Never; flag as inappropriate with a reason (sexism, rascism, spam - the list should be limited and must not include references to the intelligence of the poster or the post).
"What Tallentyre wrote was: ... Voltaire forgave him all injuries, intentional or unintentional. ‘What a fuss about an omelette!’ he had exclaimed when he heard of the burning (of a book). How abominably unjust to persecute a man for such an airy trifle as that! ‘I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it,’ was his attitude now"
I agree with that attitude as well, I identified what I consider only two possibly valid reasons for downvoting, and I usually don't apply them (racism/sexism, which others say would be more appropriately flagged, and "cool story" useless comments, which I try not to flag either).
At the risk of further karmaloss, I suspect the downvoting is because I contradict the HN echo chamber clique. There is a certain fanboi contingent that acts badly when it acts at all and that reacts badly indeed to any notion that perhaps, just perhaps, challenges closely held non-technical views.
Also, I'm an intellectual elitist and a bit of snob - but I always optimistically and naively hope that those with I engage are as well read, as critical, and as ignorant as I.
Rarely works out that way, but occasionally I learn something.
I don't use the down vote button (across the Internet). OTOH, I always ensure that I up vote good quality comments which add new perspective or insights to a discussion (even if they do not match with mine).
