HN Ignore downvotes CSS

https://gist.github.com/anonymous/ac936f87662ed0b1f6def0a65f870c69

by quickthrower2 • 8 years ago

49 88 8 years ago

gist.github.com

yup123• 8 years ago

be nice if the downvote button would be removed entirely, I believe more HNers would speak their mind.

smt88• 8 years ago

People already do speak their minds, and heavy downvoting is often limited to comments that are unsubstantive. You may dislike the downvote, but I'd stop using this site if it were removed.

onion2k2• 8 years ago

The chilling effect is a bad thing for any individual who has a point they want to make, but it also makes people less reactionary and more thoughtful which is better for the community. Overall I think downvotes are a net positive.

acct17712• 8 years ago

Isn't it only freezing those who care about their points, and/or the community?

treve• 8 years ago

I only really see really misguided/unresearched/unhelpful comments downvoted. Rarely ever comments that are just contrarian.

I'm curious if you think there's a problem, and why. Maybe I'm just inside the bubble.

dragonwriter8• 8 years ago

I only really see really misguided/unresearched/unhelpful comments downvoted.

On controversial topics, I see lots of better comments downvoted for a while when they are new, but they tend to recover within a few hours.

nocman• 8 years ago

Well, those kind of comments do get downvoted, but people on HN do also downvote comments simply because they disagree with them (often regardless of whether the comments are perfectly civil, and just express a point of view that the downvoter doesn't share). Of course, many of those downvoting these comments would be quick to label them as "misguided" or "unhelpful", at which point there is usually little reason to argue about it.

It's an imperfect system, but I'd guess it is a net positive at least most of the time. It does help to filter out when people are just being total jerks.

yorwba2• 8 years ago

Maybe, but I don't think that would improve the quality of discussion. When I get downvoted, it's usually because I'm a) factually wrong b) didn't explain the reasoning behind a counterintuitive statement or c) disagreed with someone on an emotionally charged topic. At least in cases a) and b), downvotes help me improve my writing.

lowpro• 8 years ago

Definitely agree. I find when I'm downvoted it was due to being an impulsive post rather than a well thought out post.

With the amount you see people say 'I'll get downvoted for this but...' then go on to be the top post, I think the downvoted helps more than hurts.

There's groupthink of course, but I feel the HN community is more responsible with it, and that comes from someone who often disagrees with the majority (personally, rarely expressed).

scarface742• 8 years ago

Most of my downvotes were when I was being snarky. A few were caused by me going against some HN orthodoxy but they usually get upvoted later.

blackflame70003• 8 years ago

I suggest an amendment to the downvote such that if your total lifetime positive (excluding downvotes) reaches say 1000 or 1500, you should also get the ability to downvote. It’s much easier to lose points than gain them on the site.

SyneRyder• 8 years ago

I don't think it's easier to lose points here. Gaining points is easy if your comments are constructive and actionable. Opinions and anything argumentative generally isn't very useful.

One thing you can try is looking through your comment history and see which of your comments got the most upvotes. One of my highest upvotes was in a thread about whether software engineers should waste time doing telephone customer support, and I linked to a story of when William from Microsoft took a customer support call:

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15813387

Another was a comment about where I got my first customers:

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14192711

Or linking to a strategy for finding product ideas:

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14040708

Checking your most upvoted comments can also be a way to find topics that you should turn into a blog post. If the HN community found it interesting and suddenly gave you 10x the upvotes you usually get, then it's probably also useful to the wider world.

When I've been downvoted, it's usually because I've poorly researched something & provided incorrect information.

scarface742• 8 years ago

You can only lose a maximum of 3 (4?) points on a single post. You can gain an unlimited number of points.

swang• 8 years ago

do you really think losing a bunch of internet points will reduce people's ability to speak their mind?

dingaling• 8 years ago

Or if downvoting cost the downvoter one karma point. So they'd have to make the choice between contributing a comment to contest the issue or lazily pushing the down arrow and losing karma.

I generally try to upvote only. It really annoys me to see some comment down voted to grey oblivion with no follow-up comments explaining why. Particularly when looking back at older topics; was the post wrong, or just unpopular?

dmichulke• 8 years ago

Title suggestion:

HN Show Downvoted Comments as Normal CSS

Yes: it's a step against the filter bubble

amingilani4• 8 years ago

To see everything on HN, go to your settings and enable Show Dead. You'll also get to see comments that were killed off.

quickthrower2• 8 years ago

Not for the faint at heart! Be prepared for some very offensive comments, although a lot of dead stuff is just new accounts and reasonable comments.

acct17712• 8 years ago

Examples?

I've yet to read anything dead that I'd describe using your verbiage.

cookiecaper• 8 years ago

This is absolutely worth it. I've been reading like this maybe half of my account's lifecycle. It is rare to see legitimate spam. More often you find real posts from accounts that trip the "spam account" detector because they're throwaways, or controversial but valid opinions that got flagkilled.

Sometimes you'll even find real accounts that have a years-long history of meaningful contribution. [0] It is most infuriating when these people get hellbanned just for pushing the limit once, or for triggering the mods extra hard one day.

[Quick note on old accounts that earn hellbans: I've noticed a correlation between the posting of something MRA-ish/anti-feminist and accounts getting a permanent hellban. If you have such political leanings (which I'm not endorsing or supporting) and want your account to remain in good standing, don't let them leak out on HN. Go to your regularly-scheduled Disgusting Online Den of Scum and Villainy (TM). It may be that this is only noticed because most other hot-button issues are already understood to be taboo, but sometimes the gender-in-tech threads run afield...]

There is a whole cast of characters that you can only find if you showdead. Most of these people have since realized that it's a waste of time to post here and gone away, but you'll still see the regulars pop up now and then, or find them in historic threads.

There is pg_is_a_butt, whose posts are sometimes insightful, except he ends each one with something like "you're all idiots". There is LoseThos, author of the amazing TempleOS [1], who will usually post some form of incoherent babble that is framed up like scripture. These are usually not worth much by themselves, but they remind me that he exists, which is great. And there are the heartbreaking cases mentioned above, of good contributors getting flagged off and seeing their profile activity slowly peter out as they wonder why no one replies to their posts anymore. [Vouching can actually make this more confusing, because they have ONE comment that gets replies/interest, so assume they must not be shadowbanned, they just must be going senile and have nothing worth saying anymore. You'll also get your vouching rights revoked if you vouch for something the mods don't like.]

Anyway, there's usually a discernible reason for something to be dead, but it's frequently not a good one. You'll be missing out on a lot of good stuff by keeping showdead off.

Disclaimer, lest one plunge in too anxiously: there are also things that truly deserve the flag and/or ban, and you'll have to tolerate seeing that. It helps that HN doesn't allow media embeds, but do be careful following links, etc., and probably avoid if your sensitivity to offensive text or ideas is higher than your interest in useful-but-controversial information.

[0] https://news.ycombinator.com/threads?id=X86BSD

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/TempleOS

_v7gu• 8 years ago

Go to your regularly-scheduled Disgusting Online Den of Scum and Villainy (TM).

Ah 4chan, the only true bastion of the right to free speech

eadmund• 8 years ago

It is most infuriating when these people get hellbanned just for pushing the limit once, or for triggering the mods extra hard one day.

…

You'll also get your vouching rights revoked if you vouch for something the mods don't like.

I really wish that HN could figure out a way to fix the problem of abusive moderation. Moderation is, I think, really important and valuable — but it's so important that it's easily misused.

And of course just crowd-sourcing it doesn't work, because the crowd can just shout down important viewpoints.

fnayr2• 8 years ago

I'm still working my way towards earning the downvote! I have been on the site for over 6 years and browse more than I contribute, but I still am shy a little of the 500 karma required. I wonder if there are users with even older accounts than mine that are still active and don't have the karma yet either.

cjhveal• 8 years ago

For what it's worth, my account is older by ~7 months and I'm not yet halfway there.

fnayr2• 8 years ago

Okay interesting, I thought I was alone. Guess there's a lot of us "noncontributors" on here haha.

ojkelly• 8 years ago

7 years without the downvote here. Still got a long way to go.

babaganoosh89• 8 years ago

Hope my upvote gets you a little closer :)

FuckOffNeemo2• 8 years ago

Just over ~2 years and almost half way there for me.

I haven't submitted much but occasionally comment around.

Glad I'm not the only procrastinator though the allure to be able to down vote trolls is very, very real.

simlevesque• 8 years ago

I just got it today after five years. I was freaked out at first.

Theodores• 8 years ago

Think of all the real work you have done in that time. You would not have done it all had you spent 1000+ hours collecting those internet points that none of your real friends care about.

You are winning by not being able to downvote yet.

EDIT: ...as I up-vote y'all stuck in this thread...

b3n• 8 years ago

Over a decade of browsing HN nearly every day, and still don't have it yet. One day, maybe. :-)

jvzr• 8 years ago

Just celebrated my 6 years on HN last month, and a little over half way there myself. Not sure I'm wise enough to downvote correctly though: sometimes I wish to downvote someone because what he said is stupid, but that's not how you use downvotes.

phaylon• 8 years ago

Almost 9 years for me without downvoting.

hungerstrike• 8 years ago

Even before you get the ability to downvote, the fascist regime will stop counting your upvotes if you upvote the wrong comments (ones which have been secretly flagged by the mods).

However, if you're careful you can use your upvotes against those comments that you don't like by upvoting everything around them.

sachleen• 8 years ago

6 years and 3 months and I am not even 1/5th of the way there.

superasn• 8 years ago

I wish the downvote button was two step (while upvote as is) where a user had to select from things like off topic, spam, etc. Maybe a decoy disagree too for letting the new user downvote but not counting it.

qume• 8 years ago

Definitely. Some of the most valuable posts are downvoted. Thats what makes them so valuable - sometimes the conventional wisdom is so wrong that when someone with specialist knowledge chimes in people reject it.

Try posting here about anything related to nutrition and the health risks of eating meat...

nickbarnwell• 8 years ago

Slashdot meta-moderation was fantastic for this. I'm curious why it never made an appearance elsewhere - it really was a great idea.

fnordsensei2• 8 years ago

Could you elaborate on how it works/worked? Or is it as suggested above: a downvote + a reason?

avinassh• 8 years ago

This feature exists in lobste.rs [0] and it is effective for making people think twice before downvoting anything. Atleast for me and I seem to think to again, if I want to downvote anything or not

[0] https://i.imgur.com/s0EpZOH.png

laumars3• 8 years ago

Im a firm believer that one shouldn't be allowed to downvote without leaving a comment. In instances like spam or trolling we have the 'flag' option, which if abused should then cost people karma and/or the privilege of moderation.

I say this because I often get downvoted because people don't understand my point (sometimes due to my own fault badly explaining myself, sometimes the readers fault for skimming my post) and it's not until several downvoted before someone finally chimes in an clarifies why.

Negative rep get so badly abused on this site and the most frustrating thing about it all is whenever the topic gets raised you get downvoted to hell.

There is also a disappointing trend to kneejerk downvote any comment that disagrees with any of the "famous" (for want a better description) names on HN simply because member "xyz" must be wrong if they're arguing with the famed member "abc"; regardless of whatever point xyz had made. It's daft hero worshipping.

Then there's the amount of times people can get down voted on popular threads just because they dared express and unpopular opinion.

Overall I genuinely think the quality of comments on this site has dropped over the years and I think it's directly related to the increase in members reaching the threshold to negative moderate. It gets harder to have an adult conversation when half the time people are kneejerk downvoting rather than posting a rebuttal or simply asking for clarification on why an opinion was formed to begin with. It's gotten to the point that I'm sure many people now question whether they can be bothered with the potential backlash or whether they're better off just keeping quiet. Which results in some tropes (for want a better description) not getting peer reviewed or debunked because it's such a popular piece of misinformation that the correction isn't worth the backlash.

Lastly, I get sick of people saying we shouldn't take negative rep personally. It's someone actively saying "I don't agree with you but I'm not going to state why." There is no other response to that other than frustration.

maaaats• 8 years ago

Im a firm believer that one shouldn't be allowed to downvote without leaving a comment.

I downvoted because I disagree with you.

dragonwriter8• 8 years ago

Im a firm believer that one shouldn't be allowed to downvote without leaving a comment.

The purpose of downvoting is to reduce the effective signal to noise ratio by:

(1) reducing the prominence of low-quality posts, and

(2) signalling the types of posts the community finds to be low quality, which will then be reduced in prominence.

Commenting increases the prominence of a post, and as such counteracts part of the purpose of downvotes. It may occasionally be warranted to reinforce the other half of the purpose, but generally not.

I say this because I often get downvoted because people don't understand my point

Just because someone else suggests that as their reason or a possible reason does not mean that is why other people are downvoting you.

There is also a disappointing trend to kneejerk downvote any comment that disagrees with any of the "famous" (for want a better description) names on HN simply because member "xyz" must be wrong if they're arguing with the famed member "abc"; regardless of whatever point xyz had made.

I don't think that's true at all; I do think that replies to some of the more well-known posters are more likely to get read and, therefore, voted up or down, but I don't see a lot of evidence for the kind of fan-club voting you suggest (I don't think I'd be on the leaderboard if that was the case, since I think even when I was fairly new a fair share of my posts were disagreeing with some of the more prominent figures here.)

Then there's the amount of times people can get down voted on popular threads just because they dared express and unpopular opinion.

IME, that doesn't really happen. Any opinion on a controversial thread can get downvoted for no apparent reason -- there defintely are people who downvote for shallow disagreement -- but it rarely seems to last if there isn't a better reason for downvoting, and it seems to happen across the space of ideas (I've seen HN be accused of being a left-wing hive mind, a libertarian hive-mind, and a hive-mind of several different other bents; its not any of those, its got lots of different active factions with lots of different views.)

It gets harder to have an adult conversation when half the time people are kneejerk downvoting rather than posting a rebuttal or simply asking for clarification on why an opinion was formed to begin with.

I'd rather say it gets harder to have an adult conversation when people lack the introspection to realize the reasons that their comments are getting downvoted into oblivion while others expressing similar ideology in a different manner or not has nothing to do with disagreement, or popular poster fan clubs, and everything to do with the quality of their posts.

There is no other response to that other than frustration.

Yes, there is another possible response and its called introspection and review of the guidelines.

I've gotten posts downvoted, and of those that have stayed that way more than a few hours, the vast majority have deserved it and I've gotten better at not making the same mistakes. Sure, I think there have been some mistakes (but I have seen a lot more cases of posts of mine being upvoted that don't deserve it.)

DanBC3• 8 years ago

(I upvoted because you're making a reasonable point politely).

I disagree with this bit:

Im a firm believer that one shouldn't be allowed to downvote without leaving a comment.

I think the site needs a mechanism where people can express disagreement without leaving a comment, because a downvote is mostly meaningless and comments can lead to angry bickering threads.

I do agree (and I've changed my mind on this in the past 2 years or so) that people downvote too quickly, and that people don't supply enough corrective upvotes.

yesenadam3• 8 years ago

Im a firm believer that one shouldn't be allowed to downvote without leaving a comment.

I guess that's been discussed/thought about many times. Does sound good at first. So how would it work? People would have to leave some kind of decent comment, not just one word, I suppose, like other comments. Could you downvote those comments in turn if they weren't substantive, or were snarky etc? Would you have then to explain why you did that? Hmm. There'd have to be a different comment category, a downvote-explanation comment. Sounds complicated..

There is no other response to that other than frustration.

Well, yes there is! I tried that, doesn't work. I tried not caring. Is working great! They're only fake internet points, after all. But you said you're sick of people saying that. Sorry. ..Sometimes it's just too obvious why horrid, abusive comments are downvoted. From what I've seen, how people say things is almost always the problem, not what they said. What seems to drive people nuts is presuming it's always what they said.

always_good• 8 years ago

Im a firm believer that one shouldn't be allowed to downvote without leaving a comment

I used to believe that until I put it into practice on my forum. Nah, turns out there's a class of comment that's so stupid that you're just forcing people to waste their time by responding to it. And that sort of comment is more common than you think, you just may be insulated from them by the work of other people.

Browse reddit by controversial posts first, for example.

rimliu• 8 years ago

Then please abolish the upvote too. Because it too most often means "I agree". What you propose is a bad solution because it breaks symmetry. If people are upvoting because they agree (and if you agree you tend to think about the comment like it brings value), they should be able to downvote because they disagree. Overzealous moderation and self-censorship already makes HN too sterile place to be cozy. And similar to too sterile environments in real life it has a potential to weakening your immune system and cause auto-immune diseases.

gnicholas• 8 years ago

Interesting concept. I am the creator of the BeeLine Reader browser plugin, which applies a color gradient to make text blocks easier/faster to read. I go back and forth on whether this functionality is a net benefit on sites like HN, where our text coloring obfuscates the underlying color (and the downvoting that it communicates).

Sometimes I will disable it on HN if I'm engaging in a lot of discussions where I'd like to be able to see if other comments have been downvoted. If anyone else here uses this plugin, I'd be very interested to know if you've disabled it on HN or if you find the functionality to be helpful. We can make it default on/off on certain sites, so feedback is appreciated.

Jerry2• 8 years ago

Downvotes (and flaggings) on comments are HN's biggest flaw. It has turned this site into a giant echo chamber and has completely killed any chance of having diversity of opinions.

If you do not conform, you will be downvoted into oblivion. So people censor themselves as a result.

dragonwriter8• 8 years ago

If you do not conform, you will be downvoted into oblivion. So people censor themselves as a result.

I see radically divergent opinions on many threads which are not "downvoted into oblivion".

The things I do see downvoted into oblivion are usually unsubstantive and/or uncivil, and themselves come from all directions, often from a similar apparent ideology to comments that are not downvoted.

But if people who would otherwise post in a similar manner to the posts downvoted into oblivion are censoring themselves, I think the functionality is working as intended.

jochung2• 8 years ago

You'll still see those opinions if you have the link, but there is a very obvious pattern of removing threads about contentious issues from the front page once they reach a certain amount of wrong think.

Either the admins are turning a blind eye, or they're not paying attention. At this point my money is on the former.

The supreme irony of course is that lately the most recurring instances are about the memo that was titled "Google's ideological echo chamber". It's an open secret which cliques have a septic response to disagreement, and who simply wants to be heard but is treated as malicious.

Empathy for me, not for thee, and feelings of safety are more important than actual safety. The content of people's skin is more important than their character.

FuckOffNeemo2• 8 years ago

Ironically you're being down voted because of your post.

Having seen some atrocious perspectives and opinions and Hacker News, being able to challenge some one or offer a rebuttal that doesn't turn into a comment storm is important. I don't want to engage with a troll. I want to give them a down vote and hope they're flagged and removed more often than not (I can't down vote anyone yet...).

But, there's a fine line between down voting some one because they're offensive, obtuse or obnoxious and disagreeing with some one's opinion.

I don't agree with you. In fact I outright disagree with your opinion on HN becoming an echo chamber. I believe HN is far an echo chamber, I also think it's far more diverse than most. But naturally and organically the opinions here tend to confirm with a certain bias and I like to think that's because we here on HN take more time to discuss our conversations and perspectives than the echo chambers you find on Reddit or on Facebook.

I want to believe HN is more in line with a common good, a common ideal and common truth of humanity (you can call me out on being naive here if you wish, I'm feeling more optimistic today than I normally do and I don't know why but let's let sleeping dogs lie, my cynicism is usually relentless...).

So, yeah. I disagree with you. But I wouldn't down vote you. Even if I could.

Edit: poor choice of words, sentence structure, I rushed it all to get it out in time in the hope one day I can get to 500 karma and down vote trolls.

cabraca• 8 years ago

In fact I outright disagree with your opinion on HN becoming an echo chamber.

I wouldn't say its a black and white issue. It heavily depends on the topic. For example the Google Memo. Even the slightest hint that someone agrees (on specific points) with damore was a guarantee for downvotes. In that case i would say HN reflects some sort of echo chamber.

yesenadam3• 8 years ago

If you do not conform, you will be downvoted into oblivion.

Is that true though? Conform in what way?

Who cares about being downvoted anyway?? I don't get it. After a few tantrums about it, I've realized it doesn't matter, I don't need to add edit: Could downvoters explain why please if they don't explain. Why do I care about my internet points, why am I getting sucked in to caring about the gamification? Why does it matter?

Say you are right, some opinions, even expressed articulately, helpfully, admirably etc are still always downvoted "into oblivion". So if you care, if it's important for you to change minds on it, try even harder to be more informed, articulate, irreproachable than the alleged HN 'conformists'. Hehe already talking like that, 'If you do not conform' has that heroic-paranoid-martyr sound to it that frequently downvoted/rate-limited people get. The people that ranted bitterly on the What has HN given you? page. They think it's what they say that's the problem, but in my experience it's inevitably how they say it. But every further downvote just 'proves' to them they're right.

And I'm not sure why you think HN would be better without oblivion-downvoting/flagging. More like Youtube, sure. But better? "Completely killed any chance", "giant echo chamber".. such dramatic language. Is your tone of such absolute certainty justified? Well, still there are people who think the dominant 'conformity' on HN is pro-US, anti-US, socialist, libertarian, and pro- and anti- just about anything you can imagine.

Annatar5• 8 years ago

“Is that true though?”

It is very real. And systemic.

When an unsubstantiated Docker or Kubernetes piece shows up as a story here, try asking a simple “why is that stubbornly getting pushed instead of alternatives?” and observe getting no answer to a simple “why?” while it gets downvoted under a pretense of being unsubstantiated, although the motivation for the story itself is unsubstantiated. What happens in reality is that you dared to ask a critical question which goes against ego-stroking and mob mentality. Or try asking or criticizing Rust or just mentioning Rust evangelism strike force to see just how much of an echo chamber this place is; it will be a fascinating psychosocial experiment on crowd mentality and ego-reassurance.

We are now at the point in our global societal evolution where why’s have become dangerous, considered oppositional, often considered confrontational, and that is deeply disturbing, because I’ve seen and lived through situations where such thinking leads. It’s a very subtle form of fascism in a different package. “HN” just reflects the wider systemic problems with group think dynamics.

tanilama• 8 years ago

Not really my experience. Learn to express your opinion in more civl way to avoid downvotes. The downvotes are there for a reason.

And HN is not really an echo chamber, there is an substantial audience for right-wing conservative thought, as per my observation.

extrapickles• 8 years ago

There are a few purely technical opinions that will get you downvoted, regardless of how well you phrase it.

Also asking questions about the article can get you downvoted.

HN Ignore downvotes CSS

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