
Ask YC: Voting and Karma (Call to action) - iamdave
I'm going to ask this as simply as can simply be asked:<p>In your opinion what is the purpose for the upvote and downvote?  The general consensus is the upvote is for when we agree, but there is a dichotomy, or perhaps an even larger disagreement on what the downvote should be used for.<p>I think it's time to come to a community understanding of one another, and in my opinion this indiscriminate downvoting of comments without offering some sort of foundation on our disagreement or general apprehension to the topic is inherently threatening to the positive vibe of this community.<p>Discuss.
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edw519
I almost never downvote.

The only time I downvote is if something is extremely inappropriate, negative,
trolling, or is degrading (IMO) to the quality of this community.

I never downvote when I disagree. If I disagree, I reply with my disagreement.
I wish others would too. Not much to learn from downvotes. Lots to learn from
discussion and healthy debate.

I upvote often, to anything that I think adds value.

~~~
sah
I often hear people advocate a policy of only downvoting offensive or trolling
comments on news.YC. I think it's a bad idea.

My goal in voting is always to improve the experience for the next reader.
That means that I vote up what I think is the most interesting or important
information, and vote down distractions and annoyances of all kinds: not just
trolling, but also poorly thought out arguments, boring observations,
rambling, point-missing, and anything else that consumes space without
providing value.

You can look at that as being mean to people who posted comments that were
merely not top-notch, but I think of it as being kind to the probably much
larger number of people who are skimming the comments looking for something
worthwhile.

~~~
whacked_new
The problem with your approach is you are judging what is valuable for the
next reader. Your judgment might be good most of the time but it does not
imply an all-round more efficient system. I'm sure digg and reddit were
conceived in this spirit. And when you have a large number of people thinking
like this, you automatically adjust the majority of stories to the majority
view.

This is quite a debatable flaw in your argument. Worth a downmod? Hardly. I am
pointing out the obvious to some (or many), but to others, and those who share
your viewpoint, this might be a blind spot, or simply preposterous.

I think a community like this (HN, that is) is better off just getting into
the habit of good discussion, such that it becomes implicit in the culture
(which kind of is already). Just make sure the SNR is naturally high. That's
quite a feat.

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cperciva
_In your opinion what is the purpose for the upvote and downvote?_

Upvote = "I'd like to see more comments like this".

Downvote = "I'd like to see fewer comments like this".

I don't think that people having different reasons for wanting more or less of
a particular type of comment is a problem.

~~~
jobeirne
Modified:

Upvote = "I'd like to see more comments like this" || "I agree with this".

Downvote = "I'd like to see fewer comments like this".

~~~
philh
If enough people upvote purely for agreeing, it becomes possible to get karma
for vapid posts that pander to the community.

I think it would be better to just factor in agreement as part of whether
you'd like to see more. Maybe you agree with something, but the sentiment has
been expressed so many times that it's getting tiresome.

------
dcurtis
At the very basis, an upvote means "I want other people to see this" and a
downvote means "I think this is a waste of other people's time."

Your voting habits don't influence what you see at all, so it really has no
personal effect; you're voting things for other people.

~~~
dhimes
You are exactly correct: since an upvote "floats" something to the top, you
should upvote when you think other people should see it. As hackers
understand, knowing what something does is important to knowing how to use it
correctly.

------
walterk
All these attempts at

1\. distinguishing multiple metrics for comment evaluation, and

2\. declaring that up/down voting should not be used for some of these metrics

are doomed to failure, so long as

1\. there is only one dimension on which to express anything, and

2\. the interface for voting lacks any obvious affordances/constraints on how
it should be used, even if those affordances/constraints are merely rhetorical
(e.g., a JavaScript popup that asks you to confirm your up/down vote only if
complies with some set of criteria).

I suspect PG is unlikely to complicate the voting interface to map to multiple
metrics until some threshold of community deterioration has been reached, so a
lot of this debate is pretty pointless. The only way to enforce norms about
how generic up/down voting should be used, that are not implied by the
interface itself, is to constantly comment on uses of voting that are
suspected to be illegitimate and to start threads like this one.

After seeing several such threads, I suspect that, at best, you will only be
able to convince a fraction of the community to conform to whatever norms you
think are best. Everyone else will simply use the up/down arrows as a catchall
for any positive or negative sentiment they feel like expressing. Total
conversion is pretty much impossible, partly because some people will disagree
with those norms, and newcomers will be oblivious to them.

In my opinion, there are much bigger problems here than how up/down votes are
used. Constant submission and upvoting of news that's utterly irrelevant to
hacker-entrepreneurs is one.

------
bayareaguy
I think the problem is the interface forces the projection of two dimensions
(agreement and quality) on to a single dimension (score).

Personally I think the upvote/downvote should be for indicating quality but
there should be a separate counter for agreement that would not affect the
overall ordering. A separate agreement counter would also allow for some
interesting options such as showing the comments of people who tend to
strongly agree or disagree with someone.

------
tom
At first it bothered me that I could make a comment on something, maybe not a
comment that everyone would agree with, but a comment that I believed, and yet
I'd be down-voted. I'd watch my karma tick away and be like "What are these
folks doing? What on earth is wrong with what I said? How does it lessen the
quality of the conversation?"

Then I realized, it just doesn't matter. This isn't a contest, it's a
community. All this measures is the general vibe of the comment. Higher
numbers = better vibe. A fuzzy value at best.

More useful I think would be to see the total score, but also be able to mouse
over the score to see how many down-votes and how many up-votes something
received. But that would very likely require a big change by PG to maintain
three scores, not one.

~~~
technoguyrob
Keep in mind some people might also simply click downvote without paying much
attention to their action. I've seen this time and time again on Reddit and
here that when someone replies "Why are people downvoting me? Could you please
explain?" to their own downvoted comment, everyone wakes up and realizes the
comment isn't that bad, or possibly even quite insightful.

------
blogimus
I see a practice here which I find unhelpful: "bandwagon upvoting" where it
appears that people vote up the leading comments. Do we really need to vote
the top comments in a post out of the park, please tell me what utility this
provides?

I saw this a lot on slashdot when I used to frequent that site. Comments that
were at 3 or 4 got pushed to 5, but comments at 2 or less got ignored. But on
that site, there was a hard upper limit of 5 points.

As far as my voting practices: I upvote select comments I think are
particularly lucid and have not been voted up "significantly"

I downvote what I think are innapropriate comments such as hateful, vulgar,
insulting (see this site's guidelines) "excessively" whiny or demanding or
just plain babble (rarely, usually I just ignore babble).

I do NOT downvote opinions I disagree with. I either ignore them or reply.

Overall, though, I think the lack of hard and fast rules to voting adds more
than detracts. If we all vote in different ways, then that makes the site more
dynamic.

~~~
brianlash
> "bandwagon upvoting" where it appears that people vote up the leading
> comments.

Same deal as with Google Adwords and the reason advertisers are willing to pay
top dollar for spots 1-4(ish). They're more visible, so they get more action.

You have to bear in mind that by design the top is that space where eyes fall
first. So it stands to reason those comments at the top of the page are the
ones that get the most action. Not saying "agreeing because others agree"
doesn't go on... I just think it's effect is dwarfed in comparison to the
effect visibility has on a comment's votes.

I don't see any way around the problem -- if it's a problem at all -- without
altering the presentation of comments. I just don't think it's worth that.

------
DanielBMarkham
Downvotes without an explanation have no meaning. You should be required to
explain why you downvoted.

If a downvote means "I'd like to see fewer comments like this" -- then, why?
What is wrong? Is it off-topic, rude, you disgaree, it used words you don't
like, it ran on too long. What, what, what is the problem?!?! A downvote gives
you nothing but some vague feeling that you broke some kind of social rule or
norm somewhere _without actually explaining what it was you did_

Downvotes are mostly non-useful and promote "safe" comments, which have a
tendency to be boring.

~~~
comatose_kid
I don't think that you should be _required_ to explain a downvote. This would
result in a bunch of comments saying 'this sucks because...<reason x>'.

~~~
mark-t
Actually, it would result in one person giving a reason and a bunch of people
upvoting that. Whether or not that's a good thing is still up for debate. I do
think people should feel compelled to give a reason, though.

------
andreyf
Vote things up when they are something you want the community to see, and down
when it is something you don't want it to see.

------
dfranke
Upmod: "Likely to remember reading this tomorrow"

Downmod: Incoherency, trolling, ad hominems, and spam. Also anything factually
inaccurate, but only if it is currently +1 or higher.

------
globalrev
Downvoting opinions you dont like creates a streamlined and boring community
and will turn into the tyranny of the masses.

Downvote trolling and upvote opinions and posts you like. But dont downvote
wellargumented posts that you disagree with.

------
DanielBMarkham
The only thing that makes sense to me is two sets of dropdowns, instead of the
up and down arrow. The dropdowns would have various positive categories
"agree", "insightful", "humorous", etc. and various negative categories,
"disagree", "inane", "troll", etc.

Instead of clicking up or down, you click the positive or negative attribute
you use to categorize the comment.

What with clicking the drop-down, it's a two click system instead of a one-
click system, but heck, to me it makes a lot more sense.

------
AlfaWolph
Reddit or not, here we come.

------
pierrefar
I've downvoted once or twice when it was spam. I've upvoted many excellent
discussions, a few of which I even disagreed with. When I disagree, I reply.
Always, I learn something new, regardless if I changed my mind or not.

------
msg
"be conservative in what you do, be liberal in what you accept from others"

As a commenter, you have the responsibility to raise the level of the
discussion. As a moderator (with the down arrow), you have the responsibility
to be generous with where others are taking the discussion.

Slashdot does meta-moderating, but it works because downvotes and upvotes have
categories that it's possible for a relatively neutral observer to agree and
disagree with. Here, there's a lot of ambiguity when you upvote or downvote.

------
tptacek
The reflection of comment scores in user karma makes this problem worse; it
means we're keeping score, and creates artificial reasons to vote comments.
Granted, if post submissions were all that HN tracked, I'd have a karma of 0.
But I still think Reddit's system is better.

------
allenbrunson
I agree that there has been more capricious and unnecessary downvoting lately,
and that it has a chilling effect on conversations. But pg's comments indicate
he does not agree, so what can we do about it.

If the situation gets _really_ dire, perhaps he'll notice.

------
bkovitz
I upvote to say "this is worth reading". I downvote to say "this is not worth
reading".

"Worth reading" means "worth reading and appropriate to Hacker News". No doubt
what I, or anyone, considers worth reading has some correlation with agreeing,
but not 100%.

------
daveambrose
I usually never downvote, but when there's something I blatantly disagree
with, I'll downvote.

I'll upvote for two reasons:

1\. More HN readers need to see this. 2\. Excellent point.

~~~
aneesh
downvote != disagreement

If someone says something I don't agree with, but says it reasonably and with
some sort of support, I'll reply instead of downvoting.

~~~
timr
That's your opinion.

Many times, a comment is so inane that the only time-efficient way to express
disagreement is to vote against it.

Any active forum is going to have a tiny bit of brass buried in a large pile
of muck. If we spend all of our time apologizing to the muck-makers, there's
very little time to find the brass.

------
reggplant
Usually when I downvote its by accident, from me meaning t upvote but miss,
_really_ annoys me.

Only legit things I would downvote would be trolls.

------
snewe
How do you down vote?

~~~
tom
You need to reach a threshold of karma. Once you do, you'll see a down arrow
on comments.

You should read the FAQ here: <http://ycombinator.com/newsfaq.html>

~~~
snewe
That is an excellent requirement. No wonder this place is a lot better than
digg.

------
lst
I don't like voting at all, since it favors the democratic dictatorship of
opinion.

So, the positive thing about voting is: stupid or nonsense comments can be
marked as such.

But the negative thing remains: sometimes the truth (read: reality) is not
popular at all, and seems to be wrong for the majority of audience. And since
such comments are always voted down, you end up building your opinion only on
a democratic base -- but:

Democratic Opinion Dictatorship Is Evil.

------
ideas101
i think there should be no down-vote - because i very rarely notice that
someone comments that doesn't make no sense at all - also if people who get
up-voted will automatically gain more value anyway...

so for example if i make a comment that doesn't make sense then nobody will
up-vote me (and nobody can down-vote me either as there is no option to do
that either) and i will end-up having lowest score (which is 1) compare to
others. also down-vote de-motivates more than no-vote... so why de-motivate
someone.

i hope i explained in simplistic way...

~~~
gscott
It is very difficult to get upvoted but it is far easier to be downvoted, if
that is what you mean I agree but if there was no downvote, then there would
be nothing stopping a mass flood of useless posts.

------
LPTS
If all of your comments are getting upvoted, and none are getting downvoted,
you aren't being contentious enough. Divide people. Argue your point,
forcefully, and let the people you think are wrong downvote you. It tells you
more about them, then you, if you are right, and if you are wrong you can
learn things. Win-win.

Who cares about Karma? Vote me down, please. I got 325 Karma. Vote them down,
I don't care at all. Why should you?

------
schtog
One thing i thought about was that sure if you don't downvote there could be
others later upvoting it so it becomes positive but I rarely see that happen.

So if something is already -2 it doesn't need to get downvoted to -10(ok this
rarely happens and of course something racist or similar might deserve it).

And sometimes it seems posts get downvoted because of the opinion and not the
quality of the post.

I upvote posts that I like because of the opinion but I don't downvote posts I
disagree with if they motivate their opinions well.

I only downvote if it is a slandering post with no argumentation.

