The issue with votes is that they don't fix all that much.
People often downvote other people they simply disagree with. In fact, most often do that.
So it does not just shut off the "trolls" as in the "assholes". It also shuts off any unpopular opinion.
That is sad, because unpopular opinions are generally interesting by nature, and sometimes insightful. That is because popular ones are well-known, thus cannot be "interesting".
For example, if you bash a popular company by saying what they do is wrong (whichever it is, Google, Apple, you name it), you will get down voted a lot. No matter how insightful and righteous you were.
I was trying to say the same thing in my previous comment above. Thank you for being able to put it this way. I think the downvote button should be reserved for off topic/trolling posts. If you downvote out of disagreement or boredom you risk actually turning that person into a troll later on. The newbie who writes a sincere but boring comment and gets downvoted doesn't learn how to better contribute. He just gets alienated. On the other hand, the newbie who writes a few boring comments, gets no up votes and then finally gets an up vote or two for a good contribution learns more about how to be a better contributor than if he had just gotten downvoted for what may seem to him or her, no reason at all.
I agree with you. It's far better to upvote than downvote. I dunno about others but I am willing to upvote people I disagree with. those who just repeat stock they have been told by others I don't downvote. It's only those who entirely detract from conversation....
I find the downvoting due to disagreement to be amusing here. Sometimes I read downvoted comments just to get a different viewpoint.
What I do find disturbing in this discussion are people with substantially high karma who have been hellbanned. That strikes me as dangerous. I have seen at least 4 hellbanned people on this forum and I would have disagreed with the banning of two of them (the other two were clearly trolls by any definition).
So it does not just shut off the "trolls" as in the "assholes". It also shuts off any unpopular opinion.
That is sad, because unpopular opinions are generally interesting by nature, and sometimes insightful. That is because popular ones are well-known, thus cannot be "interesting".
For example, if you bash a popular company by saying what they do is wrong (whichever it is, Google, Apple, you name it), you will get down voted a lot. No matter how insightful and righteous you were.