8 ms·

As long as it stays "Hacker" News, I think the audience will stay small enough and comments will remain to be mostly high quality. If it branches out into "Cat

As long as it stays "Hacker" News, I think the audience will stay small enough and comments will remain to be mostly high quality. If it branches out into "Cat Video News" and God knows what else then we may be in trouble.

Rainymood 11y ago
The comments on Hacker News are high quality because there are only certain people with downvoting privileges. And trust me: they downvote ruthlessly. Which is imo a good thing. Just take a peek at Reddit: subreddits with a high moderator count (which actively moderate) are high quality. /r/AskHistorians and /r/AskScience spring to mind. They do not allow any jokes in the comments.
- burger_moon 11y ago
  This is why I don't visit Reddit much anymore. I appreciate the seriousness of this discussion board even with controversial topics not related to the programming sphere.
- engi_nerd 11y ago
  I've been lurking for a lot longer than my account has been active (probably a good 5 years now); have never seen what the criteria are for being able to downvote. Could you please enlighten me?
  - Balgair 11y ago
    Honestly, I'm a bit curious too, bu kinda do not want to know, as I may be then tempted to 'go for it' and obtain that ability.
  - Retric 11y ago
    ~500 Karma
    - needacig 11y ago
      It has to be a lot higher than that now because the commenter with the comment above yours has ~900 karma and doesn't have downvote privilege.
      - seszett 11y ago
        I have 600 and can downvote, though. It appeared at exactly 500.
  - Rainymood 11y ago
    It 'used to be' 500 karma. But I've heard it goes up over time. I've heard people talk about having ~2k karma without the privilege. So I don't really know to be honest. I wish somebody could answer your question more precisly.
  - taylorling 11y ago
    It's enabled exactly when you have 500 karma. One of my colleague just got that.

8 ms·

As long as it stays "Hacker" News, I think the audience will stay small enough and comments will remain to be mostly high quality. If it branches out into "Cat

by jarrettch 11y ago

Rainymood 11y ago
The comments on Hacker News are high quality because there are only certain people with downvoting privileges. And trust me: they downvote ruthlessly. Which is imo a good thing. Just take a peek at Reddit: subreddits with a high moderator count (which actively moderate) are high quality. /r/AskHistorians and /r/AskScience spring to mind. They do not allow any jokes in the comments.
- burger_moon 11y ago
  This is why I don't visit Reddit much anymore. I appreciate the seriousness of this discussion board even with controversial topics not related to the programming sphere.
- engi_nerd 11y ago
  I've been lurking for a lot longer than my account has been active (probably a good 5 years now); have never seen what the criteria are for being able to downvote. Could you please enlighten me?
  - Balgair 11y ago
    Honestly, I'm a bit curious too, bu kinda do not want to know, as I may be then tempted to 'go for it' and obtain that ability.
  - Retric 11y ago
    ~500 Karma
    - needacig 11y ago
      It has to be a lot higher than that now because the commenter with the comment above yours has ~900 karma and doesn't have downvote privilege.
      - seszett 11y ago
        I have 600 and can downvote, though. It appeared at exactly 500.
  - Rainymood 11y ago
    It 'used to be' 500 karma. But I've heard it goes up over time. I've heard people talk about having ~2k karma without the privilege. So I don't really know to be honest. I wish somebody could answer your question more precisly.
  - taylorling 11y ago
    It's enabled exactly when you have 500 karma. One of my colleague just got that.