It is interesting to me that the karma system continues to be a discussion on LW.
Is there a correct answer to what an optimized karma system entails? How optimized is the current system? Do people really care that much?
At this point, a high comment score signals to me (A) good, useful comment and (b) someone who is super invloved in LW and LW-approved stuff like CFAR or MIRI or whatever. I’d say A is the dominant signal, but B is getting stronger all the time.
As far as mass-downvoting, I think it is problem for some users and I believe there has got to be some way to mitigate its effects. I sense a apathy from whoever makes the decisions to do anything about mass-downvoting, or the karma system writ large. Why? Who knows. I’m apathetic about their apathy.
I don’t feel this is very much an issue with the karma system, just a problem with “mean people suck”. No matter what technical system is in place, there will probably be some ways for people to be meanies—sending lots of nasty personal messages from behind a TOR proxy, for instance. The fact that in this case they decided to (ab)use the voting system is incidental, and a solution need not involve making any dramatic changes to how the voting mechanisms work.
I’d say A is the dominant signal, but B is getting stronger all the time.
You reckon the scores on individual comments are substantially a matter of the commenter’s involvement in LW, CFAR, MIRI, etc.? That seems very surprising to me, and I can’t say I’ve noticed it. If so, it’s the same sort of problem as mass-downvoting: it would mean that comment scores are assessments of people rather than comments, and on the basis of something other than the quality of what they write. That would be very bad.
I’m apathetic about their apathy.
OK. I’m left wondering why you bothered to write that paragraph, though. Perhaps I’m apathetic about your apathy about those people’s apathy.
You reckon the scores on individual comments are substantially a matter of the commenter’s involvement in LW, CFAR, MIRI, etc.?
Yes, I reckon it. Though I suppose it would depend on your exact definition of ‘substantial’. I think stuff EY says gets double digit votes with only limited exceptions, and I don’t think it would matter much what he said as long as it was spelled right and generally on-topic. I think EY says a lot of interesting shit in highly interesting ways, but many of the vote counts for his comments are based of the fact he is a celebrity around here. Similar stuff is at play for others, I’d hypothesize. Nothing too surprising. I’m sure I’d tend to unconsciously favor the online comments of those I’d met in the flesh more too—that is, if I’d met anyone from LW in the flesh. I suppose the same could be said of people I’d interacted with for many years online.
OK. I’m left wondering why you bothered to write that paragraph, though. Perhaps I’m apathetic about your apathy about those people’s apathy.
So, you are metapathetic. Now we’re talking. :)
I commented cuz’ it’s sincerely interesting to me. I think the karma system is okay. And it is better than anything I could have devised. But I don’t think it is anywhere near optimal. And on a website where people are fervant about optimizing stuff using rationality, it tickles my irony bone to see them use a non-optimal system to discuss how to optimize the universe.
I think stuff EY says gets double digit votes with only limited exceptions, and I don’t think it would matter much what he said as long as it was spelled right and generally on-topic. I think EY says a lot of interesting shit in highly interesting ways, but many of the vote counts for his comments are based of the fact he is a celebrity around here.
I think this is… well, half right. I’ve seen plenty of Eliezer comments with zero, near-zero, or negative karma; his less contentful comments tend to stay around zero where they should be, and the negative ones tend to be a lot more negative than I’d expect them to be from their content. On the other hand, when he posts something insightful, he also tends to get voted up more than I’d expect from the content. Same goes for Lukeprog, Yvain, and the other high-karma users (though I can’t recall ever seeing a negative-karma Yvain post, now that I think about it).
In other words, I suspect that community status serves as an amplifier rather than a scalar bonus. Since almost everyone has a positive karma balance, though, this hashes out to a positive effect on average.
(Incidentally, I have met a lot of the high-karma users in the flesh, but I don’t think it affects my votes much on average. I think that in most cases I treat their meat presence and their online persona as quasi-separate entities in my mind.)
Part of the explanation for this (though probably not all of it), is people like me who go looking for recent comments from people we’ve identified as often saying insightful things. I don’t indiscriminately upvote all such comments, but more eyeballs means more upvotes.
It is interesting to me that the karma system continues to be a discussion on LW.
Is there a correct answer to what an optimized karma system entails? How optimized is the current system? Do people really care that much?
At this point, a high comment score signals to me (A) good, useful comment and (b) someone who is super invloved in LW and LW-approved stuff like CFAR or MIRI or whatever. I’d say A is the dominant signal, but B is getting stronger all the time.
As far as mass-downvoting, I think it is problem for some users and I believe there has got to be some way to mitigate its effects. I sense a apathy from whoever makes the decisions to do anything about mass-downvoting, or the karma system writ large. Why? Who knows. I’m apathetic about their apathy.
I don’t feel this is very much an issue with the karma system, just a problem with “mean people suck”. No matter what technical system is in place, there will probably be some ways for people to be meanies—sending lots of nasty personal messages from behind a TOR proxy, for instance. The fact that in this case they decided to (ab)use the voting system is incidental, and a solution need not involve making any dramatic changes to how the voting mechanisms work.
You reckon the scores on individual comments are substantially a matter of the commenter’s involvement in LW, CFAR, MIRI, etc.? That seems very surprising to me, and I can’t say I’ve noticed it. If so, it’s the same sort of problem as mass-downvoting: it would mean that comment scores are assessments of people rather than comments, and on the basis of something other than the quality of what they write. That would be very bad.
OK. I’m left wondering why you bothered to write that paragraph, though. Perhaps I’m apathetic about your apathy about those people’s apathy.
Yes, I reckon it. Though I suppose it would depend on your exact definition of ‘substantial’. I think stuff EY says gets double digit votes with only limited exceptions, and I don’t think it would matter much what he said as long as it was spelled right and generally on-topic. I think EY says a lot of interesting shit in highly interesting ways, but many of the vote counts for his comments are based of the fact he is a celebrity around here. Similar stuff is at play for others, I’d hypothesize. Nothing too surprising. I’m sure I’d tend to unconsciously favor the online comments of those I’d met in the flesh more too—that is, if I’d met anyone from LW in the flesh. I suppose the same could be said of people I’d interacted with for many years online.
So, you are metapathetic. Now we’re talking. :)
I commented cuz’ it’s sincerely interesting to me. I think the karma system is okay. And it is better than anything I could have devised. But I don’t think it is anywhere near optimal. And on a website where people are fervant about optimizing stuff using rationality, it tickles my irony bone to see them use a non-optimal system to discuss how to optimize the universe.
I think this is… well, half right. I’ve seen plenty of Eliezer comments with zero, near-zero, or negative karma; his less contentful comments tend to stay around zero where they should be, and the negative ones tend to be a lot more negative than I’d expect them to be from their content. On the other hand, when he posts something insightful, he also tends to get voted up more than I’d expect from the content. Same goes for Lukeprog, Yvain, and the other high-karma users (though I can’t recall ever seeing a negative-karma Yvain post, now that I think about it).
In other words, I suspect that community status serves as an amplifier rather than a scalar bonus. Since almost everyone has a positive karma balance, though, this hashes out to a positive effect on average.
(Incidentally, I have met a lot of the high-karma users in the flesh, but I don’t think it affects my votes much on average. I think that in most cases I treat their meat presence and their online persona as quasi-separate entities in my mind.)
Part of the explanation for this (though probably not all of it), is people like me who go looking for recent comments from people we’ve identified as often saying insightful things. I don’t indiscriminately upvote all such comments, but more eyeballs means more upvotes.