Then maybe, instead of just downvoting, these persons should have asked him to clarify and repharse his post. This would have actually led to an interesting dicussion, while downvoting gave nobody nothing.
Maybe it should be possible to downvote a post only if you also reply to that post.
That would kill the main idea of downvoting which is to improve the signal/noise ratio by ensuring comments made by “trolls” just aren’t noticed anymore unless people really want to see them.
Downvoting does lead to abuses, and I do consider that downvoting deeb’s comment was not really needed, but forcing to make comments will kill the purpose, and not really prevent the abuses.
That would kill the main idea of downvoting which is to improve the signal/noise ratio by ensuring comments made by “trolls” just aren’t noticed anymore unless people really want to see them.
Khan Academy employs a reputation system such as lesswrong. What happened is that completely useless comments, e.g. “YES WE KHAN!!!!!! :)”, are voted up and drown all useful comments.
YouTube also employs a reputation system where people can upvote and downvote comments. And what happens?
Well, Less Wrong is a well-kept garden not a mass public community like YouTube.
The karma system is not perfect, but IMHO it does more good than harm (and I say that even if some of my comments were downvoted). “Chinese People Suck” would be quickly downvoted below threshold here. At least, I give a high (>90%) confidence to it.
I’d like to attest that I find the karma system (by which I understand not just the software but the way the community uses it) a huge blessing and part of LW’s appeal to me. It is a strong incentive to pause and ask myself if I even have something to say before I open my mouth around here (which is why I haven’t written a main blog post yet) rather than just fling crap at the wall like one does in the rest of the Internet.
The “downvotes vs replies” problem is, I think, for the most part a non-issue. Anyone who’s been here a bit will know that if (generic) you ask for clarification of your downvotes, people will generally provide as long as you’re not acting whiney or sore about it. And there will be nothing stopping you from constructively engaging them on the points raised (though beware to actually apply reading comprehension to what is said then, because people don’t like it when you fail to update).
I’d like to attest that I find the karma system (by which I understand not just the software but the way the community uses it) a huge blessing and part of LW’s appeal to me. It is a strong incentive to pause and ask myself if I even have something to say before I open my mouth around here...
Yes, I also see that a reputation system does have positive effects given certain circumstances. But would you want to have such a system employed on a global basis, where millions could downvote you for saying that there is no God? Obviously such a system would be really bad for the kind of people who read lesswrong and for the world as a whole.
That means that the use of the system on lesswrong is based on the assumption that it will only be used by people who are much like you and will therefore work well for you. But given that lesswrong is an open system, will it always stay that way? At what point is it going to fail on you, how will you notice, how do you set the threshold?
And given that the system works so well as to keep everyone who doesn’t think like you off lesswrong, how are you going to notice negative effects of groupthink? Do we trust our abilities to seek truth enough to notice when the system starts to discourage people who are actually less wrong than lesswrong?
That means that the use of the system on lesswrong is based on the assumption that it will only be used by people who are much like you and will therefore work well for you. But given that lesswrong is an open system, will it always stay that way?
Well, nothing lasts forever, supposedly. If in future Less Wrong’s quality gets diluted away, it won’t matter to me if it keeps using the vote system or something else because I won’t care to be on Less Wrong any more.
However, part of the function of the vote system is selection. To put it brutally, it drives away incompatible people (and signals positively to compatible ones). So I think LW will stay worthwhile for quite a while.
And yes, in a way this is one of your negatives from your other post which I actually think is a positive. If someone gets consistently downvoted, doesn’t get why, AND can’t ask and find out and update on that, then with some probability we can say we don’t want them here. I’m sure we lose some good people this way too, but the system’s better than nothing; at least what gets through the filter is much better than things would be without it.
What happened is that completely useless comments, e.g. “YES WE KHAN!!!!!! :)”, are voted up and drown all useful comments
As far as I can tell, there are no useful comments in the comments section. In the complete absence of anything of substance (a situation LW is not in danger of being), simple community applause lights floating up is understandable. The situation in the Q&A section, where there is substance, appears better.
Also you picked a page which looks like it’s largely populated by schoolchildren. Youtube is populated by, well, everyone. LW’s audience is strongly selected. I don’t know if I even need to say this, but it seems reasonable to expect the downvote system to be used more usefully on LW than on youtube.
My point is that the negative aspects of such a system are rarely compared to the positive aspects.
People say that the reputation system employed by lesswrong holds the trolls at bay and reduces noise. Yet when I am showing that reputation systems frequently fail at doing so, the same people argue that lesswrong is different and that’s why it works. Does it? Or does it just look like it works because lesswrong is different?
Do the positive effects really outweigh the negative?
Then maybe, instead of just downvoting, these persons should have asked him to clarify and repharse his post. This would have actually led to an interesting dicussion, while downvoting gave nobody nothing. Maybe it should be possible to downvote a post only if you also reply to that post.
That would kill the main idea of downvoting which is to improve the signal/noise ratio by ensuring comments made by “trolls” just aren’t noticed anymore unless people really want to see them.
Downvoting does lead to abuses, and I do consider that downvoting deeb’s comment was not really needed, but forcing to make comments will kill the purpose, and not really prevent the abuses.
Khan Academy employs a reputation system such as lesswrong. What happened is that completely useless comments, e.g. “YES WE KHAN!!!!!! :)”, are voted up and drown all useful comments.
YouTube also employs a reputation system where people can upvote and downvote comments. And what happens?
Well, Less Wrong is a well-kept garden not a mass public community like YouTube.
The karma system is not perfect, but IMHO it does more good than harm (and I say that even if some of my comments were downvoted). “Chinese People Suck” would be quickly downvoted below threshold here. At least, I give a high (>90%) confidence to it.
I’d like to attest that I find the karma system (by which I understand not just the software but the way the community uses it) a huge blessing and part of LW’s appeal to me. It is a strong incentive to pause and ask myself if I even have something to say before I open my mouth around here (which is why I haven’t written a main blog post yet) rather than just fling crap at the wall like one does in the rest of the Internet.
The “downvotes vs replies” problem is, I think, for the most part a non-issue. Anyone who’s been here a bit will know that if (generic) you ask for clarification of your downvotes, people will generally provide as long as you’re not acting whiney or sore about it. And there will be nothing stopping you from constructively engaging them on the points raised (though beware to actually apply reading comprehension to what is said then, because people don’t like it when you fail to update).
Yes, I also see that a reputation system does have positive effects given certain circumstances. But would you want to have such a system employed on a global basis, where millions could downvote you for saying that there is no God? Obviously such a system would be really bad for the kind of people who read lesswrong and for the world as a whole.
That means that the use of the system on lesswrong is based on the assumption that it will only be used by people who are much like you and will therefore work well for you. But given that lesswrong is an open system, will it always stay that way? At what point is it going to fail on you, how will you notice, how do you set the threshold?
And given that the system works so well as to keep everyone who doesn’t think like you off lesswrong, how are you going to notice negative effects of groupthink? Do we trust our abilities to seek truth enough to notice when the system starts to discourage people who are actually less wrong than lesswrong?
Well, nothing lasts forever, supposedly. If in future Less Wrong’s quality gets diluted away, it won’t matter to me if it keeps using the vote system or something else because I won’t care to be on Less Wrong any more.
However, part of the function of the vote system is selection. To put it brutally, it drives away incompatible people (and signals positively to compatible ones). So I think LW will stay worthwhile for quite a while.
And yes, in a way this is one of your negatives from your other post which I actually think is a positive. If someone gets consistently downvoted, doesn’t get why, AND can’t ask and find out and update on that, then with some probability we can say we don’t want them here. I’m sure we lose some good people this way too, but the system’s better than nothing; at least what gets through the filter is much better than things would be without it.
Chinese People Suck
Downvoted for taking the too-obvious route.
Downvoted for pointing out the obvious.
As far as I can tell, there are no useful comments in the comments section. In the complete absence of anything of substance (a situation LW is not in danger of being), simple community applause lights floating up is understandable. The situation in the Q&A section, where there is substance, appears better.
Also you picked a page which looks like it’s largely populated by schoolchildren. Youtube is populated by, well, everyone. LW’s audience is strongly selected. I don’t know if I even need to say this, but it seems reasonable to expect the downvote system to be used more usefully on LW than on youtube.
My point is that the negative aspects of such a system are rarely compared to the positive aspects.
People say that the reputation system employed by lesswrong holds the trolls at bay and reduces noise. Yet when I am showing that reputation systems frequently fail at doing so, the same people argue that lesswrong is different and that’s why it works. Does it? Or does it just look like it works because lesswrong is different?
Do the positive effects really outweigh the negative?