This is speaking from someone that does a poor job of following the rules of the place.
If upvotes are agree/approval and downvotes are disagree/disapproval then why are downvotes used for automatic moderation too? It is a problem in this site and other sites that double-use downvote to mean two different, contradictory, things.
The strange thing about HK in particular is that they already offer a "flag" button. If the flag was dedicated to moderation and the downvote dedicated to discussion, the site would be fine, but downvote will auto-hide comments, grey them, shadowban people in certain cases (like green accounts), and is weighed during flagging/dead-ing (e.g. one flag for a grey comment Vs. multiple flags for others).
I think it has a chilling effect. People are hesitant to post controversial opinions no matter how well written because the consequences (via simple downvotes) can be problematic to even accounts in otherwise good standing.
In an ideal world a site should have an upvote/downvote and flag button. The first two should be dedicated to discussion only, and having a controversial viewpoint should be noteable but not punishable. The latter (flag) should be for comments thats that violate the site's guidelines or community standards (e.g. -isms, trolling, insulting, etc).
PS - Part of the problem right now is that for comments the flag button is hidden below the fold. Many new users may never see it.
I post controversial opinions quite a bit and get downvoted regularly. However, my well-liked comments and posts generally cause my karma to increase over time despite this.
I'd say it's about 10% of dead comments where I would understand if they were just dimmed, but they're dead so you can't upvote to help resurrect them, and you can't reply.
How do they even work? I see posts get downvoted, but no downvote button.
2. Limited number of upvotes/downvotes, or downvotes substracting your own karma (perhaps not 1:1).
3. Mandatory justifications for downvotes (e.g. choose from dropdown menu), with this information publicly visible for each comment.
I also agree with #2, a single unpopular comment can ruin your karma, and seems to rapidly contribute to a rate limiter that impedes your ability to interact with the site. I tend to comment on spurts when I've got a bunch of free time. It's common to have a comment downvoted below 0 and end up with "you're doing that too fast" rate limiting. I'm not 100% that downvoted comments are the cause, but it seems likely.
I disagree with #3. The few mods HN has already work hard. I don't think we should give them more to read. I would rather remove downvotes, I don't see a point besides encouraging echo chamber mentality
And what do you do if most HN readers aren't like you?
But seriously, for number 3, what if the tallies for the reasons for downvotes are visible to the comment poster, as a form of feedback for that person?
In long threads, I suspect many posters will never scroll towards the bottom of the discussion. Thus, the comments at the top of the discussion continue to accumulate upvotes while good quality comments further down never get a chance to rise up. But I guess that is more due to user behaviour rather than some algorithmic logic.
With no evidence I blame downvotes, which seems to be a common thread with other users on this thread.
I don't think it's about high karma. I've got a few comments that gave me like 1/3 of my karma. It doesn't appear to bias towards established users. More likely, a few downvotes (luck) is what sinks you
To help convince people that your idea works, perhaps you could take a popular comment page and mock it up the way you think it should be and post it somewhere.
However, I am not saying that it should be sorted only by time for everyone, but only by the user who has changed their account options to specify that as the default sort order.
I do wonder though if a few users are posting a large volume of stories (even automatically) adding to the general mainstreamness of content. Is there a per user daily post limit? I think there ought to be.
What's important is the rules by which we act. This is of varying consistencies. In particular downvotes shouldn't be used for disagreement or dislike but rather identifying clearly incorrect statements or noncondusive/worthless comments--an opposing view well presented shouldn't be downvoted.
Instead of the karma system, I wish there was an update to the story points. HN now has so many users that unexceptional stories of general interest get far too many points.
I would be great if posts could be tagged (e.g. 36 point 'physics' label) and the reader could vary weights of labels to surface or partially bury some categories.
The least controversial comments usually bubble to the top, even when they're not the most informative or constructive, due to downvotes.
Controversial but otherwise fine comments should not be punished by downvotes if they don't violate site policy (flagging). IMO a site that promotes good discussion shouldn't allow users to tank comments they don't agree with
Sometimes people can using voting for the wrong purpose. In general, it seems to work well.
