It's an interesting idea, but you'd end up with a situation where the worse the comment, the more discussion it generates due to the forced replies, which is sort of the opposite of what you want.
I think it would just end up with trolls pasting in Lorem Ipsum or something after their trollish comment. Having trash text in low quality comments might make them easier to identify as low quality and the need to post comments of a minimum length may possibly discourage some people from posting "zingers", but I don't feel it would be a net win overall.
Counterpoint: That makes bad comments take more space in the discussion, which is the opposite of what they are intended to do. (e.g. is it really better instead of one downvoted comment to have one downvoted comment and 4 replies telling them they are an asshole/wrong/...? HN IMHO already has a problem with too repetitive commenting, that'd make it way worse)
Comments would be better if there was a enforced delay in the conversation, and you would have to sign off on what you wrote. 24h laters, the rage of the past would be seen indignified by many.
I think curiously what this would encourage is a slower way of thinking. I.e., not quick comments, but longer, more thoughtful ones.
I don't comment much, but when I do think back on the comments I have made that have been somewhat popular, they are of this longer type. Maybe there's something to this.
But just be aware you're positioning yourself as kind of a catalyst in the opposite direction of most small, quick messaging fora.
Maybe that's good for us. Maybe it will come to be appreciated. Maybe people will abandon it for something easier.
At first I thought you were suggesting that comments should be limited in length. I think that would actually be a nice idea. Bad short comments are easy to get passed. It's much harder to dig through bad long comments.
It would change the dynamics of the comment section a lot.
Instead of varied thoughts from many people in replies you’d be much more likely to have the one person arguing their point against replies which is terrible every time I see ot.
If that worked at all, it could be applied before the comment was even posted. Warn the user that their comment looks inordinately negative, and ask if they would like to revise before submitting.
Its interesting that simply restricting immediate commenting might at least deter useless comments. People who are commenting in order to elicit a response, i suppose, probably have less important things to say. Or maybe they wouldn't say them if they are not granted the immediate satisfaction.
I assume it would kill some collaboration/innovation like on HN or a meaningful subreddit, but maybe no one really ever has anything meaningful to say when reacting to general news...
I guess it would also produce duplication from many people not knowing something was said already (however, the duplicate reactions could be monetized later down the line maybe...)
to fight the lowering quality of comments, maybe you could make a meta-comment feature to describe what is wrong with the way they commented (as opposed to the content itself)
maybe making it public would stop people from making repeatedly bad comments.
Probably a lot of toxicity would be removed if it were harder for people to comment.
You wouldn't have to raise the bar very high, I think, to convince people that it's not worth the trouble to write a few hurtful words.
For example, maybe follow-up comments to material require completion of a tiny survey (like 2 questions) from the submitter, that must be answered 100% correctly to “prove” that a visitor at least read the material and understood it enough to comment.
And for people too lazy for that, have an alternative like “or, to post this comment, 45 cents will be deducted from your account”.
Having a reminder whenever you comment could cut down on thoughtless comments. Everyone makes a bad comment every now and then I think, a little nudge in the other direction could be all that's needed in some cases.
This may be a dumb idea, but how about requiring some minimum length of comment? Are there circumstances when someone legitimately should just use 8-10 words? I don't know what that minimum length would be though.
At least in this case if people want to be strident or acerbic, they have to work for it.
I agree with this to some extent, but it can be ameliorated a lot with smaller and more frequent PRs. If your PR is enormous and represents a week's worth of work and you end up having to respond to 20 comments, it's going to be awful. If your PR is small and represents hours' worth of work and you have to respond to 1-2 comments, it's a lot less obnoxious. (And you'll have more natural opportunities for context-switching, so responding to comments won't be so distracting.)
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