No, new and anonymous users do have another option, they can post their own answer.
Which is less wrong than an edit but it`s still wrong when the appropriate response is a comment.
A community can be judged by it`s responses to newbies. By this measure it fails miserably since the most common feedback many newbies get from SO are bare downvotes and rejections. What should happen is a polite response explaining the problem and the what should be done to correct it.
The biggest problem with this convention is that new & anonymous users cannot comment, so the only option they have is to edit the post. These then get rejected out of hand and useful contributions disappear. This is doubly wasteful since this behaviour often discourages people from every contributing again.
I like the idea of anonymous posting and at the same time on Reddit I've found challenges with brand new accounts with agendas showing up en mass with little regard for the local community and just wanting to push their agenda.
It's a rough thing to allow anonymous comments and also foster a community online.
Maybe there should be some kind of validation before you can start posting and taking part in the discussions.
A smart way of doing this would be to let potential new users write a bit about themselves, and let existing users vote on whether or not they should be allowed to post based on their introduction of themselves.
Another way would be to let new users have a quota of comments that could be raised if the initial comments were voted up.
I think free-form response might be a bad idea as well. One of the main problems is people being mean-spirited - now we're going to give these same people the option to anonymously write whatever they want to someone, without even the (modest) fear of being down-voted for their comment?
I think this is a GREAT idea if it uses pre-selected phrases to convey specific / useful info to the author.
> It’s not purely selfish. Some probably wouldn’t contribute here if they could not be anonymous. Quite a few people on HN who are valuable contributors are anonymous.
Maybe this is a case of the baby/bath water problem. Would comments improve if accountability is improved? Would overall comments/discussion improve?
I think there are probably 3 levels of users: 1) People like yourself. For those guys probably just a button and a place to put a link for the source should be enough, 2) People who want to vote. For those guys some kind of sign-up is required, and 3) People who want to post their own stuff.
You are right on with the anonymous coward thing. Right now you either get nothing or have to sign-up and then you can do everything. That's too big of a hurdle for casual users like yourself (and easily fixed). I'm also finding out that simply because you vote and comment doesn't mean you have the energy to tag and source new material. So there's probably a gradual engagement model that needs to be created.
I think you're right - these are risks. One thing we've done is build it so you can't just post (a status). All you can do is ask a question or start a discussion. The answers/comments could then be low effort and emotional, but we'll rely on the community to determine this and outvote those answers.
Sounds like you didn't even bother reading my comment. I am well aware Disqus can allow anonymous commenting as an option. But that doesn't clearly address what I stated.
Yeah, it would be needlessly noisy in public form. However, it can be helpful for people to get feedback directly.
Would a private reply that only the submitter can see be valuable? It would help the community give direct feedback to the submitter or commenter without adding noise.
I am one of those recent arrivals. I do work in software, but in a semi-academic environment and don't have the slightest interest in owning or working for a start-up. I came here for the signal to noise, so I guess I am exactly the newcomer that vexes the author (though not having commented until today, I can safely say I have not stoked any flamewars).
For the record I don't have a problem with user identity - after all I post under my real first name which is unusual enough to google me very quickly. I certainly do object to the suggestion of user identity being enforced through membership of a social network. Much as I love Hacker News, I don't love it enough to jettison my misgivings on social networking.
It would be a real shame to kill interesting stories because of the comments they would attract. Perhaps allow those stories to be posted, but lock them down for comments?
Fair enough, but for some submissions (like questions), all of the value is in the comments.
Also, I think a lot of long time users contribute a lot of value in the way of: helpful comments, upvotes, downvotes, spam reports, tech support, etc and they're not recognized for the value that they add. I'm happy to see that your product has the opportunity to recognize that and hopefully that will be enabled in the future.
Which is less wrong than an edit but it`s still wrong when the appropriate response is a comment.
A community can be judged by it`s responses to newbies. By this measure it fails miserably since the most common feedback many newbies get from SO are bare downvotes and rejections. What should happen is a polite response explaining the problem and the what should be done to correct it.
reply