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Comment by Anotheroneagain | Hacker News Reader

This is such a dangerously wise sounding, but selfzdestructive idea. It reminds me of an old torrent site which had the policy to upload more than you download, which lead to a stanstill, as that obviously isn't possible to achieve, and users getting angry at the best uploaders, as they "stole" upload from them...

Just imagine what it would look like if everyone on HN posted more than they read.

View on HN

Funnily enough, the old reddit formality works in reverse and makes some sense. For every post of self promotion, you should make 10 or so posts/comments on non-self promoted content. Consume significantly more than you create (and share), but you still probably end up creating more than average.

I think like most short, quippy adages, the spirit makes sense but not the literal interpretation. It's more trying to say that creation is something to strive for rather than the literal "1:1 consumption/creation", treating it like calories. I'm sure we can make models to make the quote make sense, but we probably shouldn't overanalyze what is mostly motivational ideas.

> Just imagine what it would look like if everyone on HN posted more than they read.

Imagine that every active user on HN wrote 100 comments everyday and only submitted the 5 best.

create != share

> an old torrent site which had the policy to upload more than you download

This is still how private trackers work

There is no way to make it work. It isn't mathematically possible to achieve. Somebody's cheating, or there is some other way, like people getting kicked and invited continuously.

In private tracking communities, it's commonly known that those with unusually high sharing ratios likely use seedboxes, which is often seen as unfair.

No, I mean it isn't possible for all users to get their upload above their download. Either somebody is literally cheating (and never gets caught) or you just repeatedly invite and kick new users (who take the negative upload away as they get kicked).

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