Here’s why Paul Graham (probably) owes me an apology. | Hacker News Reader

Here’s why Paul Graham (probably) owes me an apology.

michaelochurch.wordpress.com

32 pointswtn15 comments

I don't think Paul Graham owes Michael O Church a damn thing. PG has always been clear that he built this site as a place for a certain type of reasoned discourse with a certain tone. And he enforces that as he pleases, as he should. He did, after all, build this place with his own two hands and he pays for it out of his own pocket.

It wouldn't surprise me at all if people have a secret "tone score" or similar that is assigned by moderators every time they make a nasty comment. And if that is the case, looking back on Church's comments it should be pretty clear that he'd have racked up one of the highest (lowest?) tone scores on HN. His comments are full of bitterness and hatred and scorn.

I agree that who-owes-what is negotiated by the parties and not objectively pre-determined, and that we, as commenters, have a hand in deciding who-owes-what.

I ask you: would you want to secretly fail a secret grading criterion because something about you (tone, content (Church says it's content-based discrimination), et cetera) is not acceptable to a moderator?

Crucial points are: secret failing and secret grading. I wouldn't; I'd value the feedback, or get the heck out of there.

I agree. That sort of flagging leads to an echo chamber of like minded voices that excludes anyone with a reasoned, but differing view.

But that's what real-life is like. In most social situations, people are not going to tell you what they hate about you. This is as uncomfortable for them as it is for you.

As someone who was once friendless and unpopular, I agree that this is crazily frustrating. But it is the way it is for a reason; it is rarely a productive or pleasant use of time for someone to tell someone else why he sucks. If you're on the friendless and unpopular side, it's up to you to observe carefully and watch why some people are popular and some are unpopular.

"Tone" opens up a very ugly discussion I don't want to have here.

I don't know if Paul Graham is at fault for this, just to be clear about it.

Let's say he were. If he came out and said, "This is my message board, and therefore I assign personal penalties to the posts of those who oppose my economic interests", I would respect that.

What I can't respect is a silent personal penalty. That's ridiculous.

I've had this suspicion for months-- and I didn't voice it at first, because I don't much care-- but it's the latency difference and the looking into position of historical posts that made the case strong.

Why is this important? Why is it interesting? Because if I am being personally penalized, that means that the establishment is threatened by people like me who speak the truth about it. That would be a really positive sign.

It is very common, in both software systems and real-life social systems, to have silent personal penalties. You don't generally want to tip off abusers that you're onto them, because they will frequently adjust their behavior in non-constructive ways if they're aware of that. Similarly, if people find you obnoxious in real life, they will generally not tell you, they'll simply refuse to associate with you. Nobody owes you feedback, and it's a drain on their time and emotional energy to try and explain why you've offended them.

In both these cases, your signal is that people are choosing not to associate with you. If nobody wants to hang around you, that's a good sign you're doing something that's objectionable to a lot of people. If some people do want to hang around you but others don't, treasure the friends you have and stop sweating the ones you don't.

You probably won an automated penalty - it's easy to imagine your comments getting lots of downvotes even if they're overall +x.

If merely controversial (as opposed to low-quality) posts lead to a personal penalty that applies to all of one's comments, then that's a seriously fucked-up policy. Offending no one means you are saying nothing.

'Consistently controversial' might be more accurate! The up/down vote patterns are probably similar to 'top comment snark', I'm sure I read in the last month or two there was new stuff added to deal with that.

Easy way to find out - info@ycombinator.com.

As a casual browser this is the first I've heard of this. I don't know the accuracy of his claims.

I'm curious about his sources and their reasons for not coming forth. That he doesn't cite them by name leads to me to think they choose to be anonymous. I'm not accusing them of something.

I dislike the title. I need more information to decide for myself whether Paul Graham owes Michael O. Church an apology. I think Paul Graham has a hand, albeit limited, in deciding whether he owes Church an apology.

I put the word probably in for a reason. I don't know, for sure, what is going on. It does seem, however, that there are variables determining comment placement other than age and karma.

One commenter on my blog suggested the problem may be an abuse of the "flag" option (which is only supposed to be used on spammers).

If he rigged the system the way you say, I'll be angry on your behalf. With that said, I'll nitpick:

Paul Graham can respond to your post however he wants. He _could_ simply say, "I don't care."

You _want_ an apology because you _think_ you've been wronged. A blog post entitled, "I want an apology from Paul Graham" sounds whiny--I get it. Still, from where I'm sitting the title, even with the "probably" proviso, sounds like a power-grab that denies Paul Graham's ability to give whatever response he wants to you. Also it looks linkbaity to me[1].

[1] I dislike linkbaity titles. I don't deny their effectiveness; I clicked the link!

disclaimer: I teach public speaking professionally, so these kinds of less-than-explicitly-conscious word choices stick out to me.

Edited to emphasize that I agree with the spirit of his post, and that I'm nitpicking because I enjoy picking nits.

More evidence. At +12 and 1-hour in age, this thread (which I did not submit) isn't even in the top 120, whereas other less successful threads (Sunday nights are slow) are in the top 30.

The first time my blog was penalized by HN (to my knowledge) was related to this post, "Don't waste your time in crappy startup jobs": http://michaelochurch.wordpress.com/2012/07/08/dont-waste-yo...

It probably got flagged. I flagged it, for instance. It's an embarrassment.

I flagged this entry, to be honest. Ranting is one thing. This went further. The sense of entitlement pushed it over the edge for me.

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