Hacker News Reader

Regarding the missing down vote button: only users with 500 points of karma or more can down vote.

Regarding the reply limit: I believe there is a timer involved. A comment has to have a certain age (5 minutes?) before some one can reply to it.

View on HN

Ah, yes, I see the time-limit. However, for me the presence or absence of a down vote button seems to be somewhat arbitrary.

The downvote button (and presumably the ability to downvote) is removed for direct replies to comments you have authored. It is also removed for top level comments on articles you have submitted.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com