NancyLebovitz comments on Karma Changes - Less Wrong

2 Post author: Eliezer_Yudkowsky 22 December 2009 12:17AM

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Comment author: NancyLebovitz 18 June 2010 08:16:32PM 2 points [-]

That's just considering the effects of you having the awesome exponential downvote power. Would LW look much different if everyone had it?

It seems to me that the current system works pretty well. In general, posts at -2 aren't worth reading, and there isn't much drama associated with downvoting.

Comment author: Blueberry 18 June 2010 10:13:36PM 3 points [-]

Would LW look much different if everyone had it?

I think so. Consider a controversial post that three people really love and three people really hate. It would be at 0 without the exponential downvote power, but very negative with it. The effect would be to make LW blander by silencing posts that offend a small number of people.

Comment author: wedrifid 18 June 2010 10:58:05PM 1 point [-]

Consider a controversial post that three people really love and three people really hate. It would be at 0 without the exponential downvote power, but very negative with it. The effect would be to make LW blander by silencing posts that offend a small number of people.

A good point. Any system in which increasingly costly downvotes were allowed would have to allow an analogous system for giving extra upvotes at a price too.

It would be at 0 without the exponential downvote power,

That phrasing makes it sound like the downvotes are increasing exponentially with cost, not the reverse.

Comment author: Blueberry 18 June 2010 11:47:16PM 3 points [-]

I guess we should call it a logarithmic downvote power, then.

Comment author: wedrifid 18 June 2010 10:01:14PM 0 points [-]

That's just considering the effects of you having the awesome exponential downvote power. Would LW look much different if everyone had it?

I was considering the general case. It is definitely hard to predict what the outcome would be. My hunch - once people adapted it would barely make any difference.