Hacker News Reader

Comment by nessbot | Hacker News Reader

Agree that there are ways to say it nicer, but I still contend that what I said was not aggressive. The poster started with "Correct!" and they didn't understand the thing they said was "correct." I think it's fair to point out that they inappropriately made statements about something they didn't know. They even admitted to learning it afterwards. Its fair criticism and if folks wanna be making claims online they should be able to handle it.

View on HN

If you read dang's admonitions (as I have, for many years) you'll find that his viewpoint and official HN policy is that tone matters immensely, and is often read as diminished / positive by authors and amplified / negatively by recipients.

Searching for "personal attacks" and "swipes" will turn up many such examples:

"personal attacks": <https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=true&que...>

"swipes": <https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=true&que...>

I hear you. But like I said, I didn't make a personal attack or swipe. I pointed out that the person shouldn't confidently make claims for things they don't know lest they spread misinformation. It was a fair comment.

Again, my initial comment here (<https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42939581>), and go through some of dang's many comments for where he draws the line.

(I'm not dang, I'm not a mod, just something of a student of how HN (dys)functions over the years. Which is generally far above the online norm, not that the bar isn't low.)

Yeah, and again, I'm saying you're incorrectly saying my comment fits that mold and I disagree.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com