HN: The Good Parts

If you read HN, on any given week, there are at least as many good, substantial, comments as there are posts. If you just read HN, it’s hard to see the effect, but if you look at forums that use comments as a positive factor in ranking, the difference is dramatic — those other forums that boost topics with many comments (presumably on theory that vigorous discussion should be highlighted) often have content-free flame wars pinned at the top for long periods of time. Having flamebait drop off the front page quickly is significant, but it doesn’t seem sufficient to explain why there are so many more well-informed comments on HN than on other forums with roughly similar traffic.

Source: danluu.com