Is it just me, or are HN comments becoming more and more negative?
techiferous: I'm a refugee from Reddit.  That place has become too immature and ignorant.  It's hard to have a courteous, intelligent discussion there; it very easily degenerates into name-calling, arrogance and dogmatism.  It feels like middle school all over again.Hacker News' voting system is very Reddit-like, so it will also become Reddit.  Expect Hacker News to become more immature as it grows in popularity.Here are two changes that can be made to Hacker News to keep it from becoming Reddit:* Discourage controversial or dramatic posts.  For example, the latest brouhaha about American Airlines and Dustin Curtis was very dramatic, but its educational value was lower than some other less-dramatic posts on Hacker News.  I think it's okay to have content like that on Hacker News, but there should be some damping effects to keep the controversial stories lower on the list.  Otherwise, Hacker News will be taken over by knee-jerk, reactionary thinking instead of deeper, more nuanced, intelligent discussion.  Technical gossip will supplant technical news.* Provide two ways to vote:  vote up if you agree, and vote up if you think the content is valuable.  It's important not to conflate the two into one vote up button.