> The downvote is too powerful, too easy to abuse, and its overuse leads to echo chambers. Unpopular opinions don't need to be talked about or even seen, just hit that button, lol.
And you haven't noticed this is EXACTLY how HN operates too? Oh the ignorance is strong in this one.
Dude, you can't even downvote. You need 500 points, which, unless you're very smart or very lucky, doesn't come all that quickly. There are, as a rule, far fewer downvotes than upvotes here, in comparison with Reddit, which means that there's less homogeneity of opinion: It's easier to voice contrarian or unpopular views -- and they're more frequently engaged with, rather than just hidden in a facile way.
Also the rules here are basically transparent.
On Reddit the downvote is far more powerful and frequently employed, and a lot of the rules are opaque/arbitrary. It's a terrible system for free discussion.
Reddit has restrictions on votes as well. The restrictions are not necessarily visible to you. You can click the vote button but that doesn't mean your vote is actually counted. There's "vote fuzzing" and lots of other deceptions at work.
And you haven't noticed this is EXACTLY how HN operates too? Oh the ignorance is strong in this one.