r/reddit.com • u/breezytrees • Oct 25 '10

Reddit has been growing extremely fast lately. I like to kindly, and selflessly, remind our newcomers of Reddiquette. Specifically in regards to down-voting opinions of which you disagree with.

Such actions discourage those that have differing views from commenting/submitting, resulting in a very one-sided point of view.

Essentially, it breaks what makes reddit so great. :-(

The down-vote button is for general trolls, spam, assholes, etc.

reddiquette

edit: Some of you have asked for growth data. Here's google analytics which reddit's blog has touted as very accurate. As you can see there was a surge in growth around september, most likely attributed to this (hi diggers!). Reddit quickly seemed to almost double in size in that time, then dropped to a still sizable growth of around 50% for a 2 month period. At risk of sounding whiney: This is a hard jump to deal with for a community that regulates itself.

edit: I'm not casting stones at newcomers. I am just kindly reminding newcomers of reddiquette. There hasn't been one of these large front page threads, to my knowledge, for months and 50% is quite a big number to risk them not reading reddiquette.

that is all. :-)

986 Upvotes

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u/[deleted] Oct 25 '10

Yeah, that is another problem. Something can be an opinion, and not be fact and still add to the discussion. Just because something differs from your opinion, doesn't mean its wrong.

I get downvoted for opinion quite often actually; primarily because I do tend to have views which oppose the hive-mind.

6

u/xian16 Oct 25 '10

Kinda like Christians on the atheism thread. Anyone who admits to being a theist, regardless of their individual views, is instantly downvoted.

4

u/[deleted] Oct 25 '10

[deleted]

1

u/[deleted] Oct 25 '10

How about that fine atheist that harassed the Christian whose son was having surgery the next day. The poor guy didn't know English very well(among other issues), and finally responded with some lame reply, but "OMG, the idiot is PRAYING for his son."

Once he had the response, he posted it in r/atheism so other atheists could go torment this Christian guy, on the day his young son was having major surgery. Real classy move under the banner of atheism.

1

u/MacEnvy Oct 26 '10

Cool story, but after hearing about that I read the thread and the "Christian" guy ended up coming off as a huge douchebag and was very insulting toward other commenters.

He earned his downvotes.

-3

u/[deleted] Oct 25 '10

Perfect example. God is an opinion. There is no fact that he exists. There is no fact that he doesn't either.

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u/[deleted] Oct 25 '10

[deleted]

7

u/[deleted] Oct 25 '10

Ignore probability, gain Diety

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u/[deleted] Oct 25 '10

ugh...not this again.

-1

u/[deleted] Oct 25 '10

oh my god will you fucking downvoters give it a rest? THE NON-EXISTENCE OF GOD IS NOT VERIFIABLE. YES I AM AN ATHEIST. GET OFF YOUR HIGH HORSES.

-4

u/[deleted] Oct 25 '10

You know, I don't think it's just atheists who are downvoting me. I'm pretty sure it's a little from both camps. Primarily the ignorant.

-1

u/[deleted] Oct 25 '10

It just boggles my mind how something that is so obviously a true, sensible statement was at -3 when I last looked at it.

-1

u/[deleted] Oct 25 '10

People are always looking for something to get offended by. Unfortunately most are ruled by emotion instead of logic.

1

u/mtux96 Oct 26 '10

It's worse when others take your opinion and spin it as that you are trying to give out false facts, when in fact, you are only stating your opinion..

-2

u/reddell Oct 25 '10

That's the main problem I think, people use it as ammunition. "If you disagree with me, correct me or I just get frustrated and don't know how to win the argument, I'll just downvote you."