alt Hacker NewsIgnoring the actual proposal or user, just looking at karma is probably a pretty terrible metric. High karma accounts tend to just interact more frequently, for long periods of time. Often with less nuanced takes, that just play into what is likely to be popular within a thread. Having a Userscript that just places the karma and comment count next to a username is pretty eye opening.
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amelius • last Saturday at 6:14 PM
Yes, HN should probably publish karma divided by #comments. Or at least show both numbers.
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I have a userscript to actually hide my own karma because I always think it is useless but your point is good actually. But also I think that karma/comment ratio is better than absolute karma. It has its own problems but it is just better. And I would ask if you can share the userscript.
And to bring this back to the original arxiv topic. I think reputation system is going to face problems with some people outside CS lack of enough technical abilities. It also introduce biases in that you would endorse people who you like for other reasons. Actually some of the problems are solved and you would need careful proposal. But the change for publishing scheme needs push from institutions and funding agencies. Authors don't oppose changes but you have a lobby of the parasitic publishing cartel that will oppose these changes.