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Tell HN: I want my karma points back

2 points by banned_man ↗ HN
I was mercilessly downvoted for a joke that at least 9 people didn't get. Here's the post:

http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=576077

Just to spell it out for the people who failed to get the allusion: it's the victory theme from Final Fantasy. It plays when you beat the bad guys. It's not an off-topic spam link. On the contrary, it's totally appropriate for a thread about falling real estate prices.

I don't usually care about getting downvoted, especially when I know that I deserve it, which is most of the time, but this rash of downvotes was just ridiculous and embarrassing to the site. I was downvoted to -8 for a quality post, then downvoted further when I explained the allusion.

6 comments

[ 2.8 ms ] story [ 21.7 ms ] thread
dkokelley
From http://ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

Resist complaining about being downmodded. It never does any good, and it makes boring reading.

banned_man
In general, I agree with that principle. However, egregiously stupid downmodding is damaging to the discussion. I wouldn't have started this thread over a post that clearly deserved to be downmodded; I'd just be embarrassing myself by drawing more attention to the post.
gojomo
The YouTube link comment deserved the downvotes. You meant "as a renter I'm very happy about the lower rents". But directing people to listen to videogame music, at another site, to get your meaning adds a level of frivolous, time-wasting indirection. It's understandable people didn't appreciate it.
rms
It wasn't that funny
hs
i haven't downvote anything in the past year or so because it stiffles my creativity ... downvoter role fits the admin-type ... you know, the uncreative ones

don't bother explaining, argue with an idiot, you become one ... argue with uncreative, you become boring