Comment by freshhawk

> But if it does, it should stop. Just because it happens doesn't make it desirable.

Never said it was desirable. I'm just fairly convinced that this is the type of interaction that humans do when they communicate in this medium. Like I said, we have 7 or 8 years of experiments and people acting pretty much the same throughout. Some combination of anonymity, fake points to score every contribution with voting and emphasis on many short nuggets of information rather than long form maybe? who knows.

> it should stop

"why can't everyone just get along". I think it's safe to assume by now that this behaviour is human nature + this communication medium. You can tell people to "stop it" or you can change the system that encourages/causes/incentivises that behaviour. Only one of those approaches has ever worked.